Product structures and product configuration : a comparing study

Today there is an increasing demand for individually tailored products with short delivery times. This demand can be satisfied with configurable products, which can be easily customized according to customer specifications. The purpose of the thesis is to perform a comparing study of how Ericsson GSM Systems, and few other companies have structured their products and how they are handling the product configuration process. The focus areas are the sales structure, which is how the customer views the product, the configuration from customer requirements to orderable products, and the support systems used for handling the configuration. In this comparing study, a few things that can be of interest for GSM Systems have been found. Examples of this are to place a configuration sale tool on Internet, and to have country or customer specific configurable products for some large customers or markets. There are not many observations that could be directly translated and useful for GSM Systems, but it is still of great interest to get knowledge of how other companies are working, and how far GSM Systems have reached in their work with configurable product packages. In my view, GSM Systems have reached reasonably far. The company still has some problem areas, but they are aware of, and working on most of them.Validerat; 20101217 (root