Abstract
Today, Manufacturing companies are adopting a servitization strategy and Product-Service System model to enhance value and remain competitive. Often, this transition also means to embrace a System-of-Systems (SoS) perspective. Concurrently, companies face challenges with volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous (VUCA) environments. One way to tackle VUCA is to utilize simulation modeling. However, developing SoS simulations can be complex and cumbersome. This paper extracts lessons learned from six case studies to identify effective and ineffective practices in developing simulation models. The analysis has led to nine design principles for more effective simulation modeling. Furthermore, the paper explores simulation techniques for modeling SoS and discusses effective VUCA management. Finally, the paper proposes four future research directions to advance SoS simulation research.
Keywords
system-of-systems, simulation, early design phases, complexity
Reference
Toller Melén, C. N. K., Bertoni, M., & Johansson Askling, C. (2025). Effective system-of-systems simulation in a VUCA world: lessons learned for design decision-makers. In Proceedings of the Design Society : Volume 5: ICED25 (pp. 1435–1444). Cambridge University Press. Presented at 25th International Conference on Engineering Design, ICED 2025, Dallas, Aug 11-14, 2025. https://doi.org/10.1017/pds.2025.10157
