S72.124 PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT OF TELECOMMUNICATION SYSTEMS

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S-72.124 PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT OF
TELECOMMUNICATION SYSTEMS

• I Elements of Telecommunication Product
  Development Process
• II Tools for Generating and Cultivating Ideas

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S-72.124 Product Development of Telecommunication
Systems

• Objectives To understand modern, high-tech
  product development process by theory and
  practice
• Lectures discuss dominant elements of product
  development process Handouts www.comlab.
  hut.fi/opetus/124
• Workshop (fall term) deals with practical cases
  takes full-day work of 4-5 days
• Lecture Diary (optional) Guides available at the
  course homepage. Return Diary on next lecture.
• Grading based on Exam, Workshop report and
  Lecture Diary 40/40/20

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S-72.124 Product Development of Telecommunication
Systems

• Workshop tasks report prepared in groups
• Group tutoring by joint effort of Communications
  Lab. industry partner(s)
• Earlier Workshops arranged by Elisa, Telia,
  Ericsson , Satama Interactive, Sonera, etc.
• Workshop topics Prepaid Calling Cards, Wi-Fi
  Networks, Company Customer Relation Management
  (CRM) system design ...
• Join to listen lectures and make your own notes
  questions
• Writing a Lecture Diary is a splendid tool for
  making systematic notes. (guide available at
  http//www.comlab.hut.fi/opetus/245/a/writing_lect
  ure_diary.htm)

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Topics Today

• Telecommunications product development
• Information society
• Telecommunications business
• Defining modern product development process
• Project plan
• Industrial product development
• Tools for idea cultivation and project management
• How to produce ideas
• How to select applicable ideas
• How to sketch a project plan and recognize
  time-critical events

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Realizing Units of Industrial Product Development
Electronics designers
Marketing Team
Mechanical designers
Design
Purchasing engineer
Marketing
Industrial designers
Manufacturing
Team leader
Legal
Manufacturing engineer
Central factors of a project
Patents
Financial
Teams to design an electro-mechanical product
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Industrial Product Development Process
Theoretical functionality?
Firstdemo
What about in practice?
Practical proto
Sub-unit functionality?
Mass production proto
Functionality of the whole process?
Mass product
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Phases of Conventional Product Development Process
Sources of problems in high-tech
From K.T.Ulrich, S.D.Eppinger Product Design
and Development, 3rd ed, McGraw Hill, 2003
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Products do vary!
From K.T.Ulrich, S.D.Eppinger Product Design
and Development, 3rd ed, McGraw Hill, 2003
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Information Society -Force Fields -
- Immediate, personalized, mobile access to
services -
Politics, legislation regulation
Technology
Rapidly evolving services applications
New lifestyles fashion
GLOBAL NETWORKING ECONOMY
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Telecom Market Players Interoperable Hierarchy
End-Users
Content and Service Providers
Service operators/ Telecommunications Networking
Solutions
Physical Telecommunication Network
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Factors in Telecommunications Business Framework
New methods of working _at_-businessmobile tech.
Multimediacontents tools
Systems services
Essential technologies infrastructure
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Telecommunications Business in Home Access
Device manufacturers
Mobile
DVB-S
2G GSM 2.5G GPRS, HSCSD, EDGE 3G UMTS
DVB-Terrestrial (DiGi-TV)
-TV/MOVIES -GAMES -broadcasting
INTERNET services - unicasting -
multicasting - peer-to-peer ...
DVB-C, Cable TV
Copper (2 way)
ADSL/ ISDN cable- modems
Wi-Fi/
IRdA/
Network operators Service providers Content
providers
EtherNET/
ENERGY
Power Line Communications (PLC)
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Factors of High-tech Product/Service
Development
Financing
Quality
Products
Production Process
Usability
Leadership
Productdesign
Strategic management
Commercialization
Marketing
Project management
Business Plan
Patenting
Innovations
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High-tech Product Development

• constant product improvements
• high development velocity
• knowledge sharing from suppliers, competitors,
  and customers
• feedback on demand from customers

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Challenges and Rewards in Product/Service
Development
Manifestation of creativity
Trade-offs
Timetable
Dynamics
Economics
Satisfaction of social individual needs
Details
Team spirit
Team diversity

• Recognizing, understanding andmanaging key
  challenges is an elementary factor to create a
  successfulproduct/service development process
• A successful development team is
  multi-disciplinary, motivated and cooperative

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Computerized Business Planning
Business Plan Pro by Palo Alto Software
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Personal Process of Creativity1
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A Cycle in The Process of Creativity

• Creativity cultivation requires different talents
  in different phases
• System contains in practice extensive feedback
• Best workgroups are multidisciplinary (Developed
  communication skills required!)

