Abstract

Electronic industry is developing advanced and versatile products to satisfy customers’ needs. It is also creating new needs, which expand the market further. This highly competitive field forces companies to produce continuously better, and hence more complex, products at an increasingly fast rate. This is particularly true of the mobile phone industry, which pursues higher volumes and penetration rates throughout the world. Very high volumes and extreme complexity require intensive research and a commitment to high product quality. Mobile phone manufacturers must commit themselves to strict quality standards and programs, which ultimately enable high customer satisfaction.

Both quality assessment and product management generally need a method of feedback to be able to react to the manufactured output. This thesis concentrates on this aspect of feedback. A preliminary customer survey revealed that the information received directly from customers might not be accurate enough to be used as primary feedback data. The quality of the information varies notably and depends entirely on the customers’ ability to perceive the relevant parameters. This also affects greatly their ability to communicate the information to the customer interface and then all the way back to the manufacturer. Based on the findings, end customers’ average level of knowledge of mobile phone technology is fair [C]. Therefore, it is recommended that more accurate means should be developed for acquiring feedback data. Also, based on other research findings, it would be important to minimize human intervention and to make the flow of information as direct as possible.

Based on previous research and the present findings, a concept was designed which satisfies the specific need for accurate feedback from the performance of mobile phones in the field. The interfaces providing data throughout the whole product life cycle were also analyzed in detail. And finally, the concept was implemented and piloted with a mobile phone manufacturer. The pilot studies showed that an improved feedback capability would benefit not only product quality, but also various functions of the company producing mobile devices. The increased knowledge of device performance obtained from the system can be utilized in, for example, testing, design, marketing, and management and also at all customer interfaces in the field.