Recently you may have heard talk around the topic of agile engineering from PTC, Formlabs, and even us, here at EAC. We have many events throughout the year regarding lean product development; reviewing agile engineering, systems thinking methodologies, and more. Be sure to check if we’re hosting an event in your area here.
In the meantime, our friend Joris Peels over at Formlabs wrote an article discussing why agile engineering is the future of product design that reviews the benefits of agile engineering versus “the old way.”
In case you haven’t heard, in May EAC Product Development Solutions became a North American Channel Partner in the commercial, discrete manufacturing, and educational space. We now offer The Form 2 3D Printer to our customer’s to insert high-quality stereolithography (SLA) prototyping into their engineering and design workflows, for a fraction of the cost of competing technologies. Learn more about The Form 2 here.
Why Agile Engineering is the Future of Product Design
Agile Engineering is a popular process in software development, but few hardware teams apply these practices to develop physical products. For many hardware teams, implementing Agile Engineering practices saves time and money and improves the end product.
In Agile Engineering, teams quickly iterate, test, and gather feedback on product design. It divides big challenges into measurable chunks of work and promises more accurate and rapid product development cycles. Teams are self-managed and work in short two-week sprints driven by user feedback. This feedback guides teams to build a product that meets user needs.
Rather than start with a lengthy requirements phase that covers the entire span of the project, requirements are created as the team works. Requirements are specific and tied to user value. By testing features and new builds, teams verify if they are solving user problems and developing the right product.
The Benefits of Agile Engineering
With digital manufacturing tools such as mills, laser cutters, and 3D printers, hardware engineers can now develop ideas while concurrently testing them with users. Key benefits of this method include:
- Continuous collection of feedback from customers means that designs are tracking with customer needs.
- The interplay between design, engineering, manufacturing, and marketing allows teams to understand each other’s needs and challenges better.
- Each iteration gives you a physical prototype to hold and discuss. Kinesthetic learners, experiential learners, non-technical people in a technical meeting, people new to the subject matter–they will all learn from holding and discussing an actual prototype.
- Testing the physical prototype helps you identify and solve problems.
- More, quicker, and cheaper iterations mean that a higher number of possible solution paths can be explored.
- Continuous testing means that engineering risks are exposed throughout the process.
Agile Engineering unites teams across the organization and creates a better end product. By responding to user feedback with prototypes, teams develop products that users want.
The Old Way vs. Agile Engineering
In the “Old Way,” teams predicted demand months in advance. They turned a single prototype into mass manufactured goods. This method was risky: teams had a hard time predicting future demand. As a result, companies often had either product shortage or unsold inventory. Instead, Agile Engineering tests prototypes. It improves them with consumer feedback. This method develops products quicker and reduces risk.
| Week | The Old Way | Agile Engineering |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Marketing, Engineering, and Design meet to discuss an iPhone case prototype. | Marketing wants a new iPhone case to be developed. |
| 1.5 | Meetings at marketing department on new case ideas. | The prototype is printed on a desktop 3D printer and shown to each department. |
| 2 | Marketing and Engineering meet to discuss the new case. | Marketing, Engineering, and Design meet to discuss the prototype. |
| 2.5 | Five versions of the prototype are printed, tested and shown to focus groups and business partners. | |
| 3 | Parts are redesigned and shown to more focus groups and customers. | |
| 3.5 | Engineering meets to brainstorm the design. | Based on feedback, the organization chooses one design. |
| 4 | The design is redesigned five times and 3D printed in 5 different colors per design. | |
| 5 | Engineering designs a new iPhone case in CAD. | A focus group sees the 25 different designs. |
| 6 | A designer is called in to perfect the visual design in CAD. | The organization chooses 3 designs and prints them through a service bureau. |
| 7 | Product ships.* | |
| 8 | Marketing makes suggestions to improve the CAD design. | |
| 9 | The designer revises the case. | |
| 10 | The case files are sent to a manufacturer. | |
| 11-18 | Tooling and mold making. | |
| 19 | Product ships from China. | |
| 20 | Customs. | |
| 21 | Product ready to ship. |
*After week 7, an Agile team receives feedback on sales numbers. If the product is successful, and if it can be produced more cheaply using mass manufacturing, then they may decide to design the case for injection molding.
