title: Agile development of physical products
title: a study on the current state of industrial practice
titleType: Subtitle
Creators: name: Atzberger, Alexander
name: Nicklas, Simon Jakob
name: Schrof, Julian
name: Weiss, Stefan
name: Paetzold, Kristin
Publisher: name: Universität der Bundeswehr München
Year: 2020

description: This cross-sectional study covers the state of application and implementation of agile product development of physical
products in German-speaking countries. The goal of the study is to provide interested people and organizations
with a neutral frame of reference outside the software domain. This reference serves to enable users to check project
planning or ongoing transformations, to secure procedures and decisions and to classify individual experiences.
As in 2018 and 2019, both scientific findings and practical implementation experience of the study partners were
incorporated into the design of the study. Designed as an online survey, a sample of 125 participants from about 80
companies in the manufacturing industry was evaluated (⇨ Demographics). The information was collected with
36 detailed questions in the four subject areas ⇨ Understanding, ⇨ Application, ⇨ Challenges & Solutions, and
⇨ Scaling. This provides a relevant, neutral, and multifaceted insight into the industrial practice of agile product
development of physical products in 2020.
From the point of view of the team of authors, the following condensed results and tendencies can be identified:
• Agile product development continues to be attractive and growing. Familiar ('classic') project work is declining.
Periods of three to five years should be planned for successful implementations and distinguish beginners from
advanced users.
• In the majority of cases, agile product development is associated with being flexible, transparent, and customeroriented.
For two thirds of the participants, agile working makes everyday life easier. Scrum, Kanban, and Design
Thinking are the dominating methods in industry.
• The effect of agile product development is mostly perceived through the improvement of success promoting
factors such as cooperation and transparency. Hard, measurable success parameters (KPIs) are currently only
affirmed by a minority.
• Interactions with the physical nature of the products are clearly identified as difficulties. Specifically, aspects
such as external regulations, waiting times for components and dependencies on suppliers are generally stated
to be hindering factors. On the product side, modularization and interface standardization are reported as
important improvement options.
• In the majority of cases, agile product development is supported by IT tools and additive manufacturing processes.
Standard office tools dominate in approval. Rapid prototyping is already standard in the physical world
and no longer strongly differentiating.
• Agile product development is still not a finished concept. Hybridizations between proven in-house standards
and agile elements are strongly increasing. 70 % of study participants adapt elements, methods or mission
statements to a significant extent. Templates and frameworks are used for orientation. Copying from templates
does not seem to be expedient.
• There are still challenges in the implementation of agile product development. The central obstacle remains
the understanding of agility. Knowledge transfer and training are dominant solution factors. Unresolved leadership
issues such as loss of power or career paths are significant conflict potentials. Self-organisation and
empowerment of teams is low.
• Agile product development extends beyond the individual projects and is increasingly scaled. Scaling is heterogeneously
occupied and covers the project portfolio, the organization or the management. Scaling frameworks
are extensively adapted (so-called hybrids). Coordination and communication between agile teams are the
dominant challenges mentioned.
All in all, the study shows that the concept of agile product development is making further progress into the world
of physical products, forming its own paths and catching up with the software world. There is no sign of a slowdown
in the change efforts.
description: In the development of mechatronic products, agile development has been playing an increasingly important role for
several years now. This series of studies has been investigating the progression of agility in the DACH region since
2018. In the present 2020 edition, the focus is on the topics of understanding, application, challenges and solutions,
as well as scaling. As in previous years, the results of this study are based on the statements of practitioners from a
wide range of industrial companies who participated in an online survey. The study describes both quantitative and
qualitative results from industrial practice.