QFD As A Necessary Catalyst In Infrastructure Innovation

58

20th INTERNATIONAL SYMPOSIUM ON QUALITY FUNCTION DEPLOYMENT

S03

QFD As A Necessary Catalyst In Infrastructure Innovation

Tjerk Gorter 1, Biljana Visnjicki 2

1 Qanbridge Strategy and Innovation [email protected] Netherlands2 Coddel Business Development [email protected] Netherlands Abstract

Worldwide, there is a strong need for infrastructure innovation. Flood protection, safe

drinking water, better road networks for enhanced safety, reduction of food waste, waste

management, clean mobility, there is a crying need for significant infrastructure

improvement. The related programme budgets range from several million to several billion

euro investments. The infrastructure innovations more often than not are characterized by

high technical complexity, involvement of many stakeholders, endless rules and regulations

and thus long decision-making processes. As a result, the quality and speed of public

innovation in most cases does not match the (urgent) need for infrastructure improvement.

This too often leads to intolerable situations, ranging from the recent disastrous flooding in

the Balkan (22.000 square kilometers flooded, estimated damage $ 4.5 billion) and earlier

disaster in and around New Orleans to out-of-control pollution and congestion in major

cities. There is no silver bullet for improving the speed and effectiveness of public

innovation. That said, the structured, transparent and integrating methodology of modern

QFD could well be a key catalyst to significantly improve and accelerate innovation in the

public domain. In The Netherlands, focused programmes have been launched to achieve

exactly this. This paper is not about a new sophisticated tool in modern QFD nor does it

describe the application of modern QFD in the development of a highly complex piece of

equipment. This paper describes how modern QFD can make a significant and necessary

difference in the design and realization of modern infrastructure.

Keywords

VOC, innovation, smart infrastructure

59


1. Introduction: the enormous task of infrastructure innovation

Governments of all nations are faced with a host of infrastructure-related challenges that

are both substantial and complex. Some of these challenges are specific for certain regions,

e.g. the reduction of severe food waste in developing economies, a problem leaving 842

million people go hungry every day [1]. Some challenges spread across developing and

developed economies, for example the struggle of developing cities to absorb the ongoing

urbanization and autonomous growth of the population whilst ensuring an good quality of

life and a minimal environmental/energy burden. To keep populations save and dry,

existing levees have to be replaced by a new generation that is “erosion free” and able to

withstand higher sea levels. Road safety has to improve despite higher traffic flows, the

effect of an aging population and the increasing level of distraction of drivers due to feature

rich cars that are continuously on-line. And to stick with the example of roads: not only

road safety is an issue, these roads need to have a lower total cost of ownership, emit less

noise, cause zero pollution to the ground water, allow higher traffic flows per square meter

of road surface and so on. All buildings, private and public, must be re-invented in order to

achieve maximum mental and physiological health of their users (maximizing their well-

being, productivity and learning performance) and to minimize the use of non-sustainable

energy and non-recyclable materials. These are just a few examples from a long list of

public responsibilities.

The related innovations require at a global scale, trillions of dollars of investments. The

challenge for both the commissioning governments and the executing private parties is to

realize the desired innovations in a framework of ever-tighter constraints. The combination

of the rapidly growing population, much tighter constraints dictated by the need for more

sustainable solutions and a coming tidal wave of end-of-life cycle infrastructure

replacement in many developed economies will require both technical ingenuity and taking

the innovation process to a next level in terms of methodologies applied and tightness of

the cooperation between all parties involved.

Are the innovations in infrastructure keeping up with the need for infrastructure

improvement? This is always a subjective to judgment. An article in The Economist of

March 22nd 2014 states: “If you have been to New York’s La Guardia airport recently,

taken a train during London’s rush hour, tried to drive in Lagos or endured one of India’s

ubiquitous power cuts, you will have first-hand knowledge of the world’s infrastructure

60


deficit. According to the World Economic Forum, global spending on basic

infrastructure—transport, power, water and communications—currently amounts to $2.7

trillion a year when it ought to be $3.7 trillion. The gap is almost as big as South Korea’s

GDP. And it is likely to grow fast.” [2] The article goes on, suggesting that public

investments will not be sufficient to close the gap between required and actual

infrastructural innovation. It states: “The potential pot of gold is elsewhere, in the $50

trillion of capital managed by pension funds, sovereign-wealth funds, insurance companies

and other institutional investors. Only 0.8% of this is currently allocated to infrastructure. A

tenfold increase would be a good target.”

