The service positioning matrix demonstrates how the intended nature of the service encounter activity sequence translates into a suggested service system architecture. The matrix assists managers in considering marketing and operations links, customer and service provider responsibilities in producing and providing services, facility design and process selection, and the many sorts of management issues at each level in the matrix. The matrix defines and employs concepts such as the service encounter activity sequence and the degree of repetition in the activity sequence. The product process matrix combines the product lifetime, which includes all parts of the product development process—from conception through the growth or decline of a product—with the process lifecycle, which is the evolution toward a more cost-effective and productive standardised structure. Robert H. Hayes and Steven C. Wheelwright created the product process matrix. The matrix is known as the Hayes-Wheelwright Matrix. It was initially published in the Harvard Business Review in 1979, and it gives businesses a tool for estimating the development of a product and its connected processes, as well as analysing the fit between a selected product positioning and its related processes.