Data management of green product development with generic modularized product architecture

Computers in Industry 61 (2010) 223–234

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Data management of green product development with generic modularized product architecture Yuan-Ping Luh a, Chih-Hsing Chu b,*, Chih-Chin Pan c a

Institute of Manufacturing Technology, National Taipei University of Technology, Taipei, Taiwan Department of Industrial Engineering and Engineering Management, National Tsing-Hua University, Hsinchu 300, Taiwan c Institute of Mechanical and Electrical Engineering, National Taipei University of Technology, Taipei, Taiwan b

A R T I C L E I N F O

A B S T R A C T

Article history: Received 10 October 2007 Received in revised form 1 September 2009 Accepted 10 September 2009

Many manufacturers are facing a complex situation in the mixed production environment, in which green and non-green products are fabricated simultaneously. They are losing competitiveness as a downstream supplier due to lacking of a cost-effective approach to managing product variations compliant with different green directives. This paper presents a methodology based on generic modularized product architecture that facilitates data management of green product development. The four-level architecture allows one unified representation for multiple product models. An option control mechanism enables a quick generation of their BOMs (bills of material). A procedure consisting of seven steps is proposed to accomplish this. PDM functions are implemented to demonstrate the effectiveness of the methodology using a real LCD TV family as an example. This work complements the past studies on green product development, which mainly tackled the problem from design, process, and supply chain improvement. In contrast, from a management perspective, the proposed methodology provides a simple but useful tool for small-to-medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) to perform green product development in an economical manner. ß 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Green product design Product modularization Product data management Product architecture Option control

1. Introduction Companies worldwide are experiencing increasing social and regulatory demands to behave in an environmentally conscious manner. One consequence is the greater scrutiny of their manufacturing practices by different stakeholders. They are under pressure to concurrently consider product functionality, cost, quality, and environmental impacts in new product development. For example, green product design recently has been of primary concerns in industries due to the implementation of EU’s (European Union) environmental protection regulations, e.g. RoHS, WEEE and EuP directives, as well as the restrictions imposed by major electronics companies. According to RoHS, any electrical and electronic products sold in EU nations must not contain the ingredients of lead, mercury, hexavalent chromium, polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDE), and polybrominated biphenyls (PBB) greater than 0.1%. Moreover, the cadmium content must be lower than 0.01% [1,2]. Since then or even earlier, many international brand owners had taken corresponding procedures in their product development in order to be in full compliance with

* Corresponding author. E-mail address: [email protected] (C.-H. Chu). 0166-3615/$ – see front matter ß 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.compind.2009.09.002

these directives. For example, SONYTM and PANASONICTM have established a set of green purchasing standards [3,4] imposed on their global suppliers. Fig. 1 shows the timeline of major companies in their green-compliant actions. Most past studies concerning green product development fall into three categories: product design, process design, and supply chain design [5]. Green product design is focused on making a product that adopts environmentally friendly specifications [6–8]. Green process design involves reduction of the environmental impacts through operation improvement in production process [9–11]. Green supply chain is to alleviate the impact of the product development activities outside the firm’s boundaries like supplier evaluation, auditing and selection, delivery of the final product to the consumers, and end-of-life management of the product after its use [12–14]. Perhaps the most effective way of performing green product development is to integrate product design with production planning, control, and supply chain management in such a manner as to identify, quantify, assess, and manage the flow of environmental waste with the goal of reducing and minimizing its impact on the environment in the early development stage [15]. Despite a fairly large amount of literatures as above, fewer past studies concerned the data management issue in green product development. Some PDM vendors and proprietary systems [16– 18] started offering green product modules, but their focuses were

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Fig. 1. Implementation timeline of green initiatives by major brand owners.

