Research & Development Report

This set of reports provides information on all R&D projects launched in the previous periods. To facilitate the reading, separate charts are provided for projects that have just been completed, for the ones that were completed in previous periods, and for projects that are not yet finished either because the allocated budget was not sufficient or because you have decided to shelve them.

The report in Figure 18 shows the list of R&D projects completed in past periods. All reports share the same layout and include the same information:

• Project name.

• Available since. Completed projects only. This is the period when the project was completed.

• Physical Characteristics. The physical characteristics of the future product. This data is given in the relevant units for each characteristic, e.g. gigaflops for processing power or kilograms for carbon footprint.

• Current and minimum base costs. The base cost is the manufacturing unit cost of the future product, assuming an initial production batch of 100,000 units. The current base cost is the one that you entered in the R&D decision form when specifying the project. The minimum base cost is the cost below which it is impossible to manufacture the future product without taking productivity gains into account.

• Platform of brand. This is the name of the brand that is based on this project. This column is void for projects that are not yet or no longer in use.

• Cumulative and required allocated budgets. Uncompleted projects only. The cumulative budget is the total budget that has been allocated to this project over time. The required budget is the budget required to finish the project, i.e. the additional budget that must be invested to ensure that the project will be completed in the following period. You may attempt to finish the project with a lower budget, but its successful completion is not guaranteed.

  

  Figure 18 – R&D report – Sample chart & explanations