Thesis (Ph. D.)--Harvard University, 1996. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 120-124).

This thesis examines the informational requirements of customers throughout the customer journey within the industry for industrial facilitating goods and explores how to manage data to meet these requirements. The research adopts a qualitative research design with a case study approach, using semi-structured interviews supplemented with secondary survey data. Thematic analysis and descriptive and correlational analysis were employed to analyze data. The study identifies digital touchpoints as crucial areas for understanding data requirements and data exchange and highlights the importance of data quality and searchability in enhancing customer satisfaction. The research findings simultaneously emphasize the need for a balance between physical and digital touchpoints and the significance of qualitative human interactions in generating positive customer experience. Managerial implications include the importance of updating and delivering the appropriate data sets for different customer roles, investing in business web-presence to facilitate effective customer interactions, and maintaining a balance between physical and digital touchpoints.

No description available.

Os requisitos de manufatura industrial apontam uma necessidade de reconfiguração e reprogramação do fluxo de processo, a fim de atender modificações no produto com as mudanças dos requisitos de mercado. Estas mudanças implicam em alterações no processo de fabricação, o que, em muitos casos, significa alterar o leiaute, reprogramar controladores, modificar acoplamentos e interfaceamentos, etc. Os tamanhos dos lotes de produção estão ficando menores e a variedade de produtos em uma mesma linha tem aumentado. Isto torna o tempo de preparação dos dispositivos de manufatura fator crucial na formação do custo final. Dispositivos com mais autonomia, capazes de se autogerenciar e que permitam uma troca rápida de funcionalidades passam a serem desejados em um ambiente de manufatura, onde os sistemas convencionais com programação centralizada, sequência definida no controlador central e arranjo de funcionalidades fixas deixam a desejar. Orientação a serviços é um conceito que propõe a descentralização do controle e a disposição de componentes de forma a se agruparem virtualmente e formar novos dispositivos, com novas funcionalidades, otimizando investimento, recurso e tempo de produção. Nesta abordagem os equipamentos passam a se comportar como agentes de manufatura, em um universo de multi-agentes, que negociam entre si o processo requerido, propiciando o atendimento à variação de produto e dispondo de um número maior de funcionalidades, o que reduz o tempo de troca de processos. Um estudo de caso de um sistema orientado a serviços, sob uma plataforma multi-agentes, é proposto neste trabalho, buscando fornecer subsídios para a análise de desempenho e potencialidades deste conceito. / The industrial manufacturing requirements indicate a need for reconfiguration and reprogramming of process flow in order to meet changes in the product with the changing market requirements. These changes imply changes in the manufacturing process, which in many cases, means changing the layout, reprogram controllers, modify interfaces and couplings etc. The production lot sizes are getting smaller and the variety of products in the same line has increased. This makes the preparation time of manufacturing devices crucial factor in the formation of the final cost. Devices with more autonomy, able to manage themselves and allow a rapid exchange of features are to be desired in a manufacturing environment, where conventional systems with centralized scheduling, sequence defined in the central controller and array of features still fall short. Service orientation is a concept that proposes to decentralize the control and disposition of components in order to regroup virtually and form new devices with new features, optimizing investment, resource and production time. In this approach the devices start to act as agents of manufacturing, in a universe of multi-agents, who negotiate among themselves the process required, providing care for the product variation and having a greater number of features, which reduces the switching time processes. A case study of system-oriented services, under a multi-agent platform is proposed in this work, aiming to provide tools for performance analysis and potential of the concept.

Os requisitos de manufatura industrial apontam uma necessidade de reconfiguração e reprogramação do fluxo de processo, a fim de atender modificações no produto com as mudanças dos requisitos de mercado. Estas mudanças implicam em alterações no processo de fabricação, o que, em muitos casos, significa alterar o leiaute, reprogramar controladores, modificar acoplamentos e interfaceamentos, etc. Os tamanhos dos lotes de produção estão ficando menores e a variedade de produtos em uma mesma linha tem aumentado. Isto torna o tempo de preparação dos dispositivos de manufatura fator crucial na formação do custo final. Dispositivos com mais autonomia, capazes de se autogerenciar e que permitam uma troca rápida de funcionalidades passam a serem desejados em um ambiente de manufatura, onde os sistemas convencionais com programação centralizada, sequência definida no controlador central e arranjo de funcionalidades fixas deixam a desejar. Orientação a serviços é um conceito que propõe a descentralização do controle e a disposição de componentes de forma a se agruparem virtualmente e formar novos dispositivos, com novas funcionalidades, otimizando investimento, recurso e tempo de produção. Nesta abordagem os equipamentos passam a se comportar como agentes de manufatura, em um universo de multi-agentes, que negociam entre si o processo requerido, propiciando o atendimento à variação de produto e dispondo de um número maior de funcionalidades, o que reduz o tempo de troca de processos. Um estudo de caso de um sistema orientado a serviços, sob uma plataforma multi-agentes, é proposto neste trabalho, buscando fornecer subsídios para a análise de desempenho e potencialidades deste conceito. / The industrial manufacturing requirements indicate a need for reconfiguration and reprogramming of process flow in order to meet changes in the product with the changing market requirements. These changes imply changes in the manufacturing process, which in many cases, means changing the layout, reprogram controllers, modify interfaces and couplings etc. The production lot sizes are getting smaller and the variety of products in the same line has increased. This makes the preparation time of manufacturing devices crucial factor in the formation of the final cost. Devices with more autonomy, able to manage themselves and allow a rapid exchange of features are to be desired in a manufacturing environment, where conventional systems with centralized scheduling, sequence defined in the central controller and array of features still fall short. Service orientation is a concept that proposes to decentralize the control and disposition of components in order to regroup virtually and form new devices with new features, optimizing investment, resource and production time. In this approach the devices start to act as agents of manufacturing, in a universe of multi-agents, who negotiate among themselves the process required, providing care for the product variation and having a greater number of features, which reduces the switching time processes. A case study of system-oriented services, under a multi-agent platform is proposed in this work, aiming to provide tools for performance analysis and potential of the concept.

