Innovative Produktgestaltung

Not only the current economic recession forces many companies to improve their competitive power. Innovative conceptions in the domain of product development, which consider the aspects of time, quality and costs can make an important contribution to that. There are two potentials, the information technology and the organization, which can be used by a company, to transform the aims of these innovative conceptions. Because of their interdependence both potentials have to be seen in connection and not isolated from each other. New methods of organization as Lean Management, Simultaneous Engineering and Project Management require the introduction of decentralized enterprise units, of teamwork in design and of time driven decision making. The increasing quantity and complexitivity of information are demanding solutions of the information technology. First of all the introduction of an openn system architecture is necessary to obtain the flexibility of information processing. Other importa nt applications of information technology is the field of knowledge-based methods, of simulation, the modelling of product and feature processing.