Proposal of a global product development strategy assessment tool and its application in the Italian industrial context

The paper describes the construction of a new GPD strategy assessment tool. To better comprehend the current state of knowledge on GPD, a wide state-of-the-art analysis was implemented. Starting from the evidenced lacks, a specific questionnaire was structured, trying to recover information from the field. This allowed assessing the current Italian situation on a sample of 20 companies, equally distributed among SMEs and MNCs. Data were inserted into a database and classified both with cluster and qualitative analyses. Results were used to define the triad of classification axes constituting the final GPD strategy assessment tool. This new tool is able to acquire technical, geographical and strategical information. Furthermore, it can map the suitability of organisational structures, IT infrastructures and GPD strategies evolution. The assessment is virtually supported by a 3D representation and it could be useful to evaluate both ‘as is’ and ‘to be’ states.