ITUB20154622A1 - System and method of consultation and selection of hardware components for the construction and composition of interior furnishing accessories - Google Patents

Description

System and method of consultation and selection of hardware components for the creation and composition of interior furnishings

DESCRIPTION

Technical sector of the invention

The present invention relates to an innovative system and a method for improving the operations of selecting and purchasing components for the construction and composition of interior furnishing accessories.

State of the art

As is known, the manufacturing and assembly processes of furniture can be classified into two macro areas: mass-produced and made-to-measure. Mass production involves the study of design and the construction of structures and components in pre-established dimensions, with standard components and with very few margins of freedom to customize the finished product, tailor-made production overcomes these limits, allowing a subject to design and create a piece of furniture customized in each of its characteristics in terms of size, material, finishes, type of construction, etc.

The characteristics shown in terms of freedom in the design and construction of a "made-to-measure" piece of furniture, while on the one hand constitute an advantage for the customer, however, constitute an obstacle for the craftsman or designer who physically creates the piece of furniture at the moment. which must select the most suitable components for the realization of the furniture. There are, in fact, a very large number of hardware component manufacturers who produce an equally large number of items that are often similar to each other (if not identical) or vice versa, apparently similar to each other in terms of functionality, but profoundly different in terms of performance, reliability and sometimes also in terms of suitability for use, once assembled. For example, imagine a mechanism for opening doors vertically where the choice of the code to use depends on four factors: door width, door height, door thickness and door weight. They all look the same and absurdly they are also good for similar heights-widths-thicknesses, while it is the weight that makes the difference. In the case of a mechanism for a lighter weight, the furniture door, once opened upwards, would suddenly close with the risks we can imagine.

To date, the choice of components to be used for the creation of a "made-to-measure" piece of furniture involves several phases: realization of the design of the furniture in all its components, detailed description of the list of necessary components, consultation of supplier catalogs for the search for the most suitable components for the solution to be created, selection of components and subsequent acquisition of the same through the supplier's sales channels. This selection outlines a number of issues. A first problem is the retrieval of information: the catalogs of the hardware articles of the various manufacturers are available in both paper and digital format, but they still retain a common structure based on a classification of products by macro-categories; it is possible to search for specific articles exclusively through the subdivision by product category without having the possibility (even with current digital media) to cross-reference information relating to different components. Each article also has its own technical data sheet with descriptive levels of detail that vary from supplier to supplier and which are often complete for a series of important information such as dimensions, assembly methods, etc. and as many times they are lacking in anyway important information, relating to the most suitable fields of use for the specific article. This information is often very technical in nature and is owned only by the manufacturer and his technical staff and not by the supplier's sales staff who often have the same “disorientation” problems between the different types of products of the different manufacturers.

A second problem concerns the considerable use of time in the selection of components. As already mentioned, there are a large number of manufacturers and if a craftsman wants to be sure that he is buying the best component for the piece of furniture he intends to make, he should consult the catalogs of all the suppliers and punctually analyze all the detailed data sheets and the technical characteristics of each item, with a great deal of time for the selection of components. Another important aspect is linked to the denomination of the components themselves: the activity of making "custom-made" furniture is an artisan activity deeply rooted in the territory, consequently even the identifying terms are not common, but are affected by dialectal inflections and declinations typical of specific territories / regions. For example, the type of opening of a hinge is commonly defined as "external hinged", but in some regions of Italy it is known by the names "patch", "knee", "zanca". This of course entails a further difficulty in tracing the item of interest or in interpreting its characteristic (such as the type of opening in the example) which is known by the craftsman with a completely different name from that used by the supplier in the preparation of the catalog. .

A third problem concerns the risk of selecting wrong components: however careful and scrupulous the component analysis phase may be, it is always possible to make mistakes in the selection and direct one's choice on a component which, once assembled and integrated with the remaining parts of the piece of furniture that is being created, could prove to be inadequate or in any case adequate, but not perfectly congruent with the desired quality and efficiency that were intended to be achieved with the furniture being created.

A fourth problem is given by the repetitiveness in the choices: often the artisans or furniture designers tend to use previously selected components for the creation of other furniture similar to the one they intend to make, but probably different in some characteristics. This repetitiveness is linked both to the experiential component of the craftsman, but also to the difficulty in quickly tracing what is of interest, as previously illustrated. Furthermore, there is a frequent risk that for certain items, suppliers interrupt their production or support their distribution with more advanced models and which could be more suitable for the specific piece of furniture to be made. In general, this variability of the articles and the tendency of the craftsman to always procure the same types of articles risks compromising the selection of components and in general for the craftsman there is the risk of remaining unaware of the existence of a component that could be better than that traditionally used. A fifth problem concerns the speed in finding the various components for the construction of a piece of furniture and their acquisition from different manufacturers with varied supply channels and receipt of the ordered goods at different times. As already mentioned, there is a large number of manufacturers of hardware components and there is an equally large number of suppliers, some single-brand (that is, distributing components from a single manufacturer), others multi-brand; this entails the need to procure from different suppliers and therefore to create and manage a variable number of orders with the consequent risk of delays in delivery or mismatch in receiving the goods, with inevitable delays in the creation of custom-made furniture.

