Hubbell Sheds Light on New Product Development
Kevin Poyck, vice president of Engineering for Hubbell Lighting, faces some of the same challenges of managing chaos that other presenters at this event have shared. He broke down for the audience what they face in product design for any one of their lighting products: multiple considerations in each of these categories – thermal, optics, electrical, aesthetics and mechanical.
They analyzed their product development process to determine the value stream. They quantified 6 months of a typical 12-16-month process was non-value add. For example, a lot of time was wasted spent on document searching.
Hubbell is leveraging Teamcenter to turn this around. It is the technology arm of their People, Process, Technology strategy. When they were looking for a data management tool, they needed one that:
- centralized document access
- provided configuration flexibility
- provided workflow management
- enabled voice of the customer requirements
- and enabled best practice feedback.
So far, overall team productivity has increased by 14%.
One interesting takeaway from this event is how innovative 100+ – year-old companies are. I guess you’d assume this is the case to stay in business that long. But it’s encouraging to see how companies of this size and with such large amounts of legacy continue to reinvent themselves. Read more about Hubbell’s history here.
