Aided analysis for quality function deployment with an Apriori-based data mining approach

Quality function deployment (QFD) is a systematic approach that captures customer requirements and translates them, through house of quality (HOQ), into engineering characteristics of product. As the functional relationships between customer requirements and engineering characteristics in QFD are uncertain, unclear and fuzzy, radial basis function (RBF) to determine the functional relationships for QFD is presented, and a QFD functional relationships model based on RBF is proposed. According to RBF neural network can realize the nonlinear mapping space from the input space to the output, and can obtain the optimal relationships pattern of the input and output, the customer requirements and engineering characteristics in QFD constituted the input and output of the RBF neural network respectively, the optimal relationships are constructed through the neural network training. A case study of natural lighting products development is provided to illustrate the application of the presented method.

The roof matrix represents correlations among engineering characteristics (EC) in the house of quality (HoQ) in Quality Functions Deployment (QFD). Correlations are usually measured qualitatively and omitted in the analysis. However, ignoring them may cause duplication of effort, decreased product performance, and unsatisfied customer requirements (CR). Hence, this paper intends to propose an approach to considering the correlations quantitatively. Fuzzy Cognitive Maps (FCM) were used for this purpose. Additionally, Axiomatic Design (AD), for examining relationships between CRs and ECs, and Fuzzy Analytic Hierarchy Process (FAHP) with the Extent Analysis (EA) were used for checking the consistency of the evaluations. The proposed approach was applied in a sheet metal die making company for ranking CRs and ECs. Results show that FCM enables analyzing the quantitative roof matrix practically. The square roof matrix that also supports FCM’s adjacency matrix structure successfully represents asymmetric relationships among ECs. Integrating the correlations into the analysis resulted in a change in the final ranking. It also helped to determine the most manageable ECs, better satisfiable CRs, and most critical/least manageable ECs.

This research is motivated by the shift in market demand for rattan furniture, which not only needs to be functional but must also possess aesthetic and sustainability value. The objective is to analyze value-added product development strategies and the level of consumer satisfaction at Rotan Rangga Kota Baru. The study employs a qualitative approach (interviews and direct observation) for preliminary data and a descriptive quantitative approach using the Quality Function Deployment (QFD) and House of Quality (HoQ) methods for product planning. The results indicate that product development successfully enhances value-added through design innovation, quality materials, and production efficiency. The main factors influencing consumer satisfaction are quality, aesthetics, comfort, durability, and the aspect of environmental sustainability. Through HoQ analysis, the customer attribute with the highest importance is "Dilipat untuk lingkungan" (Foldable for the environment) (value 10), and the most influential technical factors are "Geometri Bentuk" (Shape Geometry) and "Sertifikat bahan baku" (Raw Material Certificate). Therefore, it is recommended that the development focus should be directed towards an ergonomic shape, high-quality material, and environmental sustainability orientation to optimally meet consumer expectations.

Quality function deployment (QFD) is a systematic approach to transform customer requirements (CRs) into product engineering characteristics (ECs). Traditional QFD relies on market research or customer questionnaires to collect a series of ambiguous and uncertain CRs. As a result, evaluating the weighting of CRs and determining the design matrix between CRs and ECs have become the focus and difficulty of QFD. This paper proposes the grey system theory in artificial intelligence technology combined with QFD to develop grey-QFD to solve the issues mentioned before. First, collect the average evaluation values between the aesthetic images and customer satisfaction of representative products. The grey prediction GM (1, N) model is used to obtain the weight of aesthetic needs relative to customer satisfaction and import it into the left QFD. Second, the domain experts decomposed the product form into a morphological analysis table, and fuzzy Delphi screened key ECs and imported them into the ceiling of QFD. Finally, grey relationship analysis established the aesthetic product design matrix between CRs and ECs, and calculated and ranked the final weights of each ECs by using grey relationship degree. The research uses the security camera in the smart home as an experimental object. After operating the proposed grey-QFD, the aesthetic quality of the target product (lively, intelligent, friendly, personalized, and fashionable) and the optimization of the corresponding product ECs are obtained. The result provides a theoretical reference for designers and significantly improves customer aesthetic satisfaction.

