Concurrent Engineering: An Overview from Manufacturing Engineering Perspectives

In the last few years, Concurrent Engineering (CE) has become a very prevalent topic in the area of manufacturing engineering. It has been viewed as one of the most effective, potential, and miraculous cures for maintaining the winning position of the American manufacturing industry in global competition. However, because CE is such a comprehensive topic which covers a wide spectrum of areas of study, there is a need to clarify the up-to-date research activities and industrial applications in the manufacturing engineering area. This paper first discusses the history and essence of CE, and then overviews seven areas of CE study in the manufacturing engineering perspective, as well as several industrial applications of CE. Because the studies on CE are still evolving, this paper aims to stimulate further explorations by providing a thor ough survey on both theoretical and application research efforts in the past decade.