Combining customer needs and the customer’s way of using the product to set customer-focused targets in the House of Quality

An increasing number of products are equipped with software and sensors. This suggests that, in order to deliver more customised performance, future products will be developed to accommodate systems that supply information on how these products are used. Today, information on the customer’s way of using a product is seldom factored into product design, but the opportunities for making use of it are increasing dramatically due to the amount of available data that can be logged. The proposed methodology is to formulate Customer Needs at a detailed level to be able to link customer satisfaction with a clear interface to the Design Requirements. These links are obtained by combining information acquired by means of surveys, among other methodologies, as well as usage data from customer products. The method is based on the planning House of Quality and also takes cost and risk into consideration. Risk is estimated using the Analytical Hierarchy Process, whereby a hierarchy of the most relevant customer information is constructed to make designers aware of how customer-focused the design process is. To validate the proposed methodology an illustrative example is presented. Results show that the method provides valuable information that enables the company to remain customer-focused during the whole process but also when strategic decisions on price and product launch are made.