08/11/2024. Scaling Modular Product Design: How to Grow Beyond a Successful Pilot

Many businesses face challenges transitioning from a successful pilot to full-scale modular product design across the enterprise.

After experiencing the benefits of modularisation with one product, firms frequently wonder, “How do we replicate this success across the board?”

As Modular5, we understand this difficulty well and have assisted numerous firms in low-volume, high-mix markets in achieving scalable modular design with a focus on engineering capacity, organisational alignment, and process digitisation.

In this article, we look at what it takes to transition from a pilot to a completely modular strategy, from resource management to process reduction.

A Modular Success: Where Do We Go From Here?

Starting with a single modular product can lead to significant benefits such as decreased planning costs, standardisation, and faster turnaround times. However, the issue typically lies in scaling up that modular success.

Many businesses find hurdles in scaling to a complete modular product architecture, particularly in three crucial areas.

1. Technical Capacity: Companies often experience capacity constraints while scaling modular designs due to the effort needed to design the modules.

2. Process Overhaul: Modularisation requires a new approach to organisational workflows, roles, and responsibilities.

3. Digital Integration: Modularisation necessitates robust digital infrastructure to identify components, manage variations, and automate processes for efficiency.

Each of these points requires attention to provide a successful modular transformation.

What Does Scaling Modular Product Design Involve?

1. Rethinking Engineering Workflows: Modular design uses standard building blocks to reuse information and optimise manufacturing. However, producing these designs necessitates substantial engineering resources. In our experience, many businesses lack the in-house capacity to handle this while supporting the projects. Remember that these projects still require bespoke designs; the modular designs are not ready yet. Engineering capacity is often the bottleneck, slowing the transition to a modular organisation down.

Modular5 assists companies in overcoming this challenge by utilising offshore engineering teams. These teams focus on expanding modular designs without overburdening in-house people, allowing businesses to continue operations smoothly.

2. Strengthening Product Management: Modular product design involves people and processes. Consider this: Is there a dedicated product manager? Who takes the lead when updates are required? Do you have a change board? Most importantly, how are new customer orders and modification requests handled?

These questions underline the need for organised roles and duties, particularly in change management.

Scaling modular designs becomes difficult without this clarity, as confusion or delays can disrupt workflows. A solid change management framework can help with these difficulties by establishing accountability and ensuring that procedures function smoothly.

3. Investing in Digitization: Digital transformation, a crucial aspect of modularisation, is often disregarded. For a digital system to function effectively throughout a firm, it must allow modular design. This covers part tracking, variation management, and customer-specific requirements. Even the best-designed modular systems might fail owing to inefficiencies or errors in information flow in the absence of a strong digital backbone.

If you have not already done so, consider purchasing a product lifecycle management (PLM) system. This system simplifies information sharing, tracking components, and managing product lifecycles, making it crucial for any organisation trying to expand modularisation.

Key Questions for Scaling Up Modular Design.

Consider the following questions to assist the process of implementing modular design across your organisation:

• Do we have a product manager to oversee modular design implementation?
• Is there a formal change management process in place?
• Who manages and accepts client-requested order variations?
• Do we have a digital infrastructure to facilitate modularisation?

Answering these questions might provide insight into your current situation and highlight areas that require attention. A well-organised team with clear duties, supported by a digital system, is the foundation of a successful modular design scale-up.

The Major Challenge: Engineering Capacity for Scaling Up

The shift to a fully modular strategy frequently necessitates significant engineering resources to set up the modular product architecture and design the modules. Developing a modular product requires a comprehensive design cycle incorporating mechanical and electrical components and control systems.

The goal is to transition from Engineering to Order (ETO) to Configure to Order (CTO), which enables products to be configured using a set of defined modules.

However, many organisations encounter a stumbling block: they lack the engineering resources to scale modularisation. This is a regular and expensive challenge. This is where offshoring can provide a strategic benefit.

Modular5’s offshore engineers have expertise in modular design. They collaborate with your in-house teams to accelerate the process and remove bottlenecks.

How Offshoring Can Speed Up Modular Design Implementation.

Offshoring engineers to assist with modularisation provides various benefits, including:

• Increased Capacity: Meet engineering objectives without straining internal resources.
• Offshore engineers often bring specialised skills, such as modularisation, digital tools, and process optimisation.
• Offshoring is a cost-effective option to increase capacity while keeping flexibility instead of hiring more in-house people.

Common Mistakes in Scaling Modular Product Design

As businesses move towards modularisation, there are a few frequent problems to watch out for:

1. Poor Product Change Management: Modularisation involves both engineering and organisational changes. To reduce inefficiencies, product change management and order acceptance must be optimised.
2. Underestimating Digital Requirements: Modular design requires handling many components, each with unique characteristics. Tracking these without a PLM system can be challenging.
3. Neglecting Customer Needs: A modular approach should allow and enable customer-specific requirements. Make sure your system is adaptable enough to handle special orders effectively. You can read more about this challenge in our previous article about smart customization.

Advantages of Scaling Modular Product Design

When effectively scaled, modularisation provides various benefits, including:

• Modular design increases sales by providing clients with more options and flexibility.
• Standardising components simplifies planning and lowers expenses.
• Improved Manufacturing Productivity: Using a modular approach improves production predictability and productivity.
• Modular designs reduce maintenance and repair costs by using standardised components that are easier to replace.
• Modularization improves product lifecycle management, allowing organisations to regulate the entire process from design to disposal.

Conclusion: Scaling Modularisation is worth the effort.

Scaling modular product design throughout your company can be difficult, but the results are well worth the effort. By assembling a strong technical team, investing in digital technologies, and clearly defining roles and duties, your organisation can realise the full potential of modularisation.

With Modular5’s help, your company may overcome capacity constraints, optimise processes, and create a streamlined, modular product portfolio.

If you’re ready to take modularisation to the next level, please watch the video above and contact us for additional information on how Modular5 may help you.

From offshored engineering solutions to strategic advising, we’re here to help you get the most out of modular product design in low-volume, high-mix markets.

Watch the video to learn more, and then contact us today!