Product and Operations Management

Project Report on:

HOUSE OF QUALITY OF DELL LAPTOPS – IT FIRMS

AND COLLEGE LABS
Date of Submission: 30.04.2019

Submitted to:

Dr. Rajesh Matai

Submitted by:

Group - 7
2018H1490389P AJO PHILIP JOHN
2018H1490391P YASHFEEN BAKHSH
2018H1490392P SRINIVAS DARAHAUS MUDDULA
2018H1490393P KARTHICK S A
2018H1490394P KETAN JAIN
2018H1490395P CHHAYA HIRAVKUMAR KIRANBHAI
2018H1490396P PRIYA R S
2018H1490397P JASMINE HANDA

Department of Management Studies

BITS Pilani, Pilani Campus

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
We, the students of Product and Operations Management course use this opportunity to
express our gratitude towards Dr. Rajesh Matai who gave us the opportunity to do this
project. We’d also like to thank him for his constant support and guidance at every step.

We are also thankful to our batch mates for their valuable advice and constructive criticism
during the project work. Our sincere thanks to the institute, BITS Pilani, for providing us with
the necessary resources which helped us complete this project successfully.

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Table of Contents
1.INTRODUCTION ......................................................................................................... 4
3.HOUSE OF QUALITY .................................................................................................. 6
Primary Purposes of QFD & House of Quality ....................................................................... 6
4.LITERATURE REVIEW ............................................................................................... 8
5.REQUIREMENTS GATHERING ................................................................................. 9
6.MATCHING THE CUSTOMER REQUIREMENTS AND TECHNICAL
SPECIFICATIONS........................................................................................................ 14
7.PROCEDURE INVOLVED IN HOUSE OF QUALITY ............................................... 16
9.HOUSE OF QUALITY – IT FIRMS............................................................................ 17
10.HOUSE OF QUALITY – COLLEGE LABS ............................................................... 18
11.QUALITY ASSURANCE IN DELL ........................................................................... 18
12.RECOMMENDATIONS FOR DELL ........................................................................ 18
12.REFERENCES ......................................................................................................... 19

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1.INTRODUCTION

DELL Inc.

Dell Inc., formerly PC’s Limited (1984–88) and Dell Computer Corporation (1988–2003),
is a global company that designs, develops, and manufactures personal computers (PCs) and
a variety of computer-related products. The company is one of the world’s leading suppliers
of PCs. Dell is headquartered in Round Rock, Texas.

The company was founded in 1984 by American Michael Dell, who was then a student at
the University of Texas in Austin. Initially running the business from a dormitory room, Dell
started out providing customized upgrades for PCs. The venture proved profitable, and Dell
dropped out of college that same year to begin building PCs. In 1985 the company released
the Turbo PC, the first computer featuring Dell’s own design. Founded on the premise of
creating and selling custom-built PCs directly to consumers, the company initially sold its
products through advertisements and mail-order catalogues. By avoiding the costs associated
with traditional retail markets, Dell was able to offer high-quality PCs at competitive prices.
Dell emphasized customer support, sending technicians to service PCs and implementing a
policy of risk-free returns. This business model proved successful, and the company quickly
grew, expanding into international markets. The company, renamed Dell Computer
Corporation, went public in 1988.

Dell released its first notebook computer, the 316LT, in 1989. The following years were
marked by advancements in Dell’s mobile technology. In 1991 Dell’s first colour notebook
computer went on sale, and in 1994 Dell was the first company to offer long-lasting lithium-
ion batteries. In 1996 Dell began selling PCs online and also used the Internet for customer
support. Online sales helped Dell overtake the Compaq Computer Corporation in 1999 as the
largest seller of PCs in the United States.

In the early 21st century Dell expanded its product line to include televisions, digital cameras,
and a variety of computer-related products. In 2003 the company was renamed Dell Inc. to
signify a move into the broader consumer electronics market. In 2016 the company and an
investment firm acquired EMC, an American corporation that specialized in data storage. The
merger, valued at approximately $60 billion, was the largest technology deal at the time.
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2.DELL PRODUCTS

Dell's Business/Corporate class represent brands where the company advertising emphasizes
long life-cycles, reliability, and serviceability. Such brands include:

 OptiPlex (office desktop computer systems)

 Dimension (home desktop computer systems)
 Vostro (office/small business desktop and notebook systems)
 n Series (desktop and notebook computers shipped with Linux or FreeDOS installed)
 Latitude (business-focused notebooks)
 Precision (workstation systems and high-performance notebooks)
 PowerEdge (business servers)
 PowerVault (direct-attach and network-attached storage)
 Force10 (network switches)
 PowerConnect (network switches)
 Dell Compellent (storage area networks)
 EqualLogic (enterprise class iSCSI SANs)
 Dell EMR (electronic medical records)

Dell's Home Office/Consumer class emphasizes value, performance, and expandability.

