Intellex Acquires Expert by Big Village

We're thrilled to announce that Intellex has acquired Expert by Big Village, effective March 22, 2024. This strategic move enhances our capabilities and strengthens our commitment to delivering exceptional solutions to our customers.

Stay tuned for more updates on how this acquisition will benefit our clients and experts.

For inquiries or more information, please contact us at info@intellex.com.

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Expert Details

Product Development High Stakes Problem Solving - Expert in Design of Experiments

ID: 723312 Minnesota, USA

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He began developing and seeing results from his Design Of Experiments techniques at the General Motors Research Labs in 1986. He has refined and tested them in various environments, including automotive, aerospace instrumentation, armament technology and medical products in roles ranging from R&D, to design and production. His unique insight into how Design Of Experiments is best used has saved project schedule (months) and money ($400k on average) while solving problems in all of these industries. He also has the ability to gain insight in data that is previously considered "useless".

He has been grooming a new generation of experts in a university setting since 1996. This involves a semester long, graduate level course in Design of Experiments.

He partners with a company's innovative thinkers for strategic testing. This helps to design and improve products and processes for focus, robustness and optimization. For growing, technically based companies, this has saved money, reduced development time by months and resolved competing requirements. The implementation track record of over 300 projects averaging $40k of benefit each speaks to the results obtained. Tools covered include full and fractional factorials, central composite, Box-Behnken, Taguchi, D-Optimal, mixtures and other advanced tools. Analysis software includes Minitab, Design- Expert and JMP.

Process optimization requires several considerations: process understanding, determination of desired standardized working levels and practical considerations to maximize yields yet reduce variability. It is also important to handle uncontrollable input variations. He has demonstrated this ability to see beyond basic application of Design Of Experiments in his work with companies. The resulting solutions have been maintained for years after initial introduction, thus eliminating issues that had existed for a long time.

Good product design leads to good process implementation. He has led design projects with cost and manufacturability targets ranging from $10,000 systems to $1,000,000 systems. The end products require high reliability, critical operation and profitable business results. Customer feedback has recognized the ability to see the design from the customer point of view. Obtaining understanding through simulations, modeling and Design of Experiments has provided supportable designs, reduced prototyping costs and getting to market quicker. This understanding leads to nominal settings and tolerance specifications which reduce product variation and deal with environmental noise.

He has experience performing product testing for a wide range of customer expectations, including FDA Testing, was conducted for electrical properties, mechanical performance and user interface. Test objectives ranged from Research and Development projects for proof of concept, design for new product releases, laboratory for pilot plant start up, manufacturing process capability, product and process optimization, and for validation of manufacturing processes. Understanding of requirements, design intent and engineering principles has made for efficient yet effective test strategy development.

Experimentation and design of products and processes are dependent on adequate measurement systems. This area is related to the core Expert focus of Design of Experiments. This component is part of an industrial training program that the Expert teaches and applies.

Using engineering principles and empirically developed equations through Design of Experiments naturally leads to the use of Monte Carlo methods for sensitivity analysis and decision making. Expert has developed and executed projects using a mix of the above techniques to resolve challenging situations.

After developing products and processes, a related area is to ensure long term process capability and process control. Expert has experience applying these tools and teaching them within applied industrial courses. Division wide implementation projects have provided the Expert a scope of issues and the key needs for success.

FMEA is a tool that can highlight the need for Design of Experiments. The medical industry increasingly uses FMEA to assess risk. Expert has experience applying FMEA to design and to processes in several industries. He also teaches an FMEA component in an industrial training program.

Expert has experience applying QFD in high visibility situations. This has gone beyond the basic "House of Quality" approach. It includes concept selection and breakthrough techniques. Highlighted areas from the QFD effort often identify opportunities for use of Design of Experiments. At a minimum, QFD can focus and prioritize resources in a project plan and develop a strategic product development road map.

Expert has knowledge and experience with project management tools for product, process and software development efforts. Scale has included up to $30M projects. He also has experience with estimating costs for development efforts. This has included parametric methods, bottoms up and similarity. Working with company experts, this skill allows development projects to have a reasonable estimate for completion. This includes assessment and inclusion of the risk potential into cost and schedule estimates. Expert has experience with contingency plans for projects in the execution phase. While Design of Experiments is one way to reduce cost and schedule, it is only one technique used. Other techniques include basic project strategy, people aspects to project management and early identification and removal of roadblocks. These techniques are taught within the university classroom setting and in industrial training as a part of running a successful Design of Experiments project.

He resolved a manufacturing process issue which was risking the product development investment for a significant project. This resulted in operating in an unexpected area yet the capability of confident production and delivery of products.He helped develop a testing strategy for a new product development project. Historically, the competing requirements could not be resolved cost effectively. In a short period of time, a scalable solution was found to meet the current needs as well as future needs.He provided DOE training services to a company who was reluctant regarding the value of training in general. After the first DOE training class was completed, the VP of operations requested additional training courses to be conducted as soon as possible based on the benefits created for the company.He provided DOE expertise to create a design solution for an implantable medical device that most thought was an impossible project. He further provided manufacturing process improvements so the production was of higher capability. Within all of this, he assisted the project manager to deal with the management aspects of the project - dealing with the executive team as well as with team members.He has developed training for companies who want the secrets of how to apply tools, not just hear about general templates and techniques. This has resulted in practical training with use in actual work applications. It also provides usable reference materials when challenging situations crop up in the future.