2. Modern QFD as core element in accelerating infrastructure innovation in

developed economies

The challenges of infrastructure renewal are too vast to cover in one article. For this paper

we will narrow it down to relatively high-tech innovation in infrastructure in the developed

economies. This covers for example the development and implementation of sustainable

industry estates, smart levees, new water purification systems, smart roads and lightweight

bridges. We will describe an effective and stimulating inroad to strengthening those

responsible for public innovation in the way they challenge and steer the industry to come

up with smart, affordable and lasting solutions for the difficult renovations and innovations

in public infrastructure now on our doorstep. The core of this approach is modern QFD

[3],[4],[5].

For national, regional and municipal governments, improving the process of specification

of new solutions is probably the key to making a quantum leap in the quality of solutions

for the complex infrastructure challenges they have to deal with. Moving from the classic

“call for proposals” and public tendering approach towards a much more professional

modern QFD based way of working may take these public players to a next and necessary

level of performance as an effective principal for public renovation and innovation projects.

In addition it will enable the private partners, i.e. the industry and engineering companies,

to develop significantly better products and systems. This way, the industry and

engineering companies will develop solutions that are strongly differentiating and will help

them to open up international markets.

61


3. Hurdles in the current practice of infrastructure innovation

The current innovation approach in many countries has a built-in handbrake. This

handbrake is the classic way of defining the specifications of a renovation or innovation in

infrastructure.

Current standard practice is that once municipal, regional or national government have

decided to repair, renew or replace an infrastructural object, they define an outline request

for proposals, that is vented out to a number of parties, the tender. Usually the requirements

put in the document are more or less standard sets of requirements for the object in

question, e.g. a new stretch of road, to which a number of situation specific requirements

have been added. This outline request for proposals is then the start of a supplier selection

and negotiation procedure. Candidate suppliers are challenged, within fairly standard

constraints like budget, throughput time, rules & regulations and risk profiles to come up

with technical and project-management proposals. An accepted practice with some serious

built-in weaknesses: in most cases, there is insufficient insight in the real need of the

relevant stakeholders (infra users, maintenance teams, local residents, local companies,..),

the dominant logic is far too much that of price negotiation rather than bundling brains

across the public and private domain to come up with real breakthrough solutions.

Tight rules and regulations have forced the government in a corner that they hardly can or

dare to interact with private parties without even creating the impression that they are

providing un-allowed support to individual companies. Another worrying driver is the fact

that in many cases the government does not have the in-depth know-how and competencies

to fully define the required functionalities of a solution that satisfies the most important

needs of the key stakeholders in a future proof way.

Currently, governmental organisations often belief or hope that this handicap is solved

through the tender process, in which companies will stretch to the best possible solutions at

a very competitive price. In reality, in the majority of cases this does not work and the more

complex the challenge, the less effective this approach. One obvious shortcoming is that

potential suppliers are tempted to sell their existing solutions, with or without minor

modifications, whether it has an optimal fit with the desired customer benefits or not.

Another more serious shortcoming is that by working with a standard template-like

approach, the government has not invested sufficient time and energy to obtain an in-depth,

integrated understanding of the aspects of the required renovation or innovation. This

increases the risk of non-effective solutions and limits the chances of creating value beyond

62


the obvious. A regional government can for example order twelve kilometers of road

repair, i.e. a new road surface using commodity tarmac and some additional requirements

with respect to rain water handling, cost of maintenance, ground water pollution and road

noise. This will result in a price driven competition for the assignment, with quality of

project and risk management as underlying factors. The new stretch of road will be

realized, however a host of (latent) needs of road users, maintenance companies, insurance

companies, citizens living adjacent to the road, health organisations and others will not be

fulfilled. In other words, a host of benefits that could have been realized in domains like

road safety, more stringent noise reduction, environmental progress like avoiding of salting

the roads in winter time, reduced fuel consumption, much higher “utilization rate per m2

tarmac” (e.g. through dynamic lining) will not even be looked at.