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Some Creativity Tools

• Critical Path Analysis
• Force Field Analysis
• Decision Tree

concept testing, decision making

• Mind Maps Fish Bones
• SWOT-method

associative mapping

• Lateral Thinking Synetics
• The Six Thinking Hats

filter modifications

• Random pictures/words/sentences
• Reinforced pictures/words /sentences (doodles)

idea generation
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How to Select the Cultivation Method?

• A tool is applicable when there is information
  for its usage!
• Some methods are primarily targeted for mapping
  the current status (eg SWOT), other for decision
  making (eg Force Field Analysis) and some are
  general purpose tools to assist project
  management (Critical Path Analysis).
• Methods work well when they are used
  simultaneously in-series or in-parallel, as for
  instance brainstorming SWOT
• Successful product development requires that one
  should have sufficient information about
• customer's requirements
• competitors product launches
• markets
• latest technology
• Vision of future trends is very important!

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Tools Focused Today

• Concept formation Decision making
• Force Field Analysis
• Decision Tree
• Critical Path Analysis

• Idea cultivation
• Brainstorming
• Mind Mapping
• SWOT

• Filter modifications
• Six Thinking Hats
• Synetics

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Brainstorming

• Objectives Bring about creative solutions (even
  for unidentified!) problems
• Take solution candidates one after another until
  unusual solutions are generated
• For a start take a word or words, from a
  dictionary at hand to feed the process and apply
  associations
• Generate ideas without critics! Thus
• many potential solution candidates are generated
  
• whole problem dilemma may change!
• For concluding the session
• analyze results for instance by SWOT, FFA and/or
  Mind Mapping
• Condensed and classified ideas can be used to
  support new sessions or other applications

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Brainstorming - Leader and Group Tasks

• Session leader
• definition of the start-up point
• gives limits to the problem
• gives limits to discussions (These limits must be
  very broad)
• minute amount of critics
• encouraging and enthusiastic
• follows (the fixed) session time table!
• Takes care that idea jamming is only temporary!
  
• Session participants
• have diverged orientations related to the problem
  at hand
• their background is as different as possible
• good communication skills
• substance should be known preferably by everybody
  (at least by somebody!!!)

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Individual vs. Group Brainstorming

• Individual BS
• many ideas
• tendency to jam into fixed trails
• easy to find unresolved questions
• Group BS
• ideas develop themselves into more elaborated
  form
• ideas develop more efficiently
• there might be less ideas (group follows the
  group behavior laws!)
• One may mix individual and group barnstorming
  For instance each member might first BS of his
  own and then one may have a meeting based on each
  individuals BS sessions

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Getting more fruitful Brainstorming

• Methods of Six Thinking Hats (Edward de Bono) or
  Six Eyes (Rodney King) can be used to get
  Brainstorming to work better

facts figures, information needs and gaps
intuition feelings and emotions
creativity alternatives, proposals, what is
interesting, provocations and changes
logical negative judgment and caution
logical positive why something works
meta-cognition creativity process control
Axon 2002 - program http//web.singnet.com.sg/
axon2000/index.htm
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Understanding process outputs a different way

• Themes can be seen from different perspectives
  by using Synetics

Gordon, W.J.J., Synetics The development of
creative capacity, 1961.
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Synetics questions explained

• Substitute/Simplify (What would you do in my
  place?)
• Combine (Think about software being capable of
  evolving and
• reproducing?)
• Adapt (Think what would happen if you would have
  wings?)
• Modify/Distort (What if cars would sometimes be
  used upsidedown?)
• Put to other purposes (Think your mailbox as a
  kite!)
• Eliminate (What would you end up by removing the
  batteries?)
• Rearrange/Reverse/Scale (Reverse the order of
  blocks?)

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Mind Mapping

• Mind Mapping is a technique to organizing
  information in its natural associative way, that
  is multidimensional.
• Procedure
• List the main topic, subtopics and facts. Search
  short expressions for them all.
• Identify the main connections between themes
• Set the main theme in the middle of the paper and
  arrange the sub-themes to surround the main theme
• Recognize idea groups (for instance by colors)
• Indicate interdependencies as the cause and
  consequence by arrows
• Use symbols and figures and even sub-maps to give
  to total picture

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Example of a Mind MapEvolving Internet Access
HAPSHigh Altitude Platform Station PDCPersonal
Digital Cellular System ITSIntelligent Transport
SystemAMPS Advanced Mobile Phone Services
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Mind Mapping Summarized

• A Mind Map is an associative structure. Therefore
  its topology contains a lot of information.
• Mind Map allows to identify the essential
  features and links of the problem at glance.
• Mind Maps can be an extremely compact way to
  present information.
• A problem of mind mapping is that the chart may
  up to be so messy that it can even hide the main
  themes. Therefore Mind Map can, and should be
  cultivated after it is formed by pruning less
  important branches
• Mind Maps can be created by computer program (as
  MindManager or eMindMaps) or by using simple
  detachable notes on a blackboard.