on managing/auditing hazardous substances, with less support to conducting the development process in a systematic or effective manner. Moreover, the design of those tools takes the perspective of the product owner (i.e. the branding company), rather than that of its suppliers, who yet make decisions directly impacting the environment. Most of the company standards are stricter than those imposed by nations. Their enforcement has a profound impact on the organizations that primarily rely on goods export. For example, most Taiwanese companies are small and mediumsized enterprises (SMEs) which mainly operate on the OEM (original equipment manufacturing), ODM (original design manufacturing), and/or EMS (electronics manufacturing services) business model. For green compliance, these companies must not only begin to offer manufacturing services, parts, technologies, and systems that are WEEE/RoHS compliant, but also need to fulfil the purchasing standards regulated by their customers, i.e. international brand owners. Almost all of the global manufacturers in Taiwan, such as QuantaTM, MiTACTM, InventecTM, ASUSTM, and FICTM, declared to have converted their suppliers and partners into the so-called green supply chain [5]. They have so far been committed to restricting use of hazardous substances in the manufacturing processes and production activities. On the other hand, it is essentially uneconomical for any company to develop a product in a different manner each specifically for one green directive. To impose the strictest regulation on the product is certainly not a cost competitive solution, either. In practice, there is a lack of systematic managerial methods for product development which can meet different environmental regulations at the same time in an economical way. The problem faced by many Taiwanese companies is more complex than that encountered by their customers. OEM/ODM/ EMS companies need to manage (or monitor) hundreds or even thousands of suppliers so as to guarantee their green compliance. In addition, they must simultaneously follow different purchasing standards imposed by their customers. In the absence of a systematic methodology and practical experience, these companies have chosen to employ such short-term strategies as ‘‘overquality’’ and ‘‘case-by-case’’ as their tentative solutions [19]:  Acquire the EIA/ECCB (Electronic Industries Alliance/Electronic Components Certification Board) 954 authentication to be qualified as ‘‘Green’’ supplier.  Establish and implement green design guidelines in a full scale.  Convert to green supply chain by imposing design specifications and material declaration on low-tier suppliers.  Improve the manufacturing processes such as lead-free process implementation. Restriction on hazardous substances significantly affects the upstream and downstream manufacturers. One big challenge is to establish a collaborative process of material declaration with their multi-tier suppliers or supplier network [20]. However, facing the

numerous regulations from different countries and brand owners, local companies have not yet been able to come up with a feasible and long-term plan. Even worse, many of them are still producing non-green products at this transitional stage, i.e. green and nongreen parts/products/processes co-exist in their product development. To solve such a critical problem, this paper develops a systematic methodology that facilitates management of product development data containing both green and non-green variants. We propose a four-level generic modularized product architecture which works as a unified product representation. Integrated with product modularization techniques, it allows development of green and non-green products at the same time. An option control mechanism avoids creation of incorrect BOMs consisting of incompatible modules. Such a product variation mechanism is implemented using PDM (product data management) functions. The development of a LCD TV product family is used to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed methodology. This work provides SMEs a simple but practical tool for managing product development in compliance with various green directives in a cost competitive manner. 2. Methodology One major challenge during the development process of green and non-green products in a mixed manner is to effectively manage, maintain, and generate BOMs which contain the right information. Product engineering lends several support tools to this problem such as product modularization, product platform, and commonality analysis [21]. The main focus of these tools is on product design that satisfies heterogeneous dynamic customer requirements. Companies implementing (or attempting to implement) them normally have a greater authority/flexibility in product development, particularly at the design stage. They, most likely brand owners, can determine product function, specification, architecture, and detailed design at their will. As mentioned above, it is the OEM/ODM/EMS companies which are facing the most difficult situation in the green era. As downstream suppliers in a product life cycle, they do not possess much latitude in the product development. Restrictions have been imposed by their customers when outsourcing the product in the early stage. Product configuration has been identified as a key element of offering a large variety of products [22]. Most product configuration systems (or configurators) can be classified into two types: the sales and technical configurations [23]. The former is a representation of the product space and of the procedures with which a sales arrangement can be defined. The technical configuration model, also called product model, is a logical representation that links what product characteristics are offered to how products are actually made. The essential function of a product model is to define the rules to produce all the BOMs of the product variants. Numerous past studies utilized the concept of generic BOM (or product architecture) for integrating product and production information when pursuing high product variety [24–27]. However, to the authors’ knowledge, product configuration or generic BOM has not yet been applied to the management of product environmental data. It would be advantageous to show how these techniques are incorporated with PDM software for the purpose of lowering the complexity in green product development. Taking this into account, this work integrates product modularization with generic product architecture for effective management of green and non-green product data with one modularized BOM representation. Green and non-green models in a product family adopt one identical product structure. As shown in Fig. 2, an option control mechanism enables quick product variations and produces correct BOMs based on the representation.

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2.2. Modularization

Fig. 2. Generic modularized product architecture with option control mechanism.

