System engineering trade studies: an enhanced technique for systems integration

A trade study is a process for determining the best alternative from a number of viable alternatives when no single choice clearly stands out. The trade study provides the basis and rationale for selecting one alternative over another.

A properly performed trade study is an excellent tool to support strategic decision making during the system design phase. These early decisions can mean the difference between producing a winning system solution proposal or a losing one. Thus the trade study is an important element of winning new business for a company. In a systems integration environment where little to no new development work is performed, the trade study must take on a larger role. It must now not only aid in selecting the best alternative product, but also tied to that decision is the supplier associated with that product.

This paper presents enhanced techniques for performing trade studies in the systems integration environment. These enhanced techniques will identify the life-cycle costs associated with an alternative and consider a company’s quality and management along with product performance characteristics. This paper also presents the utilization of a color coding system for measuring criteria instead of using numbers that are shaped, scaled, and/or weighted before they are totaled up into one single number. This serves to better facilitate the decision making process by bringing forth more pertinent information in an easy to understand summary format.

The enhanced trade study process presented in this paper is referred to as the Candidate Selection Process. It provides a tool for bringing forth to the decision maker relevant and complete information about a product alternative and the company behind it. A case study example is performed to demonstrate how the Candidate Selection Process techniques greatly enhance the decision making process. The case study validates that the Candidate Selection Process brings forth more pertinent information, in an easy to understand format, utilizing a simpler methodology. With the utilization of this enhanced trade study methodology, a company can assemble a competitively superior system solution during the proposal process and formulate a winning proposal to the customer.