Potential of conceptual design methodology for food process innovation

The available time span for food product and process innovation is steadily decreasing, and to increase the efficacy of the development cycles, systematic design procedures can be used to develop new and to redesign existing processes. The Conceptual Process Design (CPD) methodologies used in chemical industry might also be applied in the food industry to rethink their systems and to break down the complexity of problems into several hierarchical levels. The Delft design matrix, a combination of the iterative design procedure, hierarchical decomposition and task driven methods, is a promising tool which can cover the different objectives and criteria of food design. This article analyzes the potential applicability of Delft Design Matrix as a CPD methodology for food process design and illustrates its functionality with the design of a bakery production system.