The concept of modularization is defined as product development through combining individual modules containing standard interfaces and various functionalities [35,36]. The application of modularization empowered by configuration management of product architecture in PC manufacturing has improved the business process of placing orders from BTF (build to forecast) to BTO (build to order) [37]. Further improvements have been made for the process to move from BTO toward CTO (configure to order). For instance, both DellTM and CompaqTM have successfully applied BTO and CTO in reducing the number of inventories and customizing for different needs in their global logistics management. 2.3. Modular product architecture

Fig. 3. Option control mechanism in PDM.

Fig. 3 shows the option control mechanism introduced for product configuration by many PDM systems [28]. Different configurations are produced with pre-defined modules and options. The modules consist of a number of physical components through assembly. The components (Part in the figure) can be associated with other components through the consists of relationship, thus creating different product structures. Most PDM systems adopt an implicit configuration model that only allows modules (Option in the figure) and the corresponding composition rules without exact specifications of individual product configurations. This design lends a support to managing green and non-green product data simultaneously. The managing complexity can be reduced through implementation of PDM functions. 2.1. Generic product architecture As an imperative in the consumer market, mass customization has been validated by its necessity [29,30]. However, mass customization inevitably incurs extra development cost and complicates product data management and supply chain management. Companies have to properly select the degree of mass customization so as to well balance between cost and profit. Ulrich and Eppinger [31] defined product architecture as: product architecture is a structural scheme resulted by mapping the product functions and physical components. Product design is elaborated particularly in such aspects as structuring product functions and mapping such functions to physical components. In addition, the concept of generic product architecture [32–34] identifies products with similar functions and represents them in single product architecture. Engineers can thus define a new product and map it to physical components simply by specifying its functional specifications. Generic product architecture is capable of encompassing numerous products with various functional specifications. The advantages of generic product architecture can be attributed to developing new product with similar extended specifications or functions to reduce the product development cost. In summary, the purpose of generic product architecture is to maximize product variation wile guarantee costeffectiveness. However, lacking proper development principles in both products and industries often results in non-applicable product architecture.

This paper proposes a four-level modular product architecture which incorporates both the concepts of modularization and generic product architecture. As shown in Fig. 4, the top most level is product family, which consists of a group of products. The next one is product model layer. Different models share a common architecture structure in terms of functional modules. The third level, the option control layer, is a unique concept proposed by this work. An option is a product attribute which can be varied to produce different product models in a product family. The option value specifies the possible alternatives in an option. An option value can be either a feature of one module or combination of multiple modules. The last level lists the single components that comprise all the product models. The key element in the modular product architecture is the option control mechanism. It facilitates product variation in a systematic manner. The control mechanism provides the following functions:  Specify the components contained in a functional module.  Manifest the relationship between option values and functional modules.  Define the exclusive relations, if exist, among option values. Adding the option layer in the product architecture allows systematic generation of product variations which consists of green and non-green components. It also prevents generation of invalid BOMs. The development of a LCD TV family is used as an example to illustrate such a methodology. 3. Product architecture of LCD TV family The key factor in product modularization is to identify proper functional modules and to standardize the interface among different modules [38]. This section describes a procedure that constructs modular product architecture following a modified modularization methodology [39]. A LCD TV family is used as an example. The procedure consists of the following steps: 1. Categorizing product functions and mapping them to physical components. This step aims to identify the major functions of LCD TV and map each function to physical components (or modules) so as to specify their relationships. As a result, the functions of LCD TV can be categorized into six major groups and their mappings to physical components/modules are illustrated in Fig. 5. 2. Defining interface specifications. The relationships between components/modules are manifested by the interface specification, which defines (1) the interactions among physical components and (2) their geometrical relations. 3. Constructing the modular architecture. After defining the interface specification, we can start to construct the modular

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Fig. 4. Generic modularized product architecture.

Fig. 5. Mappings between functions and modules in LCD TV.

architecture by analyzing the product geometric layout, as shown in Fig. 6. Fig. 7 functional modules. It becomes the centrepiece in our generic product architecture and will be further elaborated during Step(s) (4)–(7). Fig. 8 shows the physical interactions among the modules. 4. Identifying options and the modules involved in each option. Table 1 summarizes the possible options in the LCD TV family which are generated with respect to customer’s preferences. The modules required to define each option are also identified. For example, the Case Module contains three options: size, style, and color. 5. Defining the option values. After identifying all the options in the product family, this step is to finalize the possible values in each option as shown in Table 2. The number of alternatives in each option is also listed. Each option value can then be correlated to specific physical components. For example, Fig. 9 illustrates the correlations for two options ‘‘Style’’ and ‘‘Size’’ of the Speaker

