Development and launch of new products is a critical activity for CPG industries like Food and Cosmetic. To do this, beCPG offers project management for New Product Development (or New Product Introduction NPI) which relies on several tools:
- the workflow engine
- the product repository to manage specifications
- the formulation to take in account business rules
- reports to facilitate monitoring of R&D studies
- collaborative spaces to work in teams on projects
According to Stevens, G.A. and Burley:
- For every 4 projects that enter development, only 1 makes it to the market
- At launch, at least 1 of 3 products fail despite research and planning
- An estimated 46% of all resources allocated to product development and commercialization by U.S. firms is spent on products that are cancelled or fail to yield an adequate financial return
Of course, the NPD management can be customized to best suit your needs.
Workflows
The workflows define:
- the sequence of the process steps
- actors
- alerts, reminders and deadlines
So, they automate milestone between actors. Here is an example of NPD workflow:
Repository
The repository stores information about products and R&D projects by defining technical data:
- the type of data and constraints
- forms for User Interface
- rights
Reports to follow R&D studies
Reports and analysis cubes facilitate the monitoring of R&D engineering to determine:
- where are your projects
- who works on projects
- the delayed projects, those in advance
So, you have an overview of your R&D projects.
Collaborative sites
The duration of projects and the growing number of actors require the creation of collaborative workspaces that allow:
- creating a virtual team for the project
- sharing project information (planning, documents, reports, emails, etc …)
- having a project structure with expected deliverables
- sharing of content in real time
- accessing to information from your PC, tablet or smartphone
Sources
1. Stevens, G.A. and Burley, J. – 3,000 Raw Ideas = 1 Commercial Success!, (May/June 1997) Research Technology Management, Vol. 40, #3, pp. 16-27.