Education

Year Degree Subject Institution
Year: 1988 Degree: BS Subject: Mechanical Engineering Institution: University of Minnesota, Minneapolis

Work History

Years Employer Title Department
Years: 2006 to Present Employer: Undisclosed Title: President Department:
Responsibilities:
Provides training for companies in DOE, Statistics and Program Management. Supports project applications for client companies in those same areas, creating speed records for getting to market.
Years Employer Title Department
Years: 1996 to 2014 Employer: University of St. Thomas Title: Adjunct Professor Department: Graduate Engineering
Responsibilities:
Taught a graduate level Design of Experiments course plus assisted in a Clinical Study Design course for Medical Devices.
Years Employer Title Department
Years: 2002 to 2006 Employer: Guidant Title: Project Manager Department: CRM
Responsibilities:
Responsible for project management aspects for new product development projects in manufacturing and software development. Also responsible for Design of Experiments (DOE) training development and support of internal DOE projects.
Years Employer Title Department
Years: 2000 to 2002 Employer: Medtronic Title: Project Manager Department: CRM
Responsibilities:
Responsible for project management aspects for battery development for new product development projects. He was also conducted DOE training and provided DOE project support.
Years Employer Title Department
Years: 1992 to 2000 Employer: United Defense Title: Project Manager Department:
Responsibilities:
Responsible for project management aspects for design and manufacture of new product development activities. He also developed internal DOE training and supported internal projects.
Years Employer Title Department
Years: 1988 to 1991 Employer: Rosemount Title: Design Engineer Department:
Responsibilities:
Responsible for design engineering and production support of products. Also responsible for new product development project management and using DOE in support of these roles.
Years Employer Title Department
Years: 1986 to 1987 Employer: General Motors Title: Scholar program Department:
Responsibilities:
Responsible for testing and design of manufacturing related systems, including ventilation. DOE Project on paint application processes.

International Experience

Years Country / Region Summary
Years: 2003 to 2004 Country / Region: Ireland Summary: He was the liason during development of a new product and then transfered the manufacturing of new product to this Ireland facility. This included in person visits.
Years: 1998 to 1998 Country / Region: England Summary: He led the design and testing of a new product with a company in England. This included in person visits.
Years: 2008 to Present Country / Region: Europe/ Asia Summary: A variety of consulting projects have involved Expert with technology companies in Italy, Russia, Vietnam, Japan and China.

Career Accomplishments

Associations / Societies
He is a member of ASQ.
Licenses / Certifications
Professional Engineer registered in Minnesota.
Publications and Patents Summary
He has published over 15 papers and presentations related to testing and DOE. He has written 2 magazine articles on SPC and DOE. He has 3 hour long radio interviews on business and problem solving topics.

Additional Experience

Training / Seminars
He has developed and delivered 1 hour, 1/2 day, 1 day, 3 day, 5 day and 7 day training for DOE applications. Similarly he has developed and delivered a range of statistics course, more commonly called Decision Making with Data. He has also provided a variety of problem solving training sessions, including Innovation, Root Cause Analysis and Failure Modes and Effects Analysis.
Vendor Selection
He has knowledge of the available software used in DOE analysis and is also aware of the text book availability and quality. More generally, he is aware of many vendors for engineering applications.
Marketing Experience
He has wide experience with the engineering aspects of bringing ideas to market. This includes identifying needs, dealing with changing customer requirements, optimizing the competing requirements and constraints, and ensuring satisfaction after delivery.
Other Relevant Experience
He is familiar with the patent process and requirements.

Fields of Expertise

design of experiments, statistical design of experiments, Taguchi method experimental design, response surface methodology, central composite design, Taguchi method, statistical computer software, process optimization, process design variation reduction, manufacturing process optimization, product design, product design variation reduction, research and development, product testing, optimization experiment, gage R&R test procedure, Monte Carlo method, process capability study, statistical process control, failure modes and effects analysis, process failure modes and effects analysis, quality function deployment, cost estimation, engineering project management, project cost estimation, project management, project planning, risk management, advanced process control, industrial training, mechanical engineering analysis, cooptimization, medical statistics, proposal writing, experimentation, finite element method, statistical tolerance analysis, composite material process optimization, process modeling, multivariate statistical analysis, product improvement, design for cost, product manufacturing, productivity improvement, new product design, process development, medical device product improvement, development engineering management, design for manufacturability, product cost reduction, new product development, research and development management, quality-by-design, medical device design, mechanical device design, machine design, design engineering, experiment, mixture experiment, product optimization, design process, process inventing, process assessment, planning, mechanical engineering, histogram

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