Use of product and production modularity in the automotive industry: A comparative analysis of vehicles developed with the involvement of Brazilian engineering centers

Modularity is a strategy adopted by many industrial sectors, either in product development or in industrial production configuration. In this sense, this paper investigates the key elements of modularity in design and production, seeking to formulate a proposal aimed to assess and compare the degree of modularity specifically in the context of the Brazilian automotive industry. The comparison was done considering vehicles developed with the participation of Brazilian engineering centre. Five key conceptual elements of modularity in design and four other elements of modular production were extracted from the literature and applied in the selected units of analysis. As a main result, we developed a categorization matrix for analyzing the modular degree of six vehicles. Fiat Palio's design was considered as the highest degree of modularity in design and the GM plant at Gravataí (Celta) as the more typical modular organization within the studies vehicles and respective assemblers, based on the applied methodology