In the Old Way, the company has to predict market demand and consumer tastes months in advance. If Company A makes a decision once a season, and Company B makes informed decisions every day, then Company B will get ahead. Agile Engineering saves companies not only time, but also money in the long run. The Agile method has a higher startup time and initial cost, but the cost per final product is low. Plus, the end product is shaped by market demands, ultimately yielding greater profit.
Cost Comparison
| Cost Factor | The Old Way | Agile Engineering |
|---|---|---|
| Manufacturing and shipping cost per case | $0.10 | $3 |
| Time from idea to final product | 21 weeks | 7 weeks |
| Inventory | 100,000 cases | 5 cases |
| Startup costs | $150,000 (Molding and tooling + cases + shipping) | $150 (Prototypes) |
| Number of redesigns | 1 | 55 |
| Number of different products | 1 | 3 |
Another benefit of Agile Engineering is that it encourages teams to fail quickly. By failing faster, teams learn and improve at a faster pace than those that do not. Learning from failure through prototypes helps companies quickly build better products. By validating assumptions and collecting data, these products are made in a more accurate, evidential way.
With traditional methods, teams painstakingly make world maps and then spend months planning a possible route through this imagined world. Only then do they have a product and really know where they stand. With Agile Engineering, products emerge in the first week of product development. Teams set off and check their compass often.
EAC Product Development Solutions (EAC), a leading provider of product development technology and services, is pleased to announce a partnership with Formlabs. This partnership allows EAC to bring professional quality SLA 3D printers and materials to commercial product development and education customers.
Burnsville, MN – May 5, 2016 — EAC Product Development Solutions (EAC) brings desktop SLA 3D printing to commercial customers through strategic partnership with Formlabs.
EAC has signed a partnership agreement to become a North American Channel Reseller for Formlabs. They will offer commercial, discrete manufacturing, and education customers the full line of Formlabs products. This partnership addresses increasing market demand for accessible additive manufacturing and rapid prototyping solutions. The Form 2 3D Printer will allow EAC’s customers to insert high-quality stereolithography (SLA) prototyping into their engineering and design workflows, for a fraction of the cost of competing technologies. The ability to minimize turnaround times by keeping prototyping in house is critical. Especially today, when development costs are scrutinized and time-to-market is more important than ever.
“We use the Form 2 to bring additional value to our engineering services engagements. I’m excited to bring the technology directly to our customers and look forward to sharing the knowledge we’ve acquired. These printers should be on the desk of every engineer. They have the potential to dramatically shorten design cycles and increase innovation. It’s amazing what happens when you enable an engineer to get their hands on a design idea.” — Allen Caldwell, senior mechanical engineer at EAC Product Development Solutions
Thane Hathaway, President and CEO of EAC said: “I built this company with a mission; to transform the way companies design, manufacture, connect to, and service their products. Additive Manufacturing, or 3D Printing, is a transformative technology that’s changing the way organizations approach product development. The Formlabs printers and materials offer professional quality 3D printing at an incredible price point. I look forward to this partnership and helping our education and commercial customers embrace this technology.”
“With decades of experience, EAC pairs deep product development expertise with a strong background in technical design. This distinct expertise will accelerate Formlabs’ efforts in bringing accessible, powerful desktop 3D printing to the millions of professional engineers and designers worldwide.” – Luke Winston, head of sales and customer success at Formlabs.
About EAC:
EAC Product Development Solutions transforms the way companies design, manufacture, connect to, and service their products. For more than 20 years they have provided the services and technologies needed to innovate, optimize, and win in the complex and competitive world of product development.
About Formlabs:
Formlabs designs and manufactures powerful and accessible 3D printing systems for engineers, designers, and artists. Their flagship product, the Form 2 3D Printer, uses stereolithography (SLA) to create high-resolution physical objects from digital designs. The company was founded in 2012 by a team of engineers and designers from the MIT Media Lab and Center for Bits and Atoms. With its powerful, intuitive, and affordable machines, Formlabs is establishing a new benchmark in professional desktop 3D printing. Formlabs also develops its own suite of high-performance materials for 3D printing, as well as best-in-class 3D-printing software.
