The voice of the customer--Part 2: Benchmarking battery chargers against the Consumer's Ideal Product.
The Rehabilitation Engineering Research Center on Technology Evaluation and Transfer is exploring how the end users of assistive technology devices define the ideal device. This work is called the Consumer Ideal Product program. In this work, end users identify and establish the importance of a broad range of product design features, along with the related product support and service provided by manufacturers and vendors. This paper describes a method for systematically transforming end-user defined requirements into a form that is useful and accessible to product designers, manufacturers, and vendors. In particular, product requirements, importance weightings, and metrics are developed from the Consumer Ideal Product battery charger outcomes. Six battery charges are benchmarked against these product requirements using the metrics developed. The results suggest improvements for each product's design, service, and support. Overall, the six chargers meet roughly 45-75% of the ideal product's requirements. Many of the suggested improvements are low-cost changes that, if adopted, could provide companies a competitive advantage in the marketplace.
Bauer
S M
SM
Rehabilitation Engineering Research Center on Technology Evaluation and Transfer, University of New York at Buffalo 14214, USA.
Lane
J P
JP
Stone
V I
VI
Unnikrishnan
N
N
D019985:Benchmarking; D003258:Consumer Behavior; D003365:Costs and Cost Analysis; D004465:Economic Competition; D011211:Electric Power Supplies / Q000191:economics / Q000592:standards*; D004867:Equipment Design; D004869:Equipment Safety; D005246:Feedback; D017144:Focus Groups; D006801:Humans; D008370:Manuals as Topic; D011786:Quality Control; D012046:Rehabilitation / Q000295:instrumentation; D013672:Technology / Q000295:instrumentation; D014910:Wheelchairs / Q000191:economics / Q000592:standards