Module. In this case 12 physical components are required to provide the combination of the ‘‘Style’’ and ‘‘Size’’ option values. For example, ‘‘20S’’ corresponds to one specific physical component. 6. Imposing incompatible rules among option values. Certain option values are not compatible with some others. For example, the flat panels produced by a particular TFT-LCD manufacturer may not match speaker modules of certain types, due to technical or business reasons. To prevent generation of invalid product variations induced so, i.e. product models consisting of incompatible modules, it is necessary to impose incompatibility check rules among option values. 7. Deriving product variants by selecting the option values. Finally, a modular product architecture example of LCD TV is established as shown in Fig. 10. A product variant can be derived by selecting proper options and modules. This paper proposes to add a green option into such product architecture, with different green

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Fig. 6. Geometric layout of LCD TV.

Fig. 7. Modularized product architecture of LCD TV family.

Fig. 8. Interactions among functional modules.

considerations as option values. This method offers a better way to coordinate between different green regulations and existing non-green products. 4. Green product data management for LCD TV family To facilitate management of co-existing green and non-green product models, ‘‘Green’’ is placed as an option by including

different green regulations as the option values in the modular product architecture proposed in the previous section. We can skip Steps (1)–(3) in the implementation procedure here. The major task starts from defining the green option and identifying the modules involved by the option values. Table 3 shows the result with additional ‘‘Green’’ option. Identifying the functional modules related to the option is accomplished by interviewing the design engineers of one major LCD TV manufacturer in Taiwan. They

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228 Table 1 Possible options and related modules. Module

Option item

Case Module Power PCB Module LCD Panel Module Base Module Main PCB Module User Interface Module Bracket Module Speaker Module Remote Controller Module External Power Adapter Module Interface Module (LCD vs. Main Body)

Size

Style

Color

*

*

*

* *

Panel Type

Power Supply

Broadcasting System

* *

* *

* * * *

Table 2 Corresponding values in each option. Option

# of option values

Option values

Size Style Color Panel Type

6 2 3 4

Power Supply Voltage Broadcasting System

2 3

2000 , 2300 , 2600 , 3200 , 3700 , 4200 Single speaker (S), dual speaker (D) Black (B), silver (S), white (W) AUO (A), ChiMei (C), LG-Philips (L), Samsung (S) 110, 220 NTSC, PAL, SECAM

indicate that both plastic and PCB components are the main elements regulated by the green directives. Both Case Module and Bracket Module are made by plastic material, and thus should be taken into account. Power PCB Module and Main PCB Module are also affected by the ‘‘Green’’ option. The different green regulations is then included as the option values. For example, Table 4 lists EU RoHS, Sony (SS00259 7th Edition), and Panasonic (Version 5) as possible option values. Their restrictions of toxic substantiates are different from each other. It is difficult to manage BOMs under such a circumstance in which a product family contains a non-green product model and several green models compliant with different regulations. As shown in Fig. 11, not considering the green issue, Bracket Module only has size option, which allows six option values and correspondingly six components. After adding green

option, the number of components relevant to Bracket Module is quadruple and becomes 24. The complex of BOM management increases rapidly as the green regulations get updated or become more stringent in the future. The option control mechanism allows manufacturers to differentiate between EU RoHS, Sony (SS00259 7th Edition) and Panasonic (Version 5) regulations in one single product architecture and to further obtain different variants (see Table 4). By adding new option values, it is straightforward to deal with updates or revisions of the regulations. In theory, there is no limitation on the number of option items or the number of values in each option. Thus the product models to be handled by the proposed method can be highly complex. The next step is to redefine the relationship between modules and components for each green option value, considering that each different green regulation indicates the need for different material or components to be supplied or designed. Finally, the corresponding product variations can be derived by selecting the specific option values. Table 5 illustrates the result of a 3200 LCD TV. In this table, the product version code represents a combination of different option values. For example, 3200 -A-D-B-220-PAL-EU RoHS represents the specification of this LCD TV of 3200 , AUO panel, dual speaker, black, 220 V, PAL, and compliant to EU RoHS. With such a mechanism, OEM/ODM/EMS manufacturers can better manage product variants with less management effort such as managing product billof-material and can both satisfy the trends of mass-customization and multi-green policy compliance.

