Toyota Set-Based Concurrent Engineering

Proceedings of The 1996 ASME Design Engineering Technical Conferences and Computers in Engineering Conference August 18-22, 1996, Irvine, California

96-DETC/DTM-1510

PRINCIPLES FROM TOYOTA’S SET-BASED CONCURRENT ENGINEERING PROCESS

Durward K. Sobek, II Industrial and Operations Engineering The University of Michigan Ann Arbor, MI 48109-2117 Allen C. Ward Mechanical Engineering and Applied Mechanics The University of Michigan Ann Arbor, MI 48109-2125

ABSTRACT A five-year study reveals that the highly successful Toyota Motor Corporation seems to follow a different paradigm of design than other US and Japanese auto companies. This paper outlines 11 principles that appear to form the foundation of Toyota’s use of “Set-Based Concurrent Engineering.” Discussion of the principles includes illustrations from Toyota. 1. INTRODUCTION Toyota Motor Corporation is one of the world’s leading auto manufacturers. Toyota consistently receives high, often best-in-class, quality ratings in Consumer Reports and JD Powers studies, continues to make cost reductions sufficient to maintain competitiveness despite yen appreciation, and maintains a high degree of model variety. Toyota is the industry leader in product development lead time while using many fewer engineers than its US competitors. The Toyota Production System, dubbed ‘lean manufacturing’ in a MIT study of the automotive industry (Womack, et al., 1990), now being copied the world over, is a critical element in these accomplishments. We believe that Toyota’s product design and development system must also be an important contributor. However, while Taiichi Ohno (Shingo, 1989) and others have meticulously described the Toyota production system, the Toyota development system has not been well documented. Indeed, Toyota does not use many practices often considered critical to successful concurrent engineering. Toyota’s development teams are not co-located. Personnel with the exception of the chief engineer and his staff...