Computer‐aided SPC and cybernetic view on quality control

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to put forward the view that systems theory, cybernetics, information theory, and dissipative structure theory should be the fundamental principles underlying quality management. These “new sciences” relate to quality management not just in terms of philosophy but also in the requirements of the well‐structured quantitative analysis methods. Design/methodology/approach – Discusses several issues in quality management and control from the views of the new sciences, then proposes the concept of computer‐aided statistical process control (CASPC) to bridge traditional statistical process control and automatic process control, and the use of ARIMA models to achieve CASPC for linear systems. Findings – Notes that there are implications of the new sciences for quality control and presents a discussion of same. Originality/value – Is of value by pointing out that computer‐aided statistical process control for dynamic systems can be the realistic way of leading towards more advanced systematic control approaches.