There are no known systems in the state of the art that can overcome these drawbacks in the field of "made-to-measure" furniture.

Therefore, there is a need for a system and a method capable of overcoming the technical problem that a craftsman may encounter in the selection of components for the construction and composition of interior furnishings, or the incorrect selection of components.

Summary of the invention

The object of the present invention is to solve the aforementioned technical problem by making the selection and purchase operations of the necessary components completely automatic, reliable, ie without incorrect choices, and extremely fast. The system is therefore of great help for the craftsman or the designer in choosing the correct components for the creation of a "made-to-measure" piece of furniture, to overcome each of the problems highlighted.

The purpose of the invention is to support the work of the manufacturer (artisan or entrepreneur) by obtaining an automatic selection of the "best" component, a reduction in the selection times of the individual components, ensuring that the selected components are always the most suitable in relation to the furniture to be made and are available on the market, to unify the procedure for acquiring the components produced by the various manufacturers through a single order and supply channel.

The modular system has the characteristics set out in the attached independent system claim.

The methodology that said modular system allows to implement has the characteristics set out in the independent method claim.

The dependent claims outline particular and further advantageous aspects of the invention <.>

The advantages brought by the invention object of the present invention are therefore, in this sector, many, especially as regards the retrieval of information. In fact, the system allows, through a precise classification of the different types of "made-to-measure" furniture in their main categories and according to the different constituent components, to quickly trace the items of interest to what is being created, avoiding the need to consult numerous catalogs organized in an unspecified manner. directly usable. The procedure for standardizing the contents of the catalogs ensures that all items, regardless of the manufacturer who makes them, are cataloged and classified according to common characteristics. Furthermore, the system allows their consultation through dedicated hardware tools (smartphone, tablet and PC) at any time without the need for any technician / expert consultant of the single component or representative of a specific manufacturer.

A further advantage consists in the great saving of time in the selection of the chosen components. As already pointed out, the number of producers is extremely high and the number of items available is even higher. The system allows, through the filter-based article selection mechanism, to select the best component with a few skimming operations expressed in natural language (questions and answers). Furthermore, the system allows the association of wildcard terms (defined aliases) that allow to associate to a single component or to a single characteristic more names that could respect, for example, the different names that that characteristic has, in relation to the region of origin of the 'artisan. For example, the type of "opening a hinge" is known in the different regions of Italy with different slang / dialect terms, within the system it is possible to insert these associations so that the craftsman or designer can trace the articles of interest also through one of the terms commonly used by him. In a paper catalog it would not be possible to report these dialectal terms.

A further advantage of the invention is given by the elimination of the risk of selecting wrong components. Through a mechanism for selecting items based on the characteristics of each product and implemented through the question / answer pair, it allows to minimize the possibility of selecting the wrong components.

Another advantage of the system in question is given by the repetitiveness in the choices. It allows you to update the knowledge base of the system with any frequency, which will therefore always contain items available and still in production and will immediately show the newly produced items allowing the craftsman to always have not just one manufacturer's catalog, but all catalogs. of all producers constantly updated in a completely transparent and immediate way.

Another advantage is the rapidity of system acquisition. This allows you to order products from different manufacturers and / or distributors without producing a different quote and order for each one. This is carried out automatically by a module of the system, exempting the end customer and making the order procedure easier.

With a view to branding the system, it is also possible to standardize the packaging and the various order headers, showing as the only reference that of the company that is using it and where the solution is located.

Brief description of the drawings

These and other advantages will be better highlighted in the detailed description of the invention which makes specific reference to Figure 1, in which an absolutely non-limiting example of a preferential embodiment of the present invention is represented. In particular:

Fig.1 shows a diagram of the system according to the invention.

