Information behavior in the determination of functional specifications for new product development

This paper deals with difficulties involved in analyzing and designing a management system to reduce the risk and improve the productivity of new product development. The model represents the processes of determining functional specifications for new product development based on a certain product strategy. The proposed model aims to analyze information behavior in the assessment of users’ needs based on the fusion concept. The new product development of a household electrical product in a Japanese company is analyzed using this model and method.