The first part of this paper discusses from a conceptual perspective the impact that the fit between product architecture and organizational capability has on competitive performance. Integral product architecture is compatible with capability to integrate after a project starts, while a modular...

This paper reports the results of an international comparison of productivity in automotive product development in Japan, the U.S. and Europe. This comparative survey was commenced by Harvard University in 1985. The first survey analyzed data from the 1980s, and detailed results showing the...

In this paper we attempt to integrate the open view of manufacturing on the basis of design into the theory of comparative advantage, one of the bases of the theory of industrial competitiveness. That is to say, we propose a "theory of design-based comparative advantage" from the standpoint that...

This paper attempts an empirical analysis of the "architecture theory" proposition developed by Fujimoto Takahiro in his "A Note on Comparative Advantage of Architectures," namely, that the organizational abilities in integration-based manufacturing that Japanese firms built up during the...

In this paper I investigate the issue of increasing complexity of artifacts today from the viewpoint of design theory. To be more specific, I interpret products supplied to markets by firms to be "artifacts" (things that are designed), and analyze various factors that make them complex or...

In the so-called "architecture theory," an anticipated proposition is that many Japanese companies, which have built up organizational ability in "integration-based manufacturing" during the postwar period, excel at manufacturing products featuring "integral architecture," and therefore such...

This publication is in Japanese. Neither an English translation of the publication nor an English abstract is available.

Shorter development lead times, other things being equal, contribute to competitive advantages in many of today's industries where market needs and available technologies are difficult to predict, rapidly changing or diversified and where novelty is highly valued in the market. In this paper, we...

The present situations and future prospects of the Japanese automobile industry are discussed. Selected topics in this paper include the following: analyses of the basic product-industry characteristics of the automobile (e.g., product architecture); the mature of the dynamic competition in the...