These brands include:

 Inspiron (budget desktop and notebook computers)

 XPS (high-end desktop and notebook computers)
 Alienware (high-performance gaming systems)
 Venue (Tablets Android / Windows)

Dell's Peripherals class includes USB keydrives, LCD televisions, and printers; Dell
monitors includes LCD TVs, plasma TVs and projectors for HDTV and monitors.
Dell UltraSharpis further a high-end brand of monitors.

Dell service and support brands include the Dell Solution Station (extended domestic support
services, previously "Dell on Call"), Dell Support Center (extended support services
abroad), Dell Business Support (a commercial service-contract that provides an industry-
certified technician with a lower call-volume than in normal queues), Dell Everdream
Desktop Management ("Software as a Service" remote-desktop management, originally a

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SaaS company founded by Elon Musk's cousin, Lyndon Rive, which Dell bought in
2007[166]), and Your Tech Team (a support-queue available to home users who purchased their
systems either through Dell's website or through Dell phone-centers).

3.HOUSE OF QUALITY

House of Quality refers to a well-known process for product development that is inspired by
customer desires for product or process development and anchored by the capabilities and
resources of the organization seeking to meet those desires. It is a process of listening to
customers, translating their desires into a written plan, prioritizing steps of execution based
on what is most important to the customer, and putting a realistic plan on paper.
House of Quality is a part of a larger process called QFD, which stands
for Quality, Function, Deployment. This represents quality-monitoring, a focus on
the function of execution of a quality plan, and the application of resources for deployment of
that plan. The House of Quality name comes from the very useful diagram used to make this
plan that resembles a house.

Primary Purposes of QFD & House of Quality

 Understand Customer Desires

Many times, customers need outside perspective to discover what they really need to
build their product or process. The goal is to understand customers perhaps even better
that they understand themselves so as to open their eyes to ideal solutions.

 Understand Customer Priorities

During the interview stage, getting to know customer needs, but then break those needs
down into prioritized parts. Weights are assigned to each quality based on what is most
important to the customer. How well each need is met is ultimately how the customer will
judge your solution’s value.

 Departmental Buy-In
Often, disagreement or misunderstanding between departments of a customer’s
organization can occur in relation to what is actually needed. Marketing may think that a

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 drone with trending features is top priority, but engineering may think that overhaul of a
problematic part is top priority. The process helps create a plan that addresses all true
priorities and to which all departments can agree.

 Translate Customer Desires Into Goals & Technicalities

This is the heart of the QFD process where the recorded desires of the customer are
ranked by priority and specific process and resource planning takes place. They are laid
out onto a useful diagram labelled the House of Quality.

 Specify Traceable Requirements

Specific requirements for the execution of the customer’s product or process should be
laid out. The how and why questions should be answered in the plan–how are we meeting
the client’s requirements and why are we doing it this way? The written requirements and
should be specific enough that their completion and success are traceable. One should be
able to work forward and backward in the plan and determine easily whether or not the
overall plan is being executed successfully. For example, if there is a question
on why something is done a certain way, one should be able to trace back to the
beginning of the process to the initial requirement that determined the process needed to
meet that requirement.

 Provide Structure
It is easy for customers to jump all over the place stating what they desire and tossing out
ideas. But, at the end of the day, your role is to hone in on what they want and provide a
logical, executable, traceable structure to organize their ideas.