What would have happened if the government would not use a standard template tender

approach but would start the projects with an in-depth need analysis of the key

stakeholders? We will answer this question on basis of a number of recent (and on-going)

cases of infrastructure innovation in The Netherlands.

4. Industrial cooperation and new ways of innovation

4.1. AMMON (Advanced Manufacturing and Materials Eastern Netherlands)

AMMON is a programme for industrial co-operation in the eastern part of The Netherlands

that aims to enable established companies like Royal Ten Cate, Pentair and TKH, that have

been predominantly parts suppliers, to team up and develop further towards a position of

innovative systems suppliers. The programme already has led to many new systems. An

example is GreenSource, an artificial turf field developed in first instance for Africa and

Asia that enables children to play and do sports but that also delivers fully reliable drinking

water as a turnkey system. For many communities this means that for the first time in their

existence they are no longer dependent on trucks with plastic water containers with more or

less clean water that will or will not arrive on time in the village… Currently, the unreliable

water quality leads to a lot of disease and diarrhea…

Many AMMON projects are business-to-business, but more than half of the projects are

aimed at large step infrastructure innovation. This way, AMMON should provide the

63


government with breakthrough solutions against a lower total cost of ownership, helping

the state to handle its innovation agenda as well as its huge infrastructure investments. The

companies are supported to build demonstrators of their innovative designs and to have the

government as a launching customer to enable faster ramp up to higher volume production

and sales which speeds up cash flow and lowers their cost price, important factors for

business development. In theory a smart set up and win-win situation, but as it turns out, in

practice a tough challenge to realize the first concrete projects. The Programme Director of

AMMON, Tjerk Gorter, together with its technology director, Martin Olde Weghuis of

Royal Ten Cate, observed the cumbersome attempts to get infrastructure innovation off the

ground. They both realized the huge value that could be generated if only innovation

across the interface of the public and private domain could indeed be taken to a next level.

The vast worldwide market for infrastructure solutions, the often-urgent need for solutions,

the AMMON partners with their well-matched technologies and need to move further into

system innovations …. a golden match. The question was: how to significantly and

systematically improve the quality and speed of innovation at the interface of industry and

government to unleash this potential?

As said, there is no silver bullet, yet QFD was taken as an important building block for this

joint innovation. Since the beginning of the AMMON programme in 2008 modern QFD

“light” was used to boost the quality of the projects. Modern QFD naturally guides the

AMMON partner companies from their dominant focus on traditional manufacturing

quality control to product design quality control. It is also a perfect platform to support

companies in their development towards the broader business scope of system developers

and solution providers. Gorter and Olde Weghuis decided that to unlock the innovation

potential of infrastructure innovation, especially at the interface with the government,

modern QFD should be much broader deployed in AMMON and peripheral infrastructure

innovation projects.

4.2 Case 1: The start: transforming the renewal of an industrial estate

Openness: The power of the beginners’ mind

The first case is a renovation of an industrial estate in the town of Haaksbergen.

Haaksbergen is a small town blessed with a municipal government with an open, curious

mindset. Their standard method of specification of infrastructure projects was fairly much

64


“the classic template approach”. In this case, one of the potential industrial project partners

was member of AMMON and thus had some basic familiarity with the power of the QFD-

process. The company invited Dr Biba Visnjicki to introduce a Voice-of-the-Customer

approach to the municipal government and other stakeholders. The key players of the

municipality were curious and decided to give this a chance. In a good dialogue with the

municipal government they decided, as an experiment, to change from a classic generic

“specification & tender” process to a QFD based approach.

This led to a different start, namely a voice-of-the-customer process with nine key

stakeholders, from governmental managers, companies established at the industrial estate to

architects. All were part of a VoC searching for the benefits they would like to get out of a

newly developed industrial estate. A systematic, open-minded approach through which the

municipal government obtained wholly new insights in what economic and societal benefits

an innovated industrial estate could bring in the future. An approach that also provided a

much better insight of what is important to industrial parties at the industrial estate, opening

doors for Haaksbergen to create conditions that would really attract new companies to the

town, strengthening its local economy and employment. The result of the VoC was the

development of an integrated concept of a fully sustainable industrial estate with smart

underlying technological solutions that can be exported to a host of other towns.

