PETO - Program
Papers and Abstracts
Presentations
The PETO project ** at the Department of Manufacturing Engineering and Management, Technical University of Denmark, and the International Journal of Industrial Engineering are pleased to announce the first interdisciplinary conference on product modelling and product configuration systems will be held on the 28th and 29th of June in Copenhagen.
At the turn of the 19th century customers could buy a Ford automobile in a single colour only: black. Nowadays customers demand products that fit their needs, and thus enterprises must be able to configure their products to the individual customer.
The application of product configuration systems is an efficient and important means of tailoring products to individual customer requirements. Experience from industry has demonstrated that the application of product configuration systems can reduce lead times from customer contact to delivery dramatically. Product configuration systems reduce the resources needed to specify a product, improve quality and make it possible to simulate and optimise a product configuration for specific customer preferences. Resources spent on quotations and other order specifications are greatly reduced and the quality of specifications is improved.
The preliminary experience from projects carried out in industry indicates that the construction and implementation of product configuration systems within an organisation call for a multi perspective approach in order to deal with the business strategy, economic and organisational issues as well as the technical aspects of building and implementing product configuration systems. While the technical aspects of product configuration systems are being extensively researched, the economic and organisational understanding is lagging behind.
The Centre for Product Modelling (CPM) has helped companies implement product configuration systems in a number of projects. Experience from these projects indicates that the success of product models can only be achieved by striking the right balance between the technical, economic, and organisational perspectives. The aim of this conference is to help participants develop a further understanding of the interplay between these three perspectives. The conference will include presentations of case stories from companies having implemented product configuration systems.
A selection of the papers presented at the conference will be published in the International Journal of Industrial Engineering. All accepted papers will be published in the conference proceedings.
The conference will offer an opportunity to:
The conference will bring into focus three distinct perspectives: Economics, Technology, and Organisation. Scholars must focus their contribution on one or more of the three perspectives. In particular we welcome contributions highlighting the interplay of the three perspectives. In acknowledgment of the vast amount of research conducted within the technical field further focus will be on the following scopes:
By the technical perspective this conference invites theoretical and empirical contributions within, but not limited to, the following areas:
Economic aspects of product modelling are, on the other hand, burgeoning fields of research which allow for a broader field of contributions. This conference invites theoretical and empirical contributions within, but not limited to, the following areas:
Product modelling is one example in the broader field of information systems and IT-supported knowledge work. In this perspective the conference invites theoretical and empirical contributions in relation to best practices within, but not limited to, the following areas:
The format of the conference is a combination of paper presentations followed by a Q&A session. During some sessions speakers will present cases which other speakers and the plenum in general will analyse by using their distinct perspectives. Given the interdisciplinary nature of the conference researchers are encouraged to present their papers in a way that allows researchers from the other fields to participate in the subsequent discussion.
The programme committee of this conference consists of leading researchers within their individual fields of research (listed alphabetically):
| Professor Cipriano Forza | University of Modena, Italy |
| Reggio Emilia | Department of Mechanical and Civil Engineering, Italy |
| Professor Bo Helgeson | Work Practice Laboratory, Dept. of Human Work Science and Media Technology, Blekinge Institute of Technology, Sweden |
| Dr. Lars Hvam | Department of Manufacturing Engineering and Management Technical University of Denmark |
| Senior researcher Håkon Finne | STEP, Center for innovation research, SINTEF Norway |
| Docent Staffan Laestadius | Department of Industrial Economcis and Management Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden |
| Professor A. Pennathur | Mechanical and Engineering Department, University of Texas at El Paso, U.S.A. |
| Dr. Frank T. Piller | Director of Tum research Center Mass Customization, TUM Business School, Technische Universitaet Muenchen, Germany |
| Dipl.-Ing. Ralph Seelmann-Eggebert | Fraunhofer Institute for Factory Operation and Automation, Information, Logistics and Automation Systems, Germany |
| D.Sc. (Tech), Professor Timo Soininen | Software Business and Engineering Institute, Helsinki University of Technology, Finland |
Authors are invited to submit abstracts of papers for consideration, by the 1st of March 2004 to Kasper Edwards, petoconf@ipl.dtu.dk.
Abstracts should be of approximately 200-300 words. Authors are requested to clearly state their name, organisation, address, phone number and e-mail address on their abstracts. Submissions are preferred by e-mail, including the abstract and relevant documentation attached in either Microsoft Word format or PDF format.
| Final date for submitting abstracts: | March 15th 2004 | |
| Abstract selected and authors advised: | April 1st 2004 | |
| Deadline for submission of full paper: | June 15th 2004 |
Authors and participants must register for the conference at this page soon. The fee includes a printed copy of the proceedings, lunches and coffee, and the conference dinner.
| Authors and participants | €200 | |
| Late registration, after 1st June (participants only) | €250 | |
| On arrival registration (participants only) | €350 |
Authors retain full copyright for papers submitted to the conference. If a paper is selected for publication in the International Journal of Industrial Engineering, authors will be required to surrender copyright, should they desire to have their paper published.
The Centre for Product Modelling (CPM) is a Danish research institution under the Department of Manufacturing Engineering and Management, the section of Industrial Management at the Technical University of Denmark. The aim of the centre is to carry out research within the field of automation of routine engineering tasks in the product specification process. CPM has recently developed and tested a methodology for designing and implementing product models that are used as product specification systems in configuration processes. By incorporating knowledge of e.g. the structure, function, production, transport, assembly, use, etc. of a product into a product model this knowledge is made accessible to other organisational units and is more easily shared with other units, both in-house and in relation to the customers and suppliers of the company.
CPM is a young institution, founded in 1999, which has displayed a tremendous growth with eight researchers currently associated. Furthermore, four PhD’s have been completed within the centre lifetime, and currently 4 PhD’s are under completion.
CPM is also the driving force behind the Danish Association for Product Modelling, which is an association of firms interested in - and using - product models.
The PETO project is dedicated to researching product configuration systems from an interdisciplinary perspective. The PETO project consists of 6 researchers organised in three groups: Economics (Jørgen Lindgaard Pedersen and Kasper Edwards), Technology (Lars Hvam and Jesper Riis) and Organisation (Niels Møller and Morten Møldrup).
Questions should be directed to Kasper Edwards, petoconf@ipl.dtu.dk.
* In this context we focus on product configuration systems, which support the construction of variants including specifications for products, production, transportation, use, etc.
** PETO (The Product Models, Economy, Technology, and Organisation Project) is funded by the Danish Technical Scientific Research Counsel and is conducted in collaboration with The Centre for Product Modelling (CPM) at the Technical University of Denmark, www.productmodels.org