 Allocate Resources
Whether developing a physical product or creating a process for a customer, resources are
needed to do so. Humans, machines, computers, construction materials, disposable
materials and more must be accounted for. What do we have available to us and what do
the available resources allow us to do? Answering these questions is a critical part of
execution

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4.LITERATURE REVIEW

[1] Understanding customer requirements is one of the key factors while designing the laptop.
These factors influence the purchase of the laptops. Majority of the people consider brand,
design, specification and price while purchasing a laptop, out of which specification is the
most sought. Some of the quality characteristics are efficiency of battery, CPU speed,
memory capacity, weight, compatibility with external hardware, etc. [2] Based on the study
conducted to improve the quality of Lenovo laptops, speed, weight and capacity are the three
most important characteristics in laptops that lead to high level of customer satisfaction. The
technical requirements like internal memory, frequency, size, thickness, material and hard
disk capacity satisfy these three above mentioned customer requirements. House of quality
has been built based on these and it is found that improvements are required in frequency,
memory and material. But the major challenge is increasing the frequency as the cost is very
high. The findings are of this study reveal that customers prefer a smaller and thinner laptop
with big capacity. [3] Based on another relevant study, the major customer requirements are
Speed, Size, Capacity, Weight, Colour, Graphics, OS, Warranty period. These requirements
are converted into technical requirements as Frequency, Hard Disk, Size of components,
Materials, Internal Memory and Cost. This study identifies that size and colour are given the
least preference among the listed requirements. Our data analysis also considers similar
factors in choosing a laptop by the customers, irrespective of the segment.

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5.REQUIREMENTS GATHERING

For this project we had the requirement to focus on the data collection from two different
segments like IT firms and Colleges.

Firstly, we have collected the laptop related information from five different IT companies
who are the industrial majors in our country such as: Tata Consultancy Services (TCS),
Cognizant Technology Solutions, Deloitte, Bank Of America (BA Continuum) and
Honeywell Technologies which are mentioned in the below list. In each IT company, an
Infrastructure Team handles the job of laptop ordering and maintenance. We contacted this
team in the companies and they shared the requirements they look for in a laptop which is
widely used within their company. The importance ratings were also given by them based on
their use.

In colleges sector, we contacted the IPC Department of all three campuses of BITS Pilani –
Pilani, Hyderabad and Goa in order to understand their requirements when ordering a laptop.
These requirements given by both the departments were in layman terms and we converted
these customer requirements into technical specifications. For the technical specifications, we
referred to the website of Dell and, we went to stored to understand what they are currently
providing. From our survey on other brands used in this sector, we identified what Acer and
Lenovo is currently providing to these two sectors.

Requirement Information from IT Firms:

S. No SPECIFICATIONS TCS
1 Processor Brand Intel ®
2 Processor Name Core™ i5-4200U
3 Processor GEN 4th Gen
4 SSD/HDD Capacity 256GB
5 RAM 8GB
6 Operating System Windows 7 Enterprise edition
7 System Arch (64r32 Bits) 64 Bits
8 USB Port (USB 3.0) available
9 HDMI port No
10 Touch Screen No

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 11 Screen Size 14.0"
12 Screen Resolution 1366 x 768
13 Web Cam Yes
14 GPU Intel HD Graphics 520
15 Wi Fi- 802.11ac available
Dedicated Graphic
16 Memory No
17 Laptop Model Dell Latitude Eseries

S. No SPECIFICATIONS Cognizant
1 Processor Brand Intel ®
Core(TM) i5-8250U CPU @1.60Ghz
2 Processor Name 1.80Ghz
3 Processor GEN 4th Gen
4 SSD/HDD Capacity 512 GB
5 RAM 8 GB
6 Operating System Windows 10 Enterprise
7 System Arch (64r32 Bits) 64 Bits
8 USB Port (USB 3.0) available
9 HDMI port available
10 Touch Screen No
11 Screen Size 14.0"
12 Screen Resolution 1366 x 768
13 Web Cam Yes
14 GPU Intel HD Graphics 520
15 Wi Fi- 802.11ac available
Dedicated Graphic
16 Memory No
17 Laptop Model Dell Latitude Eseries

S. No SPECIFICATIONS Deloitte
1 Processor Brand Intel ®
2 Processor Name Core i5-6200U CPU
3 Processor GEN 5th Gen
4 SSD/HDD Capacity 256GB

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 5 RAM 8GB
6 Operating System Windows 10 Pro
7 System Arch (64r32 Bits) 64 Bits
8 USB Port (USB 3.0) available
9 HDMI port available
10 Touch Screen Yes
11 Screen Size 14.0"
12 Screen Resolution 1366 x 768
13 Web Cam Yes
14 GPU Intel HD Graphics 520
15 Wi Fi- 802.11ac available
Dedicated Graphic
16 Memory No
17 Laptop Model Dell latitude E7470

