From the Editor of Visions

by April W. Klimley, Editor-in-Chief, Visions

As the economy continues to heat up, so does the new product development field. That is evident throughout industry in the U.S. and abroad. But the landscape somehow seems different than it used to be, in the late 1990s. That is the sense among consultants and practitioners today.

Those conclusions are not off base. In fact, they are confirmed by the results of the PDMA Foundation’s new Comparative Performance Assessment Study (CPAS). Some of the findings are described in the Visions CPAS Highlights article. This article reaches some surprising conclusions: For instance, although the success rate for new products within corporations has held steady over a 14-year period, the percentage of sales and profits that come from new products has been slipping.

At the same time, business units that demonstrate "the best" practices in NPD find that a much higher percentage of their profits-49.1 percent on average-comes from new products, compared to 21.4 percent for "the rest."

That is not all that the results of this study reveal. They also suggest that changes are occurring in the way NPD is practiced. Don’t miss out on this article-plus the full report when it is released this fall.

Now on to other material in this issue. In our cover story, BMW shares its vision for extending both its own brand and that of MINI into lifestyle products. We also find out how Analog Devices uses Process Knowledge to gain a competitive edge.

In addition, in our third Goldense report we takes a close look at outsourcing NPD-a growing trend.

Finally, we have two new sections in this issue. One is a new column by former PDMA President Mark Deck on "Lessons Learned." In his first column, Deck combines his own knowledge of Voice of the Customer with that of three practitioners to come up with 10 valuable lessons.

Additionally, this issue of Visions brings you a first-ever "PDMA Annual Review: 2003" describing key events and achievements of 2003 and PDMA’s plans for 2004. We placed this Review in the center of the magazine so you could tear it out and keep it for future reference. You might want to share it with colleagues to encourage them to join PDMA-the leading community of thought leaders in product development.

Please let us know how you like our two new additions. I always welcome emailed comments or phone calls to see how we’re doing-and look for new ideas to make Visions better than ever.

April Klimley
New York, N.Y.
June 14, 2004

Visions Editorial Calendar 2004 - 2005

		Deadline
Issue	Focus	Authors	Advertising
October 2004	Report from Boston: Front End Conference Six Sigma and NPD	August 9, 04	August 20, 04
January 2005	NPD Metrics Report from Chicago: PDMA 2005	November 19, 04	November 29, 04
April 2005	PDMA 2004 Annual Review	February 18, 05	February 28, 05
July 2005	General	May 12, 05	May 20, 05

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