Product development (PD) processes are complex and unstructured compared to business or manufacturing processes, as they have iterative, evolutionary, uncertain, and cooperative features. In order to effectively manage and control a complex PD process, appropriate and logical descriptions are needed. This requires a modeling framework that can capture its characteristics. However, previous modeling methodologies are limited in terms of representing the characteristics. To cope with this limitation, we propose a modeling framework that can address the typical features of the PD process. To this end, we classify PD characteristics systematically and define modeling constructs for the PD process with modeling patterns and parameters. The proposed modeling framework will provide engineers and managers with a basis for planning, organizing, analyzing, and monitoring complex PD processes effectively.

Recently, the optimisation of end-of-life (EOL) product recovery processes has been highlighted. At the inspection phase after disassembly, each part can have various recovery options such as reuse, reconditioning, remanufacturing, and disposal. Depending on the selected options of parts, the values of recovered products that are made by reassembling parts will be different. Hence, it is important to decide appropriate recovery options of parts at the treatment of EOL products, in order to maximise the values of recovered products. To this end, this study deals with a decision making problem to select the best recovery options of parts for minimising the total recovery cost of products under quality constraints. This problem is formulated with a mixed integer nonlinear programming model and heuristic search algorithms are proposed to resolve it. A case study for a turbocharger product is introduced with computational experiments of the proposed algorithms.

Recently, wind power plants that generate wind energy with electricity are attracting a lot of attention thanks to their smaller installation area and cheaper power generation costs. In wind power generation, it is important to predict the amount of generated electricity because the power system would be unstable due to uncertainty in supply. However, it is difficult to accurately predict the amount of wind power generation because the power varies due to several causes, such as wind speed, wind direction, temperature, etc. In this study, we deal with a mid-term (one day ahead) wind power forecasting problem with a data-driven approach. In particular, it is intended to solve the problem of a newly completed wind power generator that makes it very difficult to predict the amount of electricity generated due to the lack of data on past power generation. To this end, a deep learning based transfer learning model was proposed and compared with other models, such as a deep learning model without transfer learning and Light Gradient Boosting Machine (LGBM). As per the experimental results, when the proposed transfer learning model was applied to a similar wind power complex in the same region, it was confirmed that the low predictive performance of the newly constructed generator could be supplemented.

Recently the optimisation of end-of-life (EOL) computer remanufacturing has been highlighted since a big amount of used computers have been disposed of every year. Each part inspected after disassembling EOL computers can have various EOL options such as reuse, repair, reconditioning and so on. Depending on EOL options, recovered values and costs of parts will be different. Hence, in order to maximise the profit of remanufactured computers, it is important to develop the method as to how to decide the EOL options of computer parts. To this end, this study deals with a decision-making problem to select the best EOL option policy of the computer parts for maximising the total profit of computer remanufacturing considering its incurred costs and demand of remanufactured computers during multiple production periods. In particular, to maximise the total profit, the conditional repair option is newly proposed. To resolve the problem, a genetic search algorithm and an ant colony search algorithm have been developed. Computational experiments have carried out to evaluate the algorithms and the proposed conditional repair option.