Instead of doing a straightforward maintenance project with some small innovation steps

(reflecting tarmac in combination with dynamic lighting to save energy) the project has

now developed into a much richer design that integrates road management, area security,

park and green belt management, water management up to the creating employment for

people with a minor mental handicap in joint services for the industrial partners. A value

creation embraced by all stakeholders. One of the local companies, Unipro, a focused and

successful market leader in development, manufacturing and renovation of sustainable

flooring systems, provided great support in the project.

The project was an interesting learning for the local government but equally for companies

established at the industrial estate and the consortium that was formed to realize the plans.

One of the consortium parties initially showed strong resistance to the VoC approach,

claiming that it was too time consuming. The manager indicated he was under pressure of

his management to shorten the route to sales. It is an old wisdom that the longest path

between two points is a shortcut. By taking the VoC approach a much richer and much

more differentiating concept has been developed, creating significant value for

65


Haaksbergen and at the same time leading to much higher commercial value for the

consortium partners.

4.3 Main case: building an innovation platform between regional government, local

government, the user community and industrial players

The strategists of the Province of Overijssel, led by Cees Timmer, through their strong

participation in the architecture of the AMMON programme, became increasingly aware of

some current weaknesses in infrastructure innovation. AMMON introduced the principles

of QFD to the joint industry innovation projects. The development of GreenSource,

mentioned earlier, is one of them. Others include a new municipal water purification

systems (membrane bio reactor that combines biological treatment with UF membrane

separation), the design of new permanent levees, new temporary levees (fast to install

“replacement of the sandbag”), a smart low cost flow controller (to manage the different

energy contents of various gas sources feeding the grid both financially and for reasons of

payment systems), new composite bridges, the (soccer) stadium of the future and a

breakthrough One Step Filter that combines 6 different water treatment steps in one

application. These innovations were the product of the co-operation of leading innovators

from the various AMMON industrial companies. However, the innovation in joint, public –

private projects with the government as launching customer was hard to get going.

The Province of Overijssel took a bold step: in 2014 it approved a million investment

programme that is to run to 2017 to initiate breakthrough infrastructure innovations, taking

the role of launching customer. It decided to kick-start cross-university and industry

innovation from the Business and Science Park Twente (KennisPark Twente) in city of

Enschede. The new launching customer approach must result in better quality infrastructure

innovation, leading to better solutions for the government and power export products of the

industry partners involved. An important spin-off is this tangible initiative must attract high

tech companies as well as individual talent to the region. The industry already for a long

time expressed a strong need for the government to act as a launching customer, so when

the “Launching Customership” programme was announced this was strongly welcomed by

all regional players. The Provincie Overijssel assigned Mrs Jantsje Op de Hoek, responsible

for ensuring sound public innovation investment policies and deployment, as manager of

the programme.

66


As a very high-level indication of “needs”, the Provincie of Overijssel defined four key

domains of (public) innovation for the programme: Sustainability, Mobility, Safety, Health

& Productivity. The assignment now is to identify the key needs of the stakeholders related

to those domains and define projects to fulfill them. Obviously, normal economics apply:

each case must have a sound business case. Solutions developed for the Business and

Science Park preferably should be exportable to other markets inside and outside The

Netherlands.

Mrs Op de Hoek, supported by Dr Biba Visnjicki, developed a program that is perceived by

key stakeholders as a breakthrough in public innovation as it integrates four dimensions in

one approach, each of them totally new to those responsible for public innovation

1. a full-blown Voice-of-the-Customer approach

2. professional, quantified market intelligence

3. concept development using Maximum Value Tables

4. integrated monitoring of the innovation project portfolio in terms of progress with respect to the public challenges or innovation targets defined.

