The Feasibility Study is part of our Strategic Development Process tools, which offers a glimpse of the anticipated design, development, engineering and manufacturing issues in order to determine the best approach to mass manufacturing.
The Feasibility Study can help to prevent investing in a process that is either not optimal, or needs to be changed. Both of these situations are costly and aggravating, and most of time, preventable. Although the formal “study” is not always initially requested, it can prove invaluable when high production volumes are required or it involves multiple components systems.

Although each study is tailored to the specifics of the particular situation, there are general goals that are common to all:

• find method that minimizes tooling costs
• identify scenario that offers simplest assembly method
• identify any new materials or processing technologies and possible application
• define relationships between parts appearance and viable manufacturing costs
• determine if a method can deliver required tolerances
• access overall trade-offs between potential methods
• find method that will minimize part cost of a key component
• look for part consolidation opportunities

The key aspect of the results is that the feasibility study assists corporate decision-makers in evaluating the real world ramifications and costs associated with a given approach before it is pursued.