A method for evaluating functional content in mechatronic systems using optimisation

This paper presents a method to support designers and product planners in determining the functionalities that should be implemented in a product and those that should not. The proposed method identifies the set of customer functions and technical implementations that maximise the potential product profit. The customer functions represent the functionality of the product, and the technical implementations are the hardware and software components needed to realise these functions. For industrial applications, the numbers of possible combinations of customer functions and technical implementations are extremely large. We present a mathematical framework that handles this problem. Furthermore, optimisation is employed to find the set of customer functions that will maximise profit when subjected to a restricted development budget in order to find the best possible business case. The method was evaluated on an industrial case study of active safety systems performed at Volvo Cars. Based on this case study, the proposed method shows a substantial potential compared to the methods presently used.