The learnings from the Haaksbergen case inspired the team to test a more rigorous

approach in the “VoC with the government”. In the Haaksbergen project, the VoC was

executed in multidisciplinary teams with all stakeholders, including the industrial parties

that would later be responsible for realizing the desired innovations. This worked well, but,

as said, short-term commercial motives of some of the players caused unrest in the project

execution. Therefore a new set up was tested in two projects, wherein as a first step the

VoC was executed by independent QFD experts, the municipal/regional government and

potential users of the infrastructure, for instance the users of and professional organisations

related to a new composite bridge for pedestrians and cyclists. Industrial parties that might

later obtain a role as contractor/supplier were to be involved in the next phase. Reason for

this first VoC step is to ensure a pure distillation of (latent) customer needs, without

influencing by industrial players. Most of the time industrial players point out possible

innovation steps in good faith, but it can never be free of commercial bias. Too early

and/or improper industry involvement can limit the real insights harvested from the VoC, it

can lead to “jumping to solutions” and last but not least it can be perceived by the public

parties as a lack of genuine interest in their needs and headaches or worse as a covered

attempt to sell products and services, causing them to become less open in the discussion.

On top of that, the independent VoC guarantees a totally open process in terms of later

supplier selection.

67


Fig

ure

1:

The

impl

emen

tati

on p

roce

ss m

ap o

f the

Lau

nchi

ng C

usto

mer

ship

pro

gram

me

68


For the Launching Customership programme, the top VoC was executed in two steps. First

the needs of the regional and local government were mapped. As a second step, a

comprehensive VoC of the local community was conducted to mine their (latent) needs in

the four public innovation domains defined by the Province of Overijssel. In total 135 voices

across 35 companies were worked-out. Additional interviews were done with the seven

largest companies in the Business and Science Park, in their role as users of the

infrastructure. As background research, five extensive reports on regional infrastructure

development over the period 2008 – 2014 were analysed.

The VoC has been executed following the modern QFD process flow, using the Customer

Needs Affinity diagram, the Customer Need Priorities with AHP. The results of the

Customer Needs Hierarchy Calculation are presented in figure 2.

The final selection of top community needs has been presented by using the Customer Needs

Hierarchy Diagram (figure 3).

69


Figure 2 Customer Needs Hierarchy Calculation Launching Customership programme

Values

Visibility

REPRESENTATIVE LOOK should to add value to my business

Memorable effects or objects to get innovation in focus

Attractive for new generations of young professionals to stay in the region

Attractive for outsiders to start new business

Full visibility and friendly and clear information of the facilitated companies

Total 3,70 3,86 3,39 3,56 3,16 3,85

Local priority: 25% 30% 14% 20% 6% 30%

Global priority: 7,6% 3,5% 5,0% 1,4% 7,5%

Values

Business integration, acceleration and

synergy

Area has to reflect clearly the power of UT innovation valorisation

Development of the area has to create conditions for local innovation to be demonstrated

Accessibility and confortable parking solutions

Public wifi Full visibility of next door business and businesses in same industry-market-business domain

Total 3,40 3,53 3,72 3,72 3,55 3,22

Local priority: 8% 19% 26% 26% 20% 8%

Global priority: 1,5% 2,1% 2,1% 1,6% 0,6%

Values

ComfortLife in working hours should contribute to thequality of life

Confortable commuting in any weather circumstances

Attractive and affordable coffee-lunch facilities

Nice walking routes: happy- healthy business hours

Fast and safe transfer from train station to UT

Total 3,41 3,62 3,36 3,64 3,62 3,75

Local priority: 8% 15% 12% 11% 21% 41%

Global priority: 1,2% 1,0% 0,9% 1,7% 3,3%

Values

SafetyCommuters should be

protected day and nightFacilities and surrounding should be protected from hooligans

Safe feeling for commuters andvisitors

Total 3,39 3,35 3,76 3,62

Local priority: 9% 20% 44% 36%

Global priority: 1,8% 4,0% 3,2%

Values

Maintenance

Maintenance by Gemeente is not sufficient. Has to be a joint effort in order to get a high quality place.

Park management has to be developed , first focus joint energy management

Smart solutions should minimised costs of maintenance

Total 3,78 3,40 3,25 3,76

Local priority: 30% 9% 6% 17%

Global priority: 2,7% 1,7% 5,2%

Values

Sustainability

Sustainability first targets: Reduction of energy consumption + alternative energy solutions

Sustainability as a general topic and business life style

Total 3,67 3,70 3,54

Local priority: 20% 17% 13%

Global priority: 5,0% 3,8%

70


Fig

ure

3C

usto

mer

Nee

ds H

iera

rchy

Dia

gram

Lau

nchi

ng C

usto

mer

ship

pro

gram

me

71


After conducting the VoC and identifying the key needs of the three main stakeholder

groups, a national team of experts has now started on concept development using the

Maximum Value Table principles.