Quality is the ability of a product to meet or exceed customer expectations. Quality function deployment is a product development process based on the notion of House of Quality (HOQ). HOQ is a design approach to translate customer’s expectations into engineering characteristics so that the customer’s expectations can be met. The reduction of variability in important quality characteristics leads to better product quality. Taguchi method focuses on the variability of important quality characteristics. Two key concepts or techniques with the Taguchi method are quality loss and robust design by experimental optimization. This chapter introduces all these design techniques for quality, including the model-based optimum method.

Expansion of world economy brings changes in the way of thinking which can be seen in customers' demands. This directly influences the increase in demands at designing of a new or modifications of the existing products. Quality Function Deployment is a method directed towards revealing customers' wishes, which guarantees that these wishes have a positive effect on the product design and on the development of manufacturing process. Using and interpreting certain surveys of different types in the right way, additional advantages can be achieved in increasing of competitiveness in free markets. The most significant advantage is the possibility of using those specialists' expressions most often used by potential customers. Another problem of market experts and designers is translation from the "language" of customers to the "language" of quality characteristics. This problem is solved by using quality matrixes called the "house of quality" by Japanese. The "house of quality" is very appropriate and clear form of concise presenting of numerous data which refer to quality analysis, planning and decision making. Basically speaking the method of quality function deployment serves to improve customers' satisfaction with the product quality. What can this method contribute in comparison with already achieved results by using traditional methods in quality improvement? In this way the enterprise gets connected with its customers, and within the enterprise itself communication among different departments is improved so the new product has real chances to satisfy demands and needs of the customers. Taking into account that method of quality function deployment uses customers' demands as input data it means that the enterprise understands customers better and their understanding of product quality. Thus, even in the phase of planning, awareness of what should be done is raised in order to increase the degree of customers' satisfaction. Four-stage quality function deployment process in the automotive industry implemented and presented in the paper. A car represents a very complex product. A great number of parts, diversity of applicable materials, numerous and complex technology processes in manufacturing, on the one side, as well as a lot of demands from developed and less developed markets, on the other hand, make car manufacturing very complex in production, economic, and technological sense. Quality Function Deployment method can be used at designing of a new car, but also at solving of some of the existing problems. When carrying out reliability testing we came to the opening of the engine lid during driving the tested car. Taking into account that it was nonconformity which endangers traffic safety, the analysis of the stated problem was carried outimmediately.

Quality function deployment (QFD) is a planning and problem-solving tool that is gaining acceptance for translating customer requirements into the engineering characteristics of a product. Deriving the rating order of engineering characteristics from input variables is a crucial step in applying QFD. A grey method is proposed to prioritize engineering characteristics. The engineering characteristics are considered to be comparability sequences, while the customer requirements in customer competitive analysis are considered to be reference sequences. So QFD can be regarded as a grey system and the relationships between the customer requirements and engineering characteristic can be determined with the grey relational matrix. Then grey superior analysis is used to prioritize the engineering characteristics. An example of the door design of an automobile is used to demonstrate the application of the proposed approach.

The rapid growth of Indonesia’s food and beverage industry has increased the need for innovative and environmentally friendly packaging, especially for takeaway drinks. This study aims to develop a cup holder design to replace plastic bags by integrating customer needs using the Quality Function Deployment (QFD) method. QFD was chosen because it can translate the Voice of Customer (VoC) into measurable technical specifications through the House of Quality (HoQ) matrix. The research used a descriptive quantitative approach with 30 café customers selected through purposive sampling. Validity testing using the Pearson Product Moment showed that 11 out of 20 statements were valid (r > 0.36), and the reliability test achieved a Cronbach’s Alpha value of 0.870, indicating high consistency. The results of the VoC and HoQ analysis identified eleven important customer needs such as capacity, ease of use, material strength, design, and price efficiency. Three alternative cup holder designs were evaluated using the Pugh Matrix, and the best concept scored +4, featuring a kraft paper material with 300 gsm thickness, moisture resistance, ergonomic shape, and the ability to hold four cups while displaying café branding. This design improves customer comfort, strengthens brand image, and reduces plastic waste. The study demonstrates how QFD can effectively link customer preferences to engineering design, offering a practical example for small and medium cafés to develop sustainable packaging that supports both product functionality and environmental responsibility.

