Integrating Manufacturing in Product Development Process

Integrate and involve manufacturing during the product design phase brings benefits to the product development process (PDP). Although this is an old subject of studies, it continues to be a challenge in the practice of industries, and the new agile methodologies can be crucial to facilitate and reach the integration of manufacturing in PDP in an effective way. Thus, the present work proposes a method to integrate the manufacturing in the PDP, based on the practices of the Lean Startup approach. To do this, structured bibliography research was carried out, and based on the findings the method was proposed. The method is compound by two main stages. The first refers to project planning, using a visual management tool called deliverable roadmap, while the second refers to the development and evaluation of what was developed of the product. This second stage is based on the build-measure-learn cycle of the Lean Startup approach and is the heart of the method. The proposed method can fill some gaps in the traditional methods of product development, while works the two faces of integration (interaction and collaboration) between manufacturing and the project team, in a more effective and anticipated way. With the proposed method, working in short cycles is possible to reduce uncertainties during development and the need for rework, improving the development process as a whole, as well as propitiate to work with a focus on valuing and developing people.