Q$.$ Analyse how the product lifecycle model has changed when firms adopt more digital approaches into their business.

Tips for a good answer: This needs a description of the plc model and its various stages: introduction, growth, maturity, decline, withdrawal.

Answers need to discuss how the product lifecycle model has changed when firms adopt more digital approaches into their business. Answers could also discuss the importance of new products and their sources as well as how the focus changes when products are established in the market. Early stages of the plc have more product innovation, but this shifts to process as they get established. Profitability also changes as the product matures. The nature of the firm also needs to adjust, as do the systems they employ: HRM$,$ accounting, SCM$,$ etc.

Few referred to theory to support their claims, and anything that was relevant was rewarded.

In essence the new product development $($NPD$)$ process involves taking the invention and developing it into a product ready to launch on the market. There are certain steps which most organizations follow to complete this process and this chapter introduces these first to show a linear model of NPD$.$

Better answers should look at how firms combine the life cycles of different products to smooth total production output and cash flow. Some may also talk of the NPD models of stage gate$/$screening and simultaneous engineering models as these manage the overlap in different ways.

Cooper is a representation of the screening model with different departments in the firm having responsibility for separate sections $($marketing for concepts, design engineers for the design, and production department for developing the process$)$

The simultaneous model or parallel engineering change this established product design process. Japanese car makers who were able to produce new products in half the time of their US and European counterparts, and often with fewer problems. The new process of product design which emerged and is now widely adopted has a variety of names such as simultaneous engineering, and parallel design.

In terms of the plc being useful, this can be in how firms combine the life cycles of different products to smooth total production output and cash flow. How firms can identify too many young or old products in their portfolio, etc. You should at least have answered the question directly by saying the plc is important.