COURSE NUMBER: MBA247.2

This course is cross-listed with the School of Information.

COURSE TITLE: Design and Development of Web Based Products and Services

UNITS OF CREDIT: 3 Units

INSTRUCTOR: Thomas Lee

E-MAIL ADDRESS: thomasyl@haas.berkeley.edu

CLASS WEB PAGE LOCATION: http://bspace.berkeley.edu

MEETING DAY(S)/TIME: Monday and Wednesday, 2:00-3:30PM

PREREQUISITE(S): NONE- This is an experiential learning class most appropriate for students who have not already taken New Product Development.

CLASS FORMAT: Mixture of lectures and in-class exercises

REQUIRED READINGS: Readings are drawn from one textbook and various online readings.

The texts are:

Ulrich and Eppinger, Product Design and Development

Although the text is in its fifth edition, any used copy from the 2nd through the 5th edition is acceptable. Other readings will be posted on the bspace and/or directly available on Google Books.

BASIS FOR FINAL GRADE: Attendance, in-class participation, individual exercises, team project milestones, and final team project

ABSTRACT OF COURSE'S CONTENT AND OBJECTIVES:

This is an introductory course on innovation and new product development.  Students will form project teams to learn the process of innovation and product development by designing and prototyping Web-based desktop and/or mobile consumer products and services.  Students who take this course will learn:

[1] a process-oriented approach to product design including opportunity identification, opportunity selection, concept generation, and prototype testing.

[2] systematic, analytical approaches to individual design steps including concept clustering, process flow diagrams, AB test design, analytics, etc.

[3] design-for-X, incorporating design factors beyond customer needs such as design for discovery (marketing/organic search), design for platform architecture, design for distribution (cloud services and content delivery networks). 

Product design is an inherently interdisciplinary enterprise; project teams will include students from Haas, the Information School, and the Engineering School.  Teams will learn general principles of product/service design in the context of tools, methods, and concepts specific to the Web-based environment.  Even mobile products and services will be prototyped in the Web context to leverage common prototyping, development, and testing resources.  For purposes of the course, the product or service should be aimed at consumers in the range 25 - 45.  We define this target audience so that we can use classmates as preliminary subjects of interviews, testing, and surveys.  For the purposes of this course, the product or service need not have a compelling business model. The focus is on creating a product or service that solves a real problem, not necessarily creating a new business. 

This class teaches analytical, process-oriented approaches to design.  It is not a class about design aesthetics.  Neither is it a class about technology and implementation.  No prior technical knowledge is assumed.  The class is aimed at students who have not previously worked in product management or been through a product development cycle (in work or in class). 

MODIFICATIONS TO COURSE FROM ITS MOST RECENT OFFERING:  Teams are interdisciplinary rather than MBA only.  Explicit class sessions are designed around team project exercises and to allow for more faculty-team consultations.  Team deliverables are batched to provide teams with greater scheduling flexibility. 

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH:

Thomas Lee is a Visiting Assistant Professor of Operations and Information Technology Management and Research Scientist at the Institute for Business Innovation. He was most recently assistant professor of Operations and Information Management at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School where he co-taught a similar course on Web-based products and services. His research includes applications of information technology to innovation, marketing, and new product development.