Reinertsen & Associates

Don Reinertsen will discuss leading edge issues affecting development process design for fast time to market. He points out that the development process for software in many companies is structured in a way similar to how we structured manufacturing 40 years ago before the arrival of World Class Manufacturing. He will discuss specific weaknesses such as poor management of design-in-process inventory, large process queues, and incorrect batch sizes. He suggests that substantial improvements are possible by paying careful attention to the lessons we have learned in the factory while still respecting important differences between product development and manufacturing.

Don Reinertsen is president of Reinertsen & Associates in Redondo Beach, CA. He consults to companies on the management of new product development processes. Don is co-author of "Developing Products in Half the Time" and author of "Managing the Design Factory". He writes and speaks frequently on techniques for shortening product development cycles for hardware and software products. He teaches a popular executive course at California Institute of Technology on "Streamlining the Product Development Process." His approach to product development stresses tailoring development approaches to the unique economic contexts of individual projects and he stresses that there are no best practices that are universally applicable to every project.