Modeling uncertainty in through-life costing at the early design stages-I

Estimating the Through Life Cost (TLC) of a product or service is one of the major challenges for industry. If the products involved are complex and are long-life this increases the challenge. Although industry attempts to estimate the TLC of such products as early as possible, lack of information makes it very difficult. To assist in this process uncertainty within the estimate and the estimation process is normally considered. The research presented in this paper proposes an approach for the consideration and management of the uncertainties in terms of the data and alternative scenarios. First the issue of how to deal with this uncertainty from the conceptual stage of design for different phases of product life cycle is explained. From this an approach for identifying and understanding the scenario uncertainty at each phase of the lifecycle is then presented. An industrial case study is then used to explain how to map the costing process for scenario uncertainty in different phases of product life cycle including; development, manufacturing, in-service and disposal. Finally, the next phase of the research activity is discussed.