The Performance of Technical Information Transfer in New Product Development

The performance of new product development (NPD) is greatly affected by communication strategy and the information technology tools used to support the strategy. A number of users of NPD processes claim that an adequate communication strategy decreases their product cycle time and cost. However, the problem with evaluating the impact of information transfer is that no one has ever specifically measured how performant communication strategies are, or how effective information transfer tools are. For this purpose, a model was developed to evaluate communication strategies, and a set of communication measurement tools was identified to gauge the efficiency of information transfer. This study examines communication within NPD processes at three companies and measures how well information was transmitted, stored, and retrieved. The results indicate that a shorter, more efficient communication process reduces time and effort, and that a shift toward formal methods and passive information tools (computer-based systems) results in more effective and easier coordination as well as better integration.