Optimization in quality function deployment using linear programming models

Quality Function Deployment (QFD) is an approach to customer driven product development. QFD adopts a scientific and systematic method to collect customer requirements, and translates them into appropriate technical characteristics for each stage of the product development cycle using a structured framework known as House of Quality (HOQ). An important activity in HOQ is to determine target levels for technical characteristics, based on the collected customer requirements, with a view to achieving a high level of overall customer satisfaction. Traditionally, this complex planning process is accomplished in a subjective manner, which often results in non-optimal or sub-optimal solutions. This paper presents four kinds of linear programming models for such a planning process. Details are given on how the models are derived from an established HOQ. Computational experiment from the development of an air-conditioner shows that the proposed models axe effective, and can aid a design team in determining the target levels for technical characteristics based on the information in an HOQ.