S. No SPECIFICATIONS Bank Of America

1 Processor Brand Intel ®
2 Processor Name Core i5 5300U CPU @ 2.30GHz
3 Processor GEN 5th Gen
4 SSD/HDD Capacity 256GB
5 RAM 8 GB
6 Operating System Windows 10 Enterprise
7 System Arch (64r32 Bits) 64 Bits
8 USB Port (USB 3.0) available
9 HDMI port available
10 Touch Screen No
11 Screen Size 14.0"
12 Screen Resolution 1366 x 768
13 Web Cam Yes
14 GPU Intel HD Graphics 520
15 Wi Fi- 802.11ac available
Dedicated Graphic
16 Memory No
17 Laptop Model Dell latitude E7450

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S. No SPECIFICATIONS Honey Well
1 Processor Brand Intel ®
2 Processor Name Core i5-6440HQ CPU
3 Processor GEN 5th Gen
4 SSD/HDD Capacity 256GB
5 RAM 8GB
6 Operating System Windows 10 Pro
7 System Arch (64r32 Bits) 64 Bits
8 USB Port (USB 3.0) available
9 HDMI port available
10 Touch Screen No
11 Screen Size 14.0"
12 Screen Resolution 1920x1080
13 Web Cam Yes
14 GPU Intel HD Graphics 530
15 Wi Fi- 802.11ac available
Dedicated Graphic
16 Memory No
17 Laptop Model Dell Latitude E5470

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Requirement Information from College Labs:

S. SPECIFICATIONS REQUIREMENT IMPORTANCE

NO RATING
1 Processor Brand Intel 12

2 Processor Name Core i5 5300U CPU @ 3

2.30GHz
3 Processor 5th Generation 11
Generation
4 SSD/HDD Capacity 512 GB 1

5 RAM 8GB 10

6 Operating system Windows 10

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7 System 64-bit 13
Architecture

8 USB Port Available 5

9 HDMI Port Available 6

10 Touch screen No 14

11 Screen size 14 inches 7

12 Webcam Yes 15

13 Dedicated graphic No 9
memory

14 Yes 16
Wi Fi- 802.11ac

15 Warranty 5 years 8

16 Dell laptop price 30 to 60,000 2

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6.MATCHING THE CUSTOMER REQUIREMENTS AND TECHNICAL
SPECIFICATIONS

In IT Sector, the various requirements mentioned by the firms are High Speed, Low Storage,
Multi-tasking, Video Conferencing, Small Screen Size, Easy to Carry/Sleek and Internal
Memory. We shall explain each one of them below:

1. High Speed – Speed in a laptop is measured by the processor speed. Processors are
manufactured by Intel and NVDIA. Intel serves most of the Dell Laptops. Although
speed is measured in Hertz, the common terminology used while denoting speed are
i3, i5 and i7. These different versions have speed of up to 4.60 GHz, 4.60 GHz and
4.90 GHz respectively. The number of cores is also a differentiating factor. I3 has 4
cores (quad core), i5 has 6 cores (hexa core) and i7 has 8 cores (octa core) . Since the
IT firms use high end software to serve multiple clients, they require i7 processors.
2. Low Storage – Storage in laptops are measured in terms of Giga Bytes (GB). The
commonly available variants are 256 GB, 512 GB and 1 TB (Tera Byte). Now a days,
IT firms use the concept of virtualization where multiple operating systems are hosted
on one operating system. Hence, they require low storage of 256 GB. There are two
variants of storage namely HDD (Hard Disk Drive) and SSD (Solid State Drive), out
of which SSD is currently used.
3. Multi-tasking – Operating System is the component in laptop which facilities multi-
tasking. Multi-tasking means using more than one application or performing more
than one task at a time on a single laptop. IT firms require a special edition of
Operating System named as “Enterprise Edition” which has certain additional features
when compared to the regular operating system version and are priced higher than the
regular operating system.
4. Video Conferencing – IT firms are connected across the globe and the teams are
spread among different geographies. Due to this diversity, video conferencing facility
is of utmost need in the firms. For this facility, Webcam is required. So, IT firms
require laptops with a Webcam.
5. Small Screen Size – The employees of IT firms are frequent travellers for work. So, a
laptop with small screen is usually required which facilitates easy commute. A screen
size less than or equal to 14” inches is preferred. Dell usually provides a 15” inch
laptop across all sectors.

