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A Bright Spot @ Kodak--Pt. 2 of The Digimaster Story |
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This month's article is Part 2 (see November 2012 for Part 1) of the remarkable story about product reliability development and reliability that has not only lasted for 14 years, but has increased across a product platform and family of derivatives because of the use of Critical Parameter Development & Management (CPD&M) and what I call "deep" Systems Engineering that was begun in 1995!
In late 2012, I asked the folks at Kodak's Digimaster Printing Business Unit to illustrate how they have added functions and features to the product that was launched in 1999. The picture below is what the Digimaster looks like today!
As you can see, this is a large complex printing system, quite a bit more so than the product I worked on in the late 1990's. The last 3 digits in each model number indicate the speed at which the system produces a page. For example, 110 means 110 pages per minute. You can see that this number started at 110 and goes to 300 starting in 2009! The product you see above is a fully-featured digital production system that has been extended in speed, performance, print job management, image quality, paper handling, printed media security features, flexibility and most importantly for our purposes - reliability.
The Digimaster has added many new modular components to enhance its finishing capabilities. Each one of these places higher demands on overall system reliability. See the illustration below:
Enhanced Productivity and Speed
Along with enhanced finishing capabilities, Kodak engineers were tasked with increasing the speed at which the whole system operated. The high volume printing industry measures productivity using Average Monthly Duty Cycle of pages produced. Here we see the history of speed increases (impressions per minute) to support increases in Monthly Duty Cycle in Millions of pages.
To get this kind of productivity with all the enhanced finishing capabilities--while increasing reliability--takes great discipline and rigorous commitment to CPD&M. "Ordinary" engineering methods simply cannot produce these kinds of results. You can't do "build-test-fix" forms of ad hoc development and have much of a chance of obtaining the results seen in the next illustration (note: the x-axis is the year, the y-axis is Mean Images Between Service Calls, in thousands).
This is a truly remarkable plot of Mean Images Between Service Calls over Kodak's timeline of productivity and finishing accessory extension and enhancement. To give the reader a sense of what this increasing line slope really means, reliability "law" states that for each added function the reliability equation follows a path controlled by multiplication of expected probabilities or the product rule: R = P1 x P2 x P3 x .... So for every new function (P) you must account for the probability of that function occurring in light of expected performance. The more functions you add, the more difficult it becomes to hold the current expected reliability (R). Now these guys not only held the reliability - they increased it! Trust me, it takes outstanding engineering and system integration to produce this kind of reliability growth. It's a wonderful thing and should give us all confidence to insist on doing things right the first time using CPD&M.
I am frequently asked if CPD&M methods can deliver sustainable, long-term results. Am I able to prove, with real data from real products, that it is worth the time and effort to conduct systems engineering this way? This article has the facts, with a timeline from 1999 up to 2012 - 13 years of post-launch continuous improvement built on a base-line platform that was developed using CPD&M. This product makes money for Kodak and that goes right to the bottom line.
A Life-Cycle Commitment
To obtain this kind of product portfolio life-cycle performance, you have to maintain the ability to do this unique kind of systems engineering, project management and robust product design. Many of the same people who developed the Digimaster in the mid '90s have remained on the team that produces this enhanced product today. There is great value in maintaining the people, as well as this specific engineering competence, for a long-term business that can build a brand such as the Digimaster. It's a remarkable bright spot within Eastman Kodak that deserves recognition for the excellence that resides within Kodak to this day.
I don't know what the future holds for Kodak, but if the Commercial Printing Business that is to emerge from Chapter 11 bases their future technology and product development on the rigor and discipline the Digimaster Team has faithfully followed since 1995, when we first became a "team", there is a reasonable likelihood that Kodak will build the future its current leaders are forecasting. We'll stay tuned to see how those events unfold. In the mean time - stay faithful to your commitment to practice CPD&M; these facts prove it's worth the effort!
A very happy and productive new year to each of you!
(note: Kodak and Digimaster are trademarks of Eastman Kodak Company. Images courtesy of Eastman Kodak Company.) |
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Sincerely, |
Carol Biesemeyer
Business Manager and Newsletter Editor Product Development Systems & Solutions Inc. See the Archive of PDSS Newsletters |
