Optimal testing strategies in overlapped design process

Testing is an important activity in product development. Past studies, which are developed to determine the optimal scheduling of tests, often focused on single-stage testing of sequential design process. This paper presents an analytical model for the scheduling of tests in overlapped design process, where a downstream stage starts before the completion of upstream testing. We derive optimal stopping rules for upstream and downstream stages' testing, together with the optimal time elapsed between beginning the upstream tests and beginning the downstream development. We find that the cost function is first convex then concave increasing with respect to upstream testing duration. A one-dimensional search algorithm is then proposed for finding the unique optimum that minimizes the overall cost. Moreover, the impact of different model parameters, such as the problem-solving capacity and opportunity cost, on the optimal solution is discussed. Finally, we compare the testing strategies in overlapped process with those in sequential process, and get some additional results. The methodology is illustrated with a case study at a handset design company. © 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.