Fuzzy front end

David J. Soderberg, BP Chemicals You mentioned a very coherent and concise set of tools that are used portfolio management, fuzzy front end, and stage gate. Those work very well within a business unit context. They re very focused and allow you to allocate resources. 

Fuzzy front end Refers to the begirming of the development cycle, when new product and service concepts are not clear. Many organizations are defining processes and systems to manage the fuzziness of the front end of new product development cycle. 

In addition to intrinsic interest in the different modes of polymerization, attempts to commercialize FP are affected. Consider Figure 4.19, which shows a putty prepared from trimethylolpropane triacrylate with 40% aluminum oxide. On the left, the unreacted material was extmded into a cyhnder. The front was initiated at the end nearest to the bottom of the image. The product had the appearance of a fuzzy caterpillar. It is not clear whether the pattern results from only a pulsating... 

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