BUSINESS NEED

An aggressive rapid prototyping plan was required to meet the development schedule for SPOT Vital Signs Lxi, a new Welch Allyn vital signs monitor. The aggressive schedule meant that portions of design, FDA approval, marketing, and pre-manufacturing would need to be performed in parallel.

DECISION-MAKING PROCESS

Welch Allyn used a risk management process to decide that RP was the correct move. It was crucial to get the right product to market without spending a lot of money only to see the product fail.

SOLUTION

Welch Allyn used SLAs to evaluate portions of early design and test specific subsets of the vital signs monitors’ functionality in order to gain feedback. As the design matured, partial assemblies and complete units were prototyped using SLAs. These partial and completed units were used for early field-testing and were often constructed with minimal functionality in order to test specific features as the design progressed.

Welch Allyn built urethane castings of 60 working units with limited functionality to verify a specific limited subset of the products’ total functionality. The units were then evaluated by doctors and nurses.

RESULTS

The design was modified based on the early learnings. Additional functionality was added and another 60 working units were built for field testing.

Throughout the development process – from SLA to urethane castings – the user interface was evaluated and modified as needed.

The urethane prototypes were also used for packaging design, a great time saving feature. Additionally some environment testing was done with the urethanes including thermal shock, humidity, ESD emissions and susceptibility, and informal 1-meter drop.

Thanks to rapid prototyping, the program was a complete success.