In a product development process, it is crucial to understand and evaluate multiple and synergic aspects of systems such as performance, cost, reliability and safety. These aspects are mainly considered during later stages of the design process. However, in order to improve the foundations for decision-making, this paper presents methods that are intended to increase the engineering knowledge in the early design phases. In complex products, different systems from a multitude of engineering disciplines have to work tightly together. Collaborative design is described as a process where a product is designed through the collective and joint efforts of domain experts. A Collaborative Multidisciplinary Design Optimization (CMDO) process is therefore proposed in the conceptual design phase in order to increase the likelihood of more accurate decisions being taken early on. The performance of the presented framework is demonstrated in an industrial application to design aircraft systems in the conceptual phase.

This study investigates the performance of the collaborative multidisciplinary design optimization framework and how it facilitates the knowledge integration process. The framework is used to design and optimize an innovative concept of a tidal water power plant. The case study helps to highlight the challenges that may occur during implementation. The result is presented as a modified framework with less implementation difficulties. The improved framework shows significant reduction in design time and improvement in collaborative design optimization for a design team. The geometry of the product is optimized to minimize weight and maximize the power generated by the turbine with respect to some mechanical constraints.

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