Fig. 9. Correlations between option value and physical components.

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Fig. 10. Modular product architecture of LCD TV family.

Table 3 Adding ‘‘Green’’ option into the existing options. Module

Option

Case Module Power PCB Module LCD Panel Module Bracket Module Main PCB Module User Interface Module Stand-Base Module Speaker Module Remote Control Module Adaptor Module Interface (Panel to Main PCB)

Size

Style

Color

*

*

*

* *

Panel Type

Power Supply Voltage

Broadcasting System

* *

* *

Green * * * *

* * * *

5. Implementation using PDM functions BOM conveys key product information that guides the development at different stages of a product life cycle. Every product model has its corresponding BOM in a product family. In the example of the LCD TV family, the combination of options and option values can yield 2592 (see Table 4, 6  2  3  4  2  3  3) different product models and the corresponding BOMs of the same number. This number becomes quadruple 10,368 with four option values, e.g. non-green and the other three regulations shown in Table 4. The total number of possible but incorrect BOMs is certainly much

Table 4 Including green regulations as option values. Option

# of option values

Value

Size Style Color Panel Type

6 2 3 4

Power Supply Voltage Broadcasting System Green

2 3 3

2000 , 2300 , 2600 , 3200 , 3700 , 4200 Single speaker (S), dual speaker (D) Black (B), silver (S), white (W) AUO (A), ChiMei (C), LG-Philips (L), Samsung (S) 110, 220 NTSC, PAL, SECAM EU RoHS, Sony (SS00259 7th Edition), Panasonic (Version5)

higher than this. Alternative ways of handling this such as manual bookkeeping and use of MS office software like Excel are quite challenging and error-prone, if not impossible. The difficulty is further confounded by general product development activities like version control and design change. More importantly, any minor mistakes in constructing a BOM may cause product development delays or failures in the end, thus squandering critical resources. Therefore, to perform a better (or correct) BOM management, this research proposes implementation of the generic product architecture using PDM functions. Some modern PDM software tools already have built-in functions and/or APIs (application program interfaces) for implementing the option control mechanism [40], such as TeamCenterTM and WindchillTM. Facilitated by the mechanism, correct BOMs can be quickly produced for a large amount of product models in the LCD TV family. New product models can be added into the family without difficulty as long as their specifications have been defined according to the systematic procedure proposed in this paper. The following screenshots illustrate how PDM functions facilitate management of green product development. The first step is to construct the modularized product architecture shown in Fig. 9. Fig. 12 shows the hierarchical structure of the LCD TV family in terms of the composing modules, generated in a PDM system (TeamCenterTM [41]). Next, we need to specify all the options and the option values which are allowed to

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Fig. 11. BOM management becomes complex by adding green option.

appear in the product family. As shown in Fig. 13, seven options (see Table 4) are defined in a variant window. Clicking on the size option pops up an option value window, at which 2000 , 2300 , and 2600 are given as possible TV screen sizes. To identify which modules are involved in an option value relies on human discretion. The result plays a crucial role in the system implementation, though. Taking the Case Module 3200 -DB as an example, it corresponds to a Case Module that is equipped with a 3200 screen size, dual speaker, and of black color. This specification is then accomplished by defining the condition (Size = 32 AND Style = D AND Color = B) in a variant window (see Fig. 14). Note that the Case Module is a subassembly comprising of multiple components. Green is treated as an option and different green directives correspond to different option values in the implementation. Similar to other option values, it is necessary to identify which components/modules are associated with each green option value and the conditions in what conditions they comply with the corresponding green regulation. After completion of configuring the product architecture with the green option, the BOMs of various green products can be generated by selecting correct option values in the PDM system. Fig. 14 shows a green product model 3200 -A-D-B-220-PAL-EU RoHS, which indicates the product,

or more precisely, the modules that comprise of it have to comply with EU RoHS. In this case, the user only needs to select ‘‘EU RoHS’’ as the green option value; then the system will generate the corresponding BOM, as shown in Fig. 15. The purpose of the variation checking mechanism established in Step (6) of Section 3 aims to prevent improper combination of functional modules. In other words, the mechanism is to ensure the compatibility among different option values. Suppose Samsung does not produce 2000 TFT panel. This condition is defined by setting that ‘‘Size = 20’’ is not compatible with ‘‘Panel Type = S’’, in which S indicates the company Samsung. Fig. 16 highlights the screenshot of setting this rule in PDM. It shows a warning sign ‘‘Incompatible’’ in a pop-up window, alerting users of invalid product variation by incorrect combination of option values. Fig. 17 illustrates triggering of this mechanism. In summary, placing green design as an option in PDM helps manage green and non-green product development data at the same time. The variant control mechanism eliminates incorrect product variations induced by improper combination of components and/or modules. It also automates a quick generation of correct BOMs in the system. Some PDM systems have already started offering option control as standard functions for PDM

