INVESTIGATING ON THE RISE OF MODULARITY DURING THE CONCEPTUAL DESIGN PHASE
DS 77: Proceedings of the DESIGN 2014 13th International Design Conference
                        Year: 2014
                        Editor: Marjanovic Dorian, Storga Mario, Pavkovic Neven, Bojcetic Nenad
                        Author: Fiorineschi, L.; Rissone, P.; Rotini, F.
                        Series: DESIGN
                        Section: DESIGN PROCESSES
                        Page(s): 811-820
                        
Abstract
Literature acknowledges modular architectures to give rise to a series of positive effects, and advantages given by considering modularity early in the design process have also been inferred. However, current modularization methods operate only after, at least, a preliminary conceptual design process. But, although informally, modularity needs may arise also in such an early design phase. The aim of the present paper is to perform some preliminary investigations about a research approach aimed at analysing the occurrences of modularity issues during the concept design phase of a new product.
Keywords: modularity, conceptual design, design process