Design to life cycle by value-oriented life cycle costing

Industrial products basically have to satisfy the customers' wants and needs as a basic input as well as technical and ecological requirements while providing maximum economic benefit throughout the life cycle. In the early stages of design and development all these requirements have to be considered in terms of their long-term impacts on the entire product life cycle. The approach discussed in this paper combines quality and value-driven tools with the methodology of life cycle costing including the assessment of environmental aspects. While traditional cost optimising was successful by streamlining operations and returning to core competencies, this approach allows for sustainable cost optimisation in the early stages of product development and correlates with quality planning as well as ecologic product assessment. Based on the Value-Oriented Life Cycle Costing method, product components are evaluated over their life cycle to identify those components incurring high life cycle costs compared to their functional value. In order to achieve an efficient and effective design to life cycle the methods of Quality Function Deployment and Value Analysis are aligned with the methods of Life Cycle Costing and Life Cycle Assessment to be integrated into a comprehensive approach. This paper describes the theoretical background and explains the practical implementation based on a case study. The results of the practical analysis conducted illustrate the optimisation potential to be realised when implementing the approach in comparison to traditional design solutions.