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 6. Easy to carry/sleek - The employees of IT firms are frequent travellers for work. So, a
laptop with small screen is usually required which facilitates easy commute. Dell
laptops are usually heavy and may be this is one of the reasons that it is not used
widely in this sector. Light weight laptops are preferred by customers of this segment.
7. Internal Memory – Internal Memory is the laptop’s own internal storage. This is
technically defined as Random Access Memory (RAM). Usually, it comes as 2GB,
3GB and 4GB.

Coming to college labs, there are some factors other than the ones mentioned above. These
are listed below:

1. Data Transfer Facility – In college labs, data transfer facility is mostly preferred as it
is widely used by students for various purposes. To facilitate this, some ports like
USB, HDMI are present which help in data transfer, connecting to projector, etc.
2. Long Life – By meaning long life, college labs require high warranty of the laptops.
They require continuous support from the laptop manufacturer as this is widely used
by many.
3. Reasonable Price – Although college labs order in bulk, price plays an important role
when placing order. They desire a combination of all other factors listed at an
affordable price.

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7.PROCEDURE INVOLVED IN HOUSE OF QUALITY

1. Through market research company determines what the customer wants. Those wants
are shown on the left of the house of quality.
2. The product development team determines how the organization is going to translate
those customer wants into product design and process attribute targets. These hows
are entered across the top portion of the House of Quality.
3. The team evaluates each of the customer wants against the hows. In the relationship
matrix of the house, the team evaluates how well its design meets customer needs.
4. The roof of the house indicates the relationship between the attributes.
5. The team develops importance ratings for its design attributes on the bottom row of
the table. This was done by assigning values (5 for high, 3 for medium, 1 for low) to
each entry in the relationship matrix, and then multiplying each of these values by the
customer’s importance rating. The values in the “Our importance ratings” row
provides a ranking of how to proceed with product and process design, with the
highest values being the most critical to a successful product.
6. The House of Quality is also used for the evaluation of competitors, the two columns
on the right indicates how market research thinks competitors Acer and Lenovo
satisfy customer wants ( Good, Fair, or Poor).Products from other firms and even the
proposed product can be added to the next company Lenovo.
7. The team identifies the technical attributes and evaluates how well Dell and its
competitors address these attributes. The team then decides on the noted technical
attributes.

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9.HOUSE OF QUALITY – IT FIRMS

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10.HOUSE OF QUALITY – COLLEGE LABS

11.QUALITY ASSURANCE IN DELL

[4]Currently Dell uses Quality Management System (QMS) Manual for its Quality Assurance
where it focusses on customer feedback, performance of the process, status of improvements,
etc. Apart from this, Dell uses SWOT and PESTEL analysis. There is no evidence of House
of Quality being used by Dell. Through our HOQ technique, Dell can clearly meet the target
needs of the customers in various segments and also customers in single segment. Dell thus
uses Mass Customization strategy among various segments and Mass Production strategy
within each segment.

12.RECOMMENDATIONS FOR DELL

Based on our study, we recommend the below for Dell laptops in order to improve its quality
in each segment:

 Implement house of quality in each segment to satisfy the customers better.

 A Test Management Team can be developed to coordinate all of a program’s testing
efforts from development certification through user acceptance testing.
 A Functional Certification Test Team can be made for the major components of the
initiative to allow third-party certification of some of the platform’s key software
components.
 Development of a daily executive dashboard which provides quantitative metrics and
qualitative status regarding test phase readiness, test execution, defect details, trends,
retest and remediation success and closure rates.
 Using the dashboard, senior management will be able to determine, in real time,
whether the progress-to-goal being maintained or whether modifications were
necessary to meet requirements.

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  Trend data informed decisions software release cycles and their impact on eventual
deployment.

12.REFERENCES

[1]
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/308607256_Designing_Laptop_Based_On_Costum
er_Preference_Using_ECQFD_and_TRIZ_Methods

[2] https://prezi.com/ewc4ipu4hbuz/quality-function-deployment-qfd/

[3] https://www.scribd.com/document/323754778/House-of-Quality-for-Laptop

[4]
https://www.dell.com/content/topics/global.aspx/sitelets/solutions/perot/navsea_qa?c=us&l=e
n&cs=RC977746

[5] https://www.emc.com/collateral/software/service-overview/h5826-qual-mgmt-improv-
co.pdf

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