Os requisitos de manufatura industrial apontam uma necessidade de reconfiguração e reprogramação do fluxo de processo, a fim de atender modificações no produto com as mudanças dos requisitos de mercado. Estas mudanças implicam em alterações no processo de fabricação, o que, em muitos casos, significa alterar o leiaute, reprogramar controladores, modificar acoplamentos e interfaceamentos, etc. Os tamanhos dos lotes de produção estão ficando menores e a variedade de produtos em uma mesma linha tem aumentado. Isto torna o tempo de preparação dos dispositivos de manufatura fator crucial na formação do custo final. Dispositivos com mais autonomia, capazes de se autogerenciar e que permitam uma troca rápida de funcionalidades passam a serem desejados em um ambiente de manufatura, onde os sistemas convencionais com programação centralizada, sequência definida no controlador central e arranjo de funcionalidades fixas deixam a desejar. Orientação a serviços é um conceito que propõe a descentralização do controle e a disposição de componentes de forma a se agruparem virtualmente e formar novos dispositivos, com novas funcionalidades, otimizando investimento, recurso e tempo de produção. Nesta abordagem os equipamentos passam a se comportar como agentes de manufatura, em um universo de multi-agentes, que negociam entre si o processo requerido, propiciando o atendimento à variação de produto e dispondo de um número maior de funcionalidades, o que reduz o tempo de troca de processos. Um estudo de caso de um sistema orientado a serviços, sob uma plataforma multi-agentes, é proposto neste trabalho, buscando fornecer subsídios para a análise de desempenho e potencialidades deste conceito. / The industrial manufacturing requirements indicate a need for reconfiguration and reprogramming of process flow in order to meet changes in the product with the changing market requirements. These changes imply changes in the manufacturing process, which in many cases, means changing the layout, reprogram controllers, modify interfaces and couplings etc. The production lot sizes are getting smaller and the variety of products in the same line has increased. This makes the preparation time of manufacturing devices crucial factor in the formation of the final cost. Devices with more autonomy, able to manage themselves and allow a rapid exchange of features are to be desired in a manufacturing environment, where conventional systems with centralized scheduling, sequence defined in the central controller and array of features still fall short. Service orientation is a concept that proposes to decentralize the control and disposition of components in order to regroup virtually and form new devices with new features, optimizing investment, resource and production time. In this approach the devices start to act as agents of manufacturing, in a universe of multi-agents, who negotiate among themselves the process required, providing care for the product variation and having a greater number of features, which reduces the switching time processes. A case study of system-oriented services, under a multi-agent platform is proposed in this work, aiming to provide tools for performance analysis and potential of the concept.

Innovations are coming together and are changing business landscapes, markets, and societies. Data-driven technologies form new or increase expectations on products, services, and business processes. Industrial companies must reconstruct both their physical environment and mindset to adapt accordingly successfully. One of the technologies paving the way for data-driven acceleration is machine learning. Machine learning-technologies require a high degree of structured digitalization and data to be functional. The technology has the potential to extract immense value for manufacturers because of its ability to analyse large quantities of data. The author of this thesis identified a research gap regarding how industrial manufacturers need to approach and prepare for machine learning technologies. Research indicated that data quality is one of the significant issues when organisations try to approach the technology. Earlier frameworks on data quality have not yet captured the aspects of manufacturing and machine learning as one. By reviewing data quality frameworks, including machine learning or manufacturing perspectives, the thesis aims to contribute with an area-specific data quality framework in the interface of machine learning and manufacturing. To gain further insights and to complement the current research in the areas, qualitative interviews were conducted with experts on machine learning, data and industrial manufacturing. The study finds that ten different data quality dimensions are essential for industrial manufacturers interested in machine learning. The insights from the framework contribute with knowledge to the data quality research, as well as providing industrial manufacturing companies with an understanding of machine learning data requirements.

This thesis examines the informational requirements of customers throughoutthe customer journey within the industry for industrial facilitating goods and exploreshow to manage data to meet these requirements. The research adopts a qualitativeresearch design with a case study approach, using semi-structured interviewssupplemented with secondary survey data. Thematic analysis and descriptive andcorrelational analysis were employed to analyze data. The study identifies digitaltouchpoints as crucial areas for understanding data requirements and data exchange andhighlights the importance of data quality and searchability in enhancing customersatisfaction. The research findings simultaneously emphasize the need for a balancebetween physical and digital touchpoints and the significance of qualitative humaninteractions in generating positive customer experience. Managerial implicationsinclude the importance of updating and delivering the appropriate data sets for differentcustomer roles, investing in business web-presence to facilitate effective customerinteractions, and maintaining a balance between physical and digital touchpoints.

The research goal of this thesis is to support the development of energy information systems for energy-aware industrial manufacturers in the form of reusable artifacts.

No description available.