Customizing Next-Generation Multidisciplinary Product Realization Frameworks

Technological advancements have made the product realization process assume multi-disciplinary proportions. The information models associated with a product have grown richer not only in content but also in semantics and though derived from diverse sources, they are interdependent and need to interact. This paper envisions customizing Product Realization Frameworks (PRFs) as a synergistic aggregation of rich information models that cater to product development. It proposes a semantic model to organize product realization information and then develops a “Three-Tier Architecture” to enable the customization of Product Realization Frameworks for individual business needs of engineering enterprises. A prototype PRF for an “Optimized printed wiring board (PWB) stack-up design” problem has been implemented using the concepts proposed. The paper points towards the inherent flexibility of the proposed architecture to cater to varied extensions of the stack-up design problem.