Patent ID: 7206752

Claim:
A method for aiding product life cycle planning, comprising: setting a threshold value concerning reuse of parts with respect to cost and environment; reading cost of parts and environment load information from a database; displaying parts on a map displayed on a display device and divided into a plurality of domains based on the threshold; selecting reuse candidate parts from the displayed parts with reference to the displayed map; calculating a useful life based condition formula expressed as follows: min {la ˜i′ , lr ˜i′ }≦la ˜j −min{la ˜i , lr ˜i } where la ˜i′ is a useful life time of product i′, lr ˜i′ is a worth life time of product i′, la ˜j is a useful life time of part j, and lr ˜j is a worth life time of part j, determining whether the useful life based condition formula is satisfied; determining possibility of reuse with respect to the reuse candidate parts when the useful life based condition formula is satisfied; calculating a worth life time based condition formula expressed as follows: tL i′ +tP i′ +min {la ˜i′ , lr ˜i′ }≦lr ˜j where tL i′ is a time lag of product i′, and tP i′ is a production period of product i′, la ˜i′ is a useful life time of product i′, lr ˜i′ is a worth life time of product i′, and lr ˜j is a worth life time of part j, determining whether the worth life time based condition formula is satisfied; and determining possibility of reuse with respect to the reuse candidate parts when the worth life time based condition formula is satisfied; calculating a recovery quantity based condition formula expressed as follows: min {la ˜i′ , lr ˜i′ }<tL i′ +αtP i′ where 0≦α≦1, la ˜i′ is a useful life time of product i′, lr ˜i′ is a worth life time of product i′, tL i′ is a time lag of product i′, and tP i′ is a production period of product i′ determining whether the recovery quantity based condition formula is satisfied; determining on a computer possibility of reuse with respect to the reuse candidate parts when the recovery quantity based condition formula is satisfied; and displaying the determination of possibility of reuse with respect to reuse of candidate parts.