Product life cycle management study

The following are some resources on Product Life Cycle Management for the Engineering and Technology Management class:

1. Basic description: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Product_lifecycle_management
2. More detailed notes in pdf: http://www.urenio.org/tools/en/Product_Life_Cycle_Management.pdf
3. Related portal: http://www.product-lifecycle-management.com/
4. Videos: video 1http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-pygu7vyRm4; video 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CRfjJ9yOyp0&feature=related

Basic information:

1. Understanding of a product's life cycle enables a company to decide when to introduce a product, how to position its product in the market and when to withdraw a product.
2. The main phases:
• Product development
• Product introduction
• Product growth
• Product maturity
• Product decline
3. Phase 1: Product development
• Translate info and incorporate them into a new product
• Involves test market
4. Phase 2: Product introduction
• Spend large expenditure on promotion
• Introduce distribution arrangements
• Need to formulate pricing strategy
5. Phase 3: Product growth
• Attempt to increase market share
• Try to differentiate new products from that of competitors
• Keep promoting the products
6. Phase 4: Product maturity
• Attempt to compete for market share to achieve growth objective (if this is the goal)
• Probably enjoy highest returns from the product if market share is large enough
• Compete with better distribution strategy
7. Phase 5: Product decline
• Decide whether to withdraw the product
• Experience decline of product sale revenue
• Need to reduce product promotion and distribution effort
8. A product manager must attempt to figure out which phase of its product life cycle is a product and adjust adjust strategic goals, product strategies, price goals, promotion goals, and distribution goals.
9. Relationship of Product life cycle with technology life cycle (with innovators, technology enthusiasts > early adoptors> early majority pragmatists> late majority conservatives. laggards, skeptics)

The notion of product life cycle is strongly supported by the theory of diffusion.



Some notes relating product life cycle with technology mgt:
Note 1

Note 2

Note 3

Students need to refer to Ansoff, H.I. (1984) Implanting Strategic Management, Prentice Hall to learn the details of the reasoning on the two diagrams above.

Note 4

The following main points are noted from Komninos (2002):

At the introduction phase

• Development: focus on time to market and uniques
• Manufacturing: high expenditure for new production capacity

At the growth phase

• Development: complete development; market penetration is sustained with variation and improvements of the products
• Manufacturing: addition of capacity and automation

At the maturity phase

• Development: focused on cost reductions
• Manufacturing: focused on increasing yield and productivity

At the decline phase

• Development: focused on cost reduction
• Manufacturing: no capital expenditures, outsourcing 

Note 5

Now, examine your assignment task (2012) [Engineering Management]

Task 1 (60 marks)

"Discuss how the conceptual framework on Product Life Cycle Management can be employed by Engineering Manager(s) to enhance their contribution to new product development in their companies. You are required to provide relevant real-life examples to support your line of reasoning."

Question: How do the viewpoints and ideas from the working papers and academic readings contribute your review exercise on the assignment task?

References
Fleisher, C.S. and Bensoussan, B.E. (2003) "Chapter 23: Product Life Cycle Analysis" Strategic and Competitive Analysis: Methods and Techniques for Analyzing Business Competition, Prentice Hall.
Product lifecycle and engineering (pdf): http://www.me.iitb.ac.in/~bravi/lab/paper/2007PLEM_PLEM.pdf