The objective of this paper is to develop the tool of halal food control by applying Quality Function Deployment (QFD). The modification of House of Quality (HOQ) matrix in QFD model are necessary to be conducted in order to fit the proposed QFD model with halal food control in the company. The proposed QFD model is composed of three HOQ matrices. The matrix 1 describes the relationship between attributes of halal assurance system and product process. The matrix 2 represent the relationship between attributes of halal assurance system and the halal critical. Finally, matrix 3 explains the relationship between product process and halal critical. The case study in chicken meat processing company is used to test the applicability and how to work the proposed QFD model for halal food control.

As a useful product development technique, quality function deployment (QFD) can convert customer requirements into suitable engineering characteristics for maximum customer satisfaction. Nonetheless, the traditional QFD has been extensively criticized as having many defects in practical applications, which include the crisp evaluation of relationships between customer requirements and engineering characteristics, and the non-robust ranking of engineering characteristics. In this paper, we put forward a new method using double hierarchy hesitant linguistic term sets (DHHLTSs) and axiomatic design approach to enhance the performance of the classical QFD. Firs, the DHHLTSs are employed to evaluate the relationships between customer requirements and engineering characteristics. Then, the axiomatic design theory is extended to derive the prioritization of engineering characteristics in QFD. Additionally, a maximizing consensus method is used to determine the weights of experts considering inconsistency among their opinions. Finally, an empirical case of a shared car manufacturer is provided with a comparison analysis to demonstrate the feasibility and effectiveness of our proposed QFD approach.

In a rapidly growing information-oriented society, people with disabilities and older people are faced with serious inconveniences in accessing IT products due to complicated use of technologies and poorly designed interfaces. To solve the problems, it is required for designers and engineers to find out and understand user needs, and then to figure out the functionalities and design characteristics to meet the needs. Figuring out the Engineering Characteristics (EC) of products from user needs for people with disabilities and older people who have problems using main stream products due to limited accessibility would take great efforts and time. We merged two important concepts of product design for people with disabilities and older people, accessibility and universal design, using an engineering design framework of QFD (Quality Function Deployment) to provide engineers and designers with a systematic methodology for universal product design. We adapted a technical report from the ISO/IEC JTC1 Special Working Group on Accessibility (SWG-A), the Information Technology – Accessibility Considerations for People with Disabilities – Part 1: User Needs Summary (ISO/IEC PDTR 99999-1), and mapped the detailed user accessibility needs to the guidelines of 7 universal design principles which are widely accepted. We explained how a process model was built for mapping relationship between the guidelines and user accessibility needs, and extracting the critical engineering characteristics for IT product design based on these two models. A model House of Quality(HOQ) was built for such procedures.KeywordsUniversal design processUser needsQuality Function Deployment (QFD)design guidelinesISO/IEC PDTR 99999-1

The purpose of this study is to analyse and measure the current service quality of Bahir Dar city hotels and design a house of quality to improve the service quality and competitiveness. SERVQUAL and quality function deployment (QFD) models are employed as a service quality measurement, design and customer satisfaction improvement tools. After prioritising customer needs, competitive assessments of hotel services were done from the customers' perspective using house of quality (HoQ). As a result of the differences between expectations and perceptions, service quality gaps are revealed in all hotel service quality dimensions. Generally, the results revealed that the overall hotels' services quality levels are bellow customers' expectations. According to the findings, technical requirements important to enhance service quality and meet customer satisfaction are identified and prioritised. Finally, a house of quality is designed to improve the service quality and competitiveness of hotels.

