Throughout the entire life of a product, establishing and improving product quality are dependent upon clear, accurate data, strong participation by all included disciplines and strong basic systems to provide the proper feedback at the proper time.
The ongoing improvement of product quality and reliability is a key element to the survival of any manufacturing organization in today's marketplace. In the electronics market, the ever accelerating pace of technological development places additional emphasis upon methodical analysis and disciplined execution of product development and release to guard against the potential design and manufacturing errors or oversights which could result in interruptions in manufacturing flow or latent product defects.
The customer-supplier relationship setting for this paper is the “build to specification” scenario. The customer supplies a description of the intended product function and operating environment to which the supplier provides a design and manufactures a product to meet the design standards. This is a common relationship in today's transportation market and provides a clear insight into the key issues.
Each phase of the product cycle (see fig. 1 below) demands attention to its unique requirements. At each phase opportunities exist to enhance our confidence in the ultimate success of the product. Further, each phase of the product cycle affords a learning opportunity to enhance our future efforts.
