Systems Engineering for the Digital Age

Chapter 15Set‐Based Design: Foundations for Practice

Shawn Dullen and Dinesh Verma

Stevens Institute of Technology, School of Systems and Enterprises, Hoboken, NJ, USA

What Is Set‐Based Design?

Set‐based design (SBD), so‐named by Allan Ward in a study of the Toyota approach sponsored by the Air Force Office of Scientific Research, is an analysis method in which designers focus on design alternatives at both the conceptual and parametric levels (Ward et al. 1995). It differs from point‐based design evaluation in that SBD preserves consideration of multiple alternatives, and does so through allowing different specialty groups in the process to each consider the design space independently. As elimination of inferior alternatives occurs, the sets gradually narrow until there is convergence upon a final solution. This avoids extensive iteration commonly found in point‐based methods and enables a design team to perform a more informed, holistic assessment by preserving more design options longer in the process.

SBD, combined with concurrent engineering, forms set‐based concurrent engineering (SBCE), which is the core component of the lean product development process. SBCE has been synonymous with Toyota's SBCE process, which has three principles (Sobek II et al. 1999): (1) map the design space, (2) integrate by intersection, and (3) establish feasibility before commitment. This concept is illustrated in Figure 15.1.

The first principle is to map the design space, which includes defining ...