Once the VoC has been fully executed, technical / industrial players are invited to learn the

true needs of the stakeholders. Using a Need – Functionality table, in a joint effort between

those responsible for the infrastructure, technology institutes and the industrial solutions

providers, the needs are translated to required functionalities of the solution. At this point,

the public parties feel comfortable, as they are sure their genuine needs form the basis of

this transition towards technological solutions. As a result of the industrial co-operation in

AMMON, the functionalities are taken on by a wide array of players and their

competencies, creating a platform for breakthrough technology and system development.

An example is the recent development of a prototype of a fully sustainable, non-polluting

crash barrier made from hemp composites. The transparency of the Need – Functionality-

table approach does help a great deal both in the in-depth approach towards effective

solutions and in the trust and mutual understanding between the public and private players.

The new approach, with a first VoC with the Province of Overijssel, the municipal

government of Enschede, potential users of the infrastructure and other non-commercial

stakeholders proved to work very well. It led to a sound definition of (latent) stakeholder

needs and the participants expressed strong appreciation of this way of working. A first

project, the composite bridge for pedestrians and cyclists, has been started. In the second

half of 2014, other projects will be defined on basis of the VoC and Maximum Value

Table. The Province of Overijssel has obtained many insights from these to steps, which

enables them to sharpen their objectives in the four innovation domains. Visnjicki and Op

de Hoek have defined a simple tool to monitor the project portfolio and the project results

on the one hand and the related fulfillment of the higher-level objectives of the Province of

Overijssel on the other.

72


5. Strengthening the abilities and motivation of talent in governmental organisations

One major hurdle in infrastructure innovation and especially in complex innovations (e.g.

full traffic bridges or new levees) is the level of domain know-how at the side of the

government. The downside of having insufficient technological expertise at the side of the

government is obvious. A principal that cannot sufficiently comprehend the technological

aspects of an infrastructural problem and the ins and outs of potential solutions loses its

grip and ends up in a position that it is too much at the mercy of contracted engineering

companies and industrial suppliers. As more and more people with a technological

background prefer working in the industry, several governmental organization foresee they

will suffer from a serious competency gap in the near future.

This lack of know-how in combination with a strong objective to minimize the total project

costs too often leads to giving the green light to ill-conceived project proposals made by the

lowest cost contender. This leads to sub-optimal or even non-working solutions. It shows

the deficiency of the European tender system, which hampers innovation and leads to huge

additional costs caused by the faulty solutions (legal issues, technical repairs etc). As a

consequence the “sharpest offer” way too often turns out to not only be a missed

opportunity in sustainable infrastructure improvement but also to be an expensive one.

To make matters worse, regional governments are increasingly struggling with a brain drain

as domain specialist retire and, as said, the in-flow of talent is insufficient. Therefore, for

the government it is important to be perceived (again) as an attractive employer for

technological talent. For this to work, it is essential the government can show that it is

working with passion, speed and quality on challenging innovations. Not in splendid

isolation, but in an open innovation interface with industry and research institutes.

During our projects, we experienced that QFD-approach not only provides a powerful tool

for the government to obtain better insights in the key needs and possible solutions beyond

the obvious. All participants, both from the industry and the government were strongly

motivated by the results, the systematic approach, the integration power and the strong

team effects of modern QFD. A way of working that effectively stimulates and attracts

talent.

6. Enabling the government to make larger innovation steps

When the governmental stakeholders are not certain about an infrastructural challenge and

its possibly solutions, as a natural consequence, the responsible managers of the

73


governmental organisations will seek to mitigate the perceived risks of a project. A clear

outcome both of the Haaksbergen project and the Launching Customership programme is

that the full involvement of the municipal respectively regional government in the

systematic definition, weighing and prioritizing of needs and their opportunity to obtain a

good insight in how these needs are integrated in the concept development, resulted in a

high level of trust of the regional and local government in the process, the parties involved

and the on-going concept development. This trust translates into open, more effective and

much faster cooperation between the parties involved.

