Robust Design and Quality Assurance

Book chapter, 2011

Robust design aims at reducing the effects of variation on a design, without eliminating the variation itself. It is a method of improving product quality with little or no additional manufacturing costs. Robust design methodology was pioneered by Japanese statistician Genichi Taguchi in the 1960s. His work is believed to have had a large influence on Japanese engineering tradition, and he is credited with playing a part in the Japanese industrial boom of the 1970s and 1980s. Today, robust design methodology is employed in companies all over the world, and extensive research has been conducted on the subject.