Model-Based System Architecture

Preface

Reacting to market needs on time with systems of high quality and marketable costs is a strong competitive advantage. Once a market need has been identified, multiple disciplines are involved in developing a system toward it. They need to collaborate closely and each according to a precise understanding of the own contribution to the system development. Effective communication and the creation of understanding for the whole system of interest are keys for the success. Organizations are facing a more and more dynamic environment, and at the same time, an increasing organizational complexity of distributed teams and stakeholders, and an increasing technical complexity of more heterogeneous relationships between system components and their environment. This context requests an explicit and sustainable system architecture.

Each of the engineering disciplines contributing to system development needs specific views for obtaining the needed insight. System models enable the creation of consistent sets of stakeholder-specific views. People using them gain a fast and comprehensible understanding of the system they are developing, which can help them choose appropriate solutions for fulfilling the market needs. All the views look on the same data baseline. There is no effort to consolidate redundant data or to clarify misunderstandings of inconsistent information and the costs of resulted errors.

A system architect needs to shape the system architecture well for realizing a successful ...