Table 5 Variants of 3200 LCD TV including the green option. Product

3200 -A-D-B

3200 -A-D-B

3200 -C-D-B

3200 -C-S-W

3200 -A-D-B

Version

-110

-220

-220

-220

-220-PAL

Code

-NTSC

-PAL

-PAL

-PAL

-EU RoHS

Module Front Module Inverter Module Panel Module Bracket Module Main PCB Module User Interface Stand-Base Module Speaker Module Remote Control Adaptor Module Interface

32DB Default 32A 32 NTSC Default B 32D Default 110 A

32DB Default 32A 32 PAL Default B 32D Default 220 A

32DB Default 32C 32 PAL Default B 32D Default 220 C

32SW Default 32C 32 PAL Default W 32S Default 220 C

32AD Default 32A 32 PAL Default B 32S Default 220 A

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support to quick adoption of the proposed methodology by companies, since it may have been put into practice for a different purpose. It is very likely that downstream suppliers are mandated to do so as a result of the pressure imposed by their customer on green declaration. 6. Discussion and conclusions

Fig. 12. The modularized product architecture of LCD TV.

deployment in industry [41]. For example, automobile manufacturers have applied the method for managing modules that provide essentially similar functions but contain minor variation designed for different geographic regions. This experience should lend a

Environmental issues have become one of the critical challenges most developed nations and global brands are facing. Introduction of green directives like EU RoHS and WEEE produces a profound impact on modern product development. Companies began to establish green procedures during the product development process, e.g. green purchasing standards, design guidelines, and/or develop toxics-free manufacturing processes. The situation becomes complex when OEM/ODM/EMS manufacturers are producing green and non-green products, or green products compliant with different green standards, at the same time. Not only strive to guarantee that their daily operations are greencompliant, but they also need to manage the product data in a better way to support such mixed production environment. These organizations, usually SMEs, are taking temporary strategies like ‘‘over-quality’’ and ‘‘case-by-case’’ when facing this problem. Inevitably, they start to lose competitiveness either with higher product development costs caused by the over-quality or with

Fig. 13. Defining options and option values in PDM system.

Fig. 14. Defining the condition of a option value for a Case Module.

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Fig. 15. BOM generation for product model 3200 -A-D-B-220-PAL-EU RoHS.

Fig. 16. Setting incompatible condition between option values.

poor product quality induced by the case-by-case approach. There is a lack of support in both managerial means and information technologies which can help downstream suppliers accomplish green product development in an economic manner. To address this need, we propose a methodology for development of multiple products in a product family that are compliant to different green regulations simultaneously. Our approach adopts generic modularized product architecture as one unified product

representation. The four-level architecture incorporates the concept of option control. Green compliance is treated as an option with different compliances as the option values. A sevenstep procedure is developed for a quick generation of BOMs corresponding to different product models. An option control mechanism help avoids creation of invalid BOMs consisting of incompatible modules. The methodology was implemented by PDM functions to show its practices. In the implementation, the

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Fig. 17. Enforcement of improper product variation.