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Alternate Mind Mapping

• Fishbone diagram Enables to focus onto the
  problem and perceive the causes and its relative
  importance
• After drawing the diagram the next step is to
  analyze the magnitude of each of the identified
  causes

Axon 2002 - program http//web.singnet.com.sg/
axon2000/index.htm
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SWOT analysis

• SWOT is applicable for sorting unorganized
  knowledge bases and analyzing current status
• Successful SWOT yields structured mapping of the
  problem at hand
• For instance in product analysis
• identify strength and weaknesses of the product
• search through possibilities and threats (for
  instance for product launch)
• Realization List all the relevant properties and
  sort them into SWOT boxes!

inside
outside
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A case of SWOT WAP-based Knowledge Base Service
Strength Expandable, flexible, easy to use,
dynamic, easy to personalize, bypassing of
telephone exchange, more effective graphics,
utilization of location information
Weakness Need for WAP terminal managing, search
routines require dedication
Opportunity If first at the market may be a
killer-kind app. Due to usage of
immediatelocation info by GPS or GSM location
technology
Threats No popularity, one applies terminal
specific catalogs, competitive techniques may
hit markets
S-72.124 spring 99
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Force Field Analysis

• FFA is a method to analyze factors for and
  against an act
• Objective To create an unified description of
  the factors forming the problem. This is used to
  alter the process state to the wanted direction!
• Benefits
• Describes all the relevant forces
• Allows to plan
• contra strategies for negative forces
• supporting strategies for positive forces
• The FFA method Identify, Sort and Grade the
  different forces and illustrate the problem by a
  diagram including the forces!
• The first result of this method describes the
  current state
• Alteration of forces can change the current state
  to the objective state!

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Force Field Analysis Example
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Decision Trees

• Usage To analyze strictly economical and
  numerical decisions
• Applicable when a lot of complicated information
  is associated to the decision making process
• The analysis results in a system model that gives
  arguments to
• make a justified best decision
• consider decision alternatives
• understand effects of the decisions already
  undertaken
• understand risks involved
• Building a decision tree
• tree skeleton
• decision probability and net income evaluation
• solution path weighting
• cost evaluation
• final inspection of the tree

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Decision Trees Skeleton
Decision indicated by square
Consolidateyhdistää Reapkorjata
Circles represent uncertainty in markets
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Decision Trees Weighting
Estimate marketreaction probabilities
Estimate the net income sums (no expenses)
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Decision Tree Path Evaluations
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Net Cash Income from all Paths
Path income evaluations
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Subtracting the Costs
Profit without expenses
Profit with expenses
Maximum profit with expenses while taking this
path
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Decision Trees Summarized

• Decision trees provide an effective method for
  decision making because they
• clearly lay out the problem so that all the
  choices can be viewed, discussed and challenged
• provides a framework to quantify the outcome and
  the associated probability
• help us to make the best decisions on the basis
  of our existing information (or the best guesses)
  
• Accuracy of the results comparable to the
  accuracy of the statistical substance knowledge
  
• Often many factor must be evaluated by experience
  and common sense this is a point to utilize
  group work!

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Critical Path Analysis (CPA)

• A method for project analysis and management that
  points out the critical phases of the project
• Enables to
• define minimum time span to complete the project
• prioritization of tasks
• recognize central project activities
• evaluate risks
• CPA is a foundation for project planning,
  scheduling and monitoring
• CPA phases
• listing project phases (tasks durations)
• recognizing series and parallel activities
• recognizing task inter-dependencies
• recognizing the critical path inspecting
  project flow (for instance by Gantt Chart)

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CPA Listing Project Phases
CASE Custom written computer installation
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CPA Estimating Time

• Time evaluation is difficult for new tasks
• Typically time is underestimated due to
• Influence of the unexpected changes
• Unscheduled high priority work is forgotten
• Accidents and emergencies
• Meetings
• Breakdowns in equipment
• Quality control rejections
• If the accuracy of time estimates is critical,
  you may find it effective to develop a systematic
  approach to including these factors
• Typically realistic time estimation is done based
  on past experience

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CPA in Gantt Chart
Critical path (blue)continues through the whole
project
Non-critical paths (red) are not so time critical
Duration in weeks
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In Conclusion...

• We had an overview on Telecommunications Product
  Development Process
• We discussed the following mind- and process
  mapping techniques
• Brainstorming
• Mind Mapping
• SWOT analysis
• Six Thinking Hats
• Synetics
• Force Field Analysis
• Decision Tree
• Critical Path Analysis
• The best way to learn these methods is to use
  them!