A short summary: modular design.

Take the LEGO car illustrated below as an example. It is possible to put on four different tires or to use three different types of motors. The car is essentially still the same, but with different sub-components, a customer can have the product built to their liking.

This also applies to industrial products. By dividing a product into standardized components or dimensions, you can easily and quickly configurate the desired product for the customer. Defining and designing these modules is called modular design.

Modular design comes with a number of adventages. First one would be that the lead time at the sales order decoupling point is accelerated. This is also known as the main stock point. Second, modular design results in lower costs because fewer engineering hours are spent on a project; less time is spent on a project when a product is sold in different sizes and can easily be adapted. Modular design also has the advantage that the assembly speed of a product is improved because a lot is standardized, such as the same type of connecting elements.

At Fabrique Invent we are constantly working to optimize and improve products and modular design is an important part of that!

Pepijn is a mechanical engineer student and is doing his graduation internship at Fabrique Invent. To complete his studies, he is designing a slat system. A major challenge in terms of modular design!