users are allowed to record, maintain, and manage BOMs in a systematic manner for a substantial amount of product variants. A real LCD TV family is used as an example to highlight the effectiveness of the methodology in data management of green product development. This work provides downstream suppliers a simple but practical tool for green compliance in a mixed production environment. One important topic for future research is to incorporate material declaration information in the generic architecture for green supply chain management. Another emerging need is to manage green product development over the entire supply chain supported by existing data exchange mechanisms such as RosettaNet 2A10, 2A13 and 2A15PIPs standards. The goal is to seamless integrate green data from product planning, through design and procurement, and finally to production, logistics, and end-of-use. References [1] EU-RoHS, Directive 2002/95/EC of the European parliament and of the council on the restriction of the use of certain hazardous substances in electrical and electronic equipment (RoHS), 2003. [2] EU-WEEE, Directive 2002/96/EC of the European parliament and of the council on waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE), 2003. [3] PANASONIC, Chemical Substance Management Rank Guideline Ver.5 for Product, Matsushita Group, Osaka, 2003 (http://panasonic.net/eco/suppliers/data/chemical5p_e.pdf). [4] SONY Ss-00259, Management Regulation for Environment-related Substances to be Controlled Which are Included in Parts and Materials, SS-00259 for General Use, Seventh Edition, SONY, Tokyo, 2003 (http://www.sony.net/SonyInfo/procurementinfo/ss00259/). [5] L.M. Ellram, W. Tate, C.R. Carter, Applying 3DCE to environmentally responsible manufacturing practices, Journal of Cleaner Production 16 (2008) 1620–1631. [6] C. O’Brien, Sustainable production: new paradigm for a new millennium, International Journal of Production Economics 60–61 (1999) 1–7. [7] P. Nielsen, H. Wenzel, Integration of environmental aspects in product development: a stepwise procedure based on quantitative life cycle assessment, Journal of Cleaner Production 10 (2002) 247–257. [8] S. Waage, Reconsidering product design: a practical road-map for integration of sustainability issues, Journal of Cleaner Production 16 (2007) 638–649. [9] L. Angell, R. Klassen, Integrating environmental issues into the mainstream: an agenda for research in operations management, Journal of Operations Management 17 (1994) 575–598. [10] A. Gungor, S. Gupta, Issues in environmentally conscious manufacturing and product recovery: a survey, Computers and Industrial Engineering 36 (1999) 811–853. [11] A. DeRon, Sustainable production: the ultimate result of continuous improvement, International Journal of Production Economics 56–57 (1998) 1–19. [12] S. Walton, R. Handfield, S. Melnyk, The green supply chain: integrating suppliers into environmental management processes, International Journal of Purchasing Material Management 34 (2) (1998) 2–11. [13] J. Sarkis, A strategic decision framework for green supply chain management, Journal of Cleaner Production 11 (2003) 159–174.

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[39] P. O’Grady, The Age of Modularity, Adams and Steele Publishers, Iowa City, 1999. [40] Y.P. Luh, C.H. Chu, C.C. Pan, Economical green product development based on a generic product architecture in PDM, in: International Conference of Manufacturing Automation, Singapore, 2007. [41] TeamCenter Engineering Help Library – Application Usage, Product Modelling, UGS Corp., Plano Texas, USA, 2006. Yuan-Ping Luh is an assistant professor in Institute of Manufacturing Technology at National Taipei University of Technology, Taiwan, R.O.C. He received his PhD degree from Cornell University in 1996. He was an ebusiness consultant from 1997 to 2002. He started his academic career since then. His current research focuses on the information and communication technologies (ICT) and management applications for global manufacturing industry, including collaborative system development, RFID system development, product data management, supply chain management, product lifecycle management, collaborative product commerce, and global logistics management. Currently, he also serves as the deputy director of RFID project office at Ministry of Education in Taiwan. Chih-Hsing Chu attended National Taiwan University and received his BS and MS from Department of Mechanical Engineering. He received his PhD in Mechanical Engineering at the Laboratory for Manufacturing Automation, University of California at

Berkeley, USA. His past work experiences include a web applications engineer at RedSpark, an AutodeskTM Venture, USA, a research intern at DaimlerBenzTM AG, Germany, and a visiting researcher at the Laboratory for Machine Tools and Production Engineering (WZL), RWTH Aachen, Germany. Prior to joining National Tsing-Hua University in 2002, he was on the faculty of Industrial and Systems Engineering Department, Virginia Tech, USA. He was an invited scholar at CREDITS Center, Sungkunkwan University, Korea, during the summer of 2005. Dr. Chu has published more than 100 research papers. He is on the editorial board of IEEE Transactions on Automation Science and Engineering (IEEE-TASE), Journal of the Chinese Institute of Industrial Engineers (JCIIE), and International Journal of Electronic Business Management (IJEBM). His research interests include collaborative design, product development, design chain management, and CAD/CAM/PLM.

Chih-Chin Pan is currently a PhD student in Institute of Mechanical and Electrical Engineering at National Taipei University of Technology, Taiwan, R.O.C. He has been a consultant and technical manager on PLM system implementation for over 10 years. His research interests include product lifecycle management, ebusiness, and supply chain management.