Commissioning (Cx) is a quality process for building construction used to verify that the Owner’s Project Requirements (OPR) are being met by the final design and construction (D&C). The goal is to confirm that each phase of the project is linked back to the OPR through quality assurance methods. Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certification is an OPR and can contribute to difficulties within the D&C process. The LEED rating system offers numerous point opportunities that span the full range of design disciplines. It is difficult to quickly understand how a design decision made by one discipline impacts another discipline’s goal(s) for maximizing LEED points in their respective areas. The House of Quality (HOQ) tool of the Quality Function Deployment (QFD) methodology can provide a means of comparison among the OPR, the proposed design, and the design impacts among the LEED credits. This paper will introduce a proposed four-phase QFD model that has been specifically modified and tailored for use by the Commissioning Authority through all phases of D&C process. It will then focus on the methodology for developing the first phase of the model, which is expanded for projects seeking LEED certification. The remaining three phases of the Commissioning QFD are discussed elsewhere. The first phase or pre-design phase will consist of two HOQ matrices for LEED projects. The first HOQ will be used to assist in identifying the LEED credits to be included in the OPR and to understand the design impacts among the LEED credits selected. The second HOQ will evaluate the alignment of the architect/engineer team’s Basis of Design (BoD) with the OPR, as well as identify the impacts among the OPR and the impacts among the BoD.

Krepek tette is one of the traditional chips from Pamekasan. Generally, this product is a famous souvenir from the city. This product is usually produced by a small-medium enterprise (SME). In the krepek tette industry, the steaming process is dependent on wood as fuel. The condition makes the steaming process contributes significantly to the resulting carbon footprint. To support sustainable development goals (SDGs), explicitly ensuring sustainable consumption and production pattern. The production process technology in SMEs needs to be upgraded to achieve sustainable production. One of the solutions is to re-design the steamer for the steaming process of raw cassava. To achieve a good steamer design, gathering information about customer need is a fundamental step to accomplish. The research aims to investigate criteria steamer design that meets customer needs. The survey gathered data about customer requirements and pointed to employees in the krepek tette industry located in central production, Blumbungan sub-district, Pamekasan. All qualitative data were analyzed using fuzzy logic to quantify the value of customer requirements and engineering characteristics. House of Quality, the first matrix of QFD, was used to obtain engineering characteristics priority. There was 12 attribute of customer requirements; however, one attribute failed to meet minimum customer importance weight criteria. Translating customer requirements to engineering characteristics obtain ten attributes. Using fuzzy logic to rank engineering characteristics that meet customer requirements, obtain eight attributes for the design criteria of cassava steamer. The attributes were ignition system used heat element, stainless steel, the design used modular systems, used LPG fuel, input, and output process from the same side, temperature and steam disperse equally, and used under steam pressure

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to report a case study in which financial feasibility integrated quality function deployment (QFD) approach was implemented. Design/methodology/approach – Customer complaints were systematically gathered. The house of quality (HoQ) matrix was developed. The technical descriptors were prioritized and subjected to the financial feasibility study. The cost calculations were carried out and the actions were derived. A set of value engineering (VE) principles was used during this case study. Findings – The study reported in this paper indicated the need for integrating financial feasibility study with QFD for enhancing the effectiveness of the method. The measures taken to prevent the customer complaints will be of considerable value to the manufacturing organizations. Research limitations/implications – During the conduct of case study, high-cost factors restricted the selection of materials which would exhibit higher performance. The case study was carried out in a single electronic switches manufacturing organization. Practical implications – The manufacturing costs incurred have been reduced by incorporating changes in the part material. The outcomes of the study have been considered for further implementation in the case organisation which indicated the practicality of the study. Originality/value – The concept of apportionment of HoQ cost developed with the idea of integrating the same with QFD is the original contribution of the authors.