Concurrent engineering, also known as simultaneous engineering, is a method of designing and developing products in which the different stages of functional development are run at the same time rather than in consecutive order. This approach decreases product development time and also the time to market, leading to improved productivity and reduced costs.
From a nearly non-existent industry in 2010 to an estimated annual spend of around $13 billion in 2015, wearable electronics have come to the forefront in popularity and functionality.
Wearable devices are one of the fastest growing industries today. In fact, the market is expected to reach 12.6 billion in 2018 from nearly 0 in 2010! An amazing 20% of all Americans are sporting some type of fitness tracker or smart technology for personal or professional use. Unfortunately, ease of use is a key purchasing factor but nearly 83% of consumers report having difficulty using their device. Since these devices are such a big part of their lives, consumers have very definite performance and reliability expectations – and that means designers and engineers need to meet the challenge.
In Part 1 of this blog series, we examined how the popularity of wearable electronics and consumer expectations inform product design, engineering and reliability in terms of functionality and manufacturability.
It’s estimated that the wearable electronics market will be worth nearly $13 million in 2018. It’s easy to understand why – 1 in 5 Americans own some type of wearable, like fitness trackers, smart glasses and watches, and 1 in 10 report wearing them daily. Factor in the use of personal medical applications like blood pressure screeners or insulin pumps and rapidly advancing technologies, and those numbers increase exponentially.
Design Failure Mode and Effect Analysis (DFMEA) is a systematic group of activities used to determine how to recognize and evaluate potential systems, products or process failures. DFMEA identifies the effects and outcomes of failures, actions that could eliminate or mitigate the failures and provides a historical written record of the work performed.
Thermal cycling is the source of the majority of electronics failures, yet the comparatively lower number caused by vibration fatigue can result in greater financial consequences.
Staying relevant in the automotive industry means introducing products that are ahead of the curve in design, function, performance and reliability. When a progressive domestic automobile manufacturer was faced with testing inefficiencies that jeopardized their premium brand, they turned to DfR Solutions and Sherlock Automated Design Analysis™ software. The result? A testing approach as sleek and innovative as the vehicles produced – and an unanticipated cost savings of over $1 million.
Highly Accelerated Life Testing (HALT) is designed to induce product failure to determine failure site, failure mechanism and root cause. Omitting a thorough post-HALT root cause analysis prevents improvement in design margins and, overall, eliminates the value of the HALT process.
Assessing the robustness of an electronic product is integral to successful design and performance. HALT is an important testing tool for this purpose, and its effectiveness can be maximized through careful planning prior to testing and detailed execution.
