A Study Investigating Challenges in The Interface Between Product Development and Manufacturing in The Development of Software-Intensive Automotive Systems

• The automotive industry is facing a tremendous growth in the engineering of software-intensivesystems, giving rise to various challenges. To prevent problems related to the ¯t of newsoftware technologies in vehicles and the manufacturing processes, a well functioning interactionbetween the functions for product development and manufacturing is crucial. This iscomplicated by the fact that the changeable nature of software development causes unprecedentedneeds for collaboration and coordination between these two functions. This paperreports on a process assessment that focuses on the interface between the functions forproduct development and manufacturing in the development and design of software-intensiveautomotive systems. The main purpose of the study was to identify the key issues for improvementin the area assessed. The assessment was performed at two Swedish automotivecompanies where data were collected from documents and in interviews with practitioners.Nine key improvement issues were established ranging from challenges in requirements engineeringto the need for knowledge transfer between manufacturing and product development.In addition, to increase the understandability of the results and map possible avenues for solution and future research, the paper provides an extensive analysis of each improvement issue in relation to the state-of-the-art.

Subject headings

NATURVETENSKAP  -- Data- och informationsvetenskap -- Programvaruteknik (hsv//swe)

NATURAL SCIENCES  -- Computer and Information Sciences -- Software Engineering (hsv//eng)

Keyword

Process assessment

integrated product development

software intensive product development

manufacturing engineering

process improvement

automotive software development

Publication and Content Type

art (subject category)

ref (subject category)