Apply fuzzy regression to model functional relationships in product planning

Product planning is one of four important processes in new product development (NPD) using quality function deployment (QFD), which is a widely used customer-driven approach. Owing to the complexity of functional relationship between customer requirements (CRs) and technical attributes (TAs) and the correlation among TAs, the product planning is becoming difficulty, particularly in fuzzy environment and hence the identification of the functional relationship and correlation receives many attentions. A non-symmetric fuzzy linear regression approach is developed to help design team identify relationships between technical attributes and customer requirements and among technical attributes, reconcile tradeoffs among the various degree of customer satisfaction. It has been applied to an emulsification dynamite packing-machine quality improvement problem as an illustration.