The importance of joint, transparent processes cannot be overstressed. A lack of

transparency or insights leads to an overkill of risk mitigation. This will cause the issuing

government to hesitate to in larger-step innovations. In the best case it will seriously slow

down the innovation process, adding cost and postponing the harvesting of the desired

economic and societal benefits. In the worst case the government will not intervene in the

quality of the infrastructure at all, leading to New Orleans like situations.

Conclusions

Boosting the quality and speed of public-private innovation is key in addressing the huge

infrastructure challenges facing us. The complexity of the challenges too often causes

progress to be slow, even in areas where structural solutions are urgent. The logic,

transparency and trust between parties modern QFD creates in the process of infrastructure

innovation makes it a very powerful methodology that could play an important role in

creating the necessary acceleration and improvement in the way we take on the renewal of

our public infrastructure.

Acknowledgements

We would like to acknowledge importance of KennisPark Twente [7] as a facilitator of the

Launching Customership program. Especially we are grateful to Mrs. Jantjs Op de Hoek,

program manager, for allowing us to present the program and it’s first results.

74


References

1. Arbon, I.M.,(2014) “Cleantech Leapfrog To A More Food Secure World Report”

Institution of Mechanical Engineers, London, UK

2. The Economist, (2014) “Investing in infrastructure: The trillion-dollar gap”

available at: http://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21599358-how-get-more-

worlds-savings-pay-new-roads-airports-and-electricity

3. Visnjicki, B., Gorter, T., Mazur, G. (2013), “QFD as integrating framework for

differentiated business positioning, business development and related product

definition”, ISQFD'13- Santa Fe, 19th International Symposium on Quality

Function Deployment in Santa Fe, USA, 6-8 September 2013, pp. 71-84.

4. J.P. Ficalora, L. Cohen, “What are QFD and Six Sigma?” . INFORMIT, 2009

5. Yoji Akao, “QFD: Past, Present, and Future,” paper presented at the International

Symposium on QFD (1997).

6. Shigeru Mizuno and Yoji Akao, eds., Quality Function Deployment: A Company-

wide Quality Approach (Tokyo: JUSE Press, 1978).

7. KennisPark Twente www.kennispark.nl

About the Author(s)

Tjerk Gorter started his professional career at Philips Electronics, working in the field of

pre-competitive research cooperation, optoelectronics and real-time software engineering.

After 6 years he founded Createch, which focused on the development of decision support

software. As a partner in Rijnconsult he was responsible for Industry and Technology in the

group Topstructure and Strategy. He focused on strategy development for players in the

chemical, technical fibers, machine building and diagnostics industry. In 1999 he joined

Friesland Foods as Director Corporate Innovation and Technology, with global

responsibility for innovation and technology management, Corporate Research, strategy

development and business intelligence.

As a member of the Innovation and Technology Committee of the Dutch Employers

Federation he became actively involved in national innovation efforts. He has built four of

the private-public technology programmes. In 2005, Tjerk founded Qanbridge in 2005 as a

vehicle to support fast track business development, with an emphasis on companies

creating technology solutions that enable the development of sustainable businesses.

75


Tjerk is co-founder of PamGene a biomarker company. Tjerk’s current roles in Dutch

innovation include: Member non-executive board for Food & Nutrition Delta, Member

Supervisory Board Technology Foundation STW, progamme director of AMMON, the

regional industry-led innovation program for the Eastern Netherlands.

Biba Visnjicki started her professional career at “Stark” company in Serbia as a product

and business developer. In 1998 she become regional Managing Director of Mobile Oil for

the former Yugoslavia region. After finishing PhD studies she joined Demcom Twente

B.V. as Business Development Manager focusing on advanced methodologies for business

and product development practice.

She received a PhD for her research on renewable energy production from biomass at the

University of Twente’s Faculty of Science and Technology in the Netherlands. She

received QFD Black Belt status at the QFD Institute of America. Biba joined Qanbridge in

2009 and focuses on Advanced Business Analytics, Fast track business development and

QFD. In 2008 Biba has founded Coddel, a company dedicated to real-life coaching of

professionals in business development and modern QFD.

Environment

QFD As A Necessary Catalyst In Infrastructure Innovation