The conceptual stage precedes the detailed elaboration of the components within the different engineering disciplines. Therefore, the conceptual design plays many central roles in the product life cycle, Next, we emphasize some of the most important ones, in our opinion.
The formal description of the product at an early stage of the life cycle improves the understanding of the product requirements and how they answer the customer needs. The allocation of requirements to the model elements ensures that these needs are covered and provides a rationale for the engineer in charge of fulfilling these requirements. The rationalization of the design is therefore a communication tool spanning organizational levels and life cycle stages. It improves communication across teams, between teams (think of the different engineering disciplines) and between teams and decision makers. It uses a generic language (in the sense that it is not specific to any engineering discipline) that accommodates the incremental detailing of the product representation. That last aspect allows coping with organizational levels. Note that such a formal description is well suited to methodologies.
The SysML model provides an electronic representation of the product that is leveraged as a decision tool.
The product model represents abstractions of artifacts that are progressively elaborated throughout the life cycle. These artifacts are distributed across the engineering disciplines participating to the design. Hence the model forms a traceability scaffold that provides a means to measure the development progress, perform change impact analysis, and manage dependencies between processes and the produced artifacts. The SysML model is therefore a management and integration tool for the stakeholders.
