Industrial Feedback on Implementing Functional Decomposition Design Processes for Reliability and Functional Safety

The value of Axiomatic Design functional decomposition as a design analysis point tool has been widely reported. This paper reports on the implementation of functional decomposition design processes as a system design tool on 23 industrial projects over a 5 year period with product development teams ranging from 6 to 35 engineers. The products developed were systems of systems with mechanical, electrical, firmware, software, and operational interface elements. Functional decompositions ranged from about 200 to 1600 Functional Requirements. A number of these projects are now in commercial production. This paper reviews the process definition and implementation process steps that evolved from these experiences. The paper then reports on the implementation lessons learned and the value propositions noted. Conclusions and recommendations are made. The experiences demonstrated that functional requirement decomposition processes aid in achieving on-time, on-cost and on-specification project development targets. The authors propose this paper summarizes the "Endgame" design process impact that axiomatic design can reasonably expect in industry design practices for system development.