Detailed description

With particular reference to Figure 1, the innovative system 100 proposed, includes a first WKB module configured to contain the information assets that allows you to improve the component selection process. This patrimony is provided by a team of experts in the domain of manufacturing "made-to-measure" furniture who previously analyzes the catalogs and products of the various suppliers and groups their information according to two main guidelines: navigation by environments and the model for choosing components. based on the characteristics of the individual items. The heritage contained, in a nutshell, formalizes the experience of domain experts by combining it with the tacit knowledge present within the catalogs and with which each article is intrinsically equipped. The navigation by environments is based on a phase of selection of the articles, that is not based on the minimum components necessary for the realization of the "made-to-measure" furniture, but starting directly from the object to be created, that is the furniture itself (the only information certain that the craftsman or designer has when he decides to make the piece of furniture). The heritage therefore implements a system for storing categories of environments, macro-components, sub-components and minimum components. The definition of these objects is as follows: "environment" is the environment of the house in which the furniture to be made will be placed; "Macro-component" represents the main elements in which it is possible to classify the furniture (for example base, column, wardrobe, etc ...); "Sub-component" is the secondary type that provides greater detail on the type of element to be made (for example base - with pull-out doors, base - open, column - with drawers, etc ...);

“Component” is the lowest level of subdivision of a piece of furniture. It constitutes, in fact, the breakdown of the piece of furniture into all its minimum constituent components (for example for a "base - open" the components will be the following: door, hangers, joints, lighting, feet, shelf supports, body, groove systems); "Article" represents the lowest level of detail, that is the minimum selectable element for the construction of the furniture. The navigation path starts from the broadest classification category up to the minimum level of constitution of a “made-to-measure” piece of furniture. The classification hierarchy is shown in the following diagram: ENVIRONMENT → MACROCOMPONENT → SUB-COMPONENT → COMPONENT → ARTICLE

With this approach, within the WKB module, it is possible to know all the "atomic components" necessary for the creation of a "made-to-measure" piece of furniture, starting from the environment in which it will be positioned and gradually descending into the constituent details of the piece of furniture itself. and not as it happens in the traditional way of working "to measure" in which this information is tacit and the exclusive patrimony of the craftsman / designer.

Furthermore, this heritage is cataloged through a precise classification of the articles of the various suppliers based on their main characteristics. The choice to use this classification lies in providing the craftsman / designer with a series of decision-making parameters that allow him to select the most suitable item for the "made-to-measure" furniture he is making.

The characteristics are associated with the previously formalized hierarchy: at the lowest level that is that of the "components", considering that each hardware item can belong to one and only one type of "component", articles from different suppliers will obviously share the same characteristics with values different. Therefore, when inserting an "article" within the knowledge base, it will be sufficient to associate it with a "component" of those already recorded and to decline the characteristics of the article with respect to those provided for by the knowledge base. Below is an example of this association: domain experts can formalize the following characteristics for the hinges "component": type of door stop on the side, door material, door thickness, overhang of the top on the side , door opening angle, type of hinge fixing, distance between the holes of the hinges, color of the hinge, type of door closure, etc.

For each of these characteristics, the domain experts also populate the list of possible values that the characteristics may possess. This information is extracted both from the official catalogs of suppliers and from the experience of the staff in charge of formalizing the knowledge base. Examples of possible values for some characteristics of the hinge <“components” are given below:>

� Type of door stop on the side

EXTERNAL SWING HALF CENTRAL SWING <INTERNAL WIRE>

� Door material

WOOD MDF CHIPBOARD LISTELLAR ALUMINUM GLASS

When inserting the "articles" in the WKB unit, each article is declined with respect to the characteristics envisaged by the component to which the article is associated, therefore a XXX model hinge from an ABC supplier will be characterized by certain values while a YYY model hinge of a CDEF supplier may have the same characteristics or differ in some of them. With this approach, within the WKB unit, it is possible to define an article through its characteristics and then implement a navigation mechanism that starts from these properties and then goes back to the specific article and not the other way around as happens in standard catalogs where starts from the list of articles to get to the detail of the single characteristic.

A second WNS module configured for navigation that the craftsman or designer can use to access the information contained in the first WKB module to physically perform the search and selection of components. The unit implements advanced navigation as it is not based on the traditional product subdivisions, those traditionally used in product catalogs but, as mentioned, implements a system based on the taxonomy provided in the WKB unit, i.e. linked to the environment and to the specific object you want to make.

The navigation system is based on the following taxonomy: ENVIRONMENT → MACROCOMPONENT → SUB-COMPONENT → COMPONENT → FILTER → ITEM

As is evident with respect to the classification implemented by the WKB module, during the consultation there is an additional level, that of the filter. The filter represents the link between the two lines of innovation implemented in the WKB module and in the WNS module is further evident. Browsing by filter is based on a series of questions that the system asks the user to help him select the item that best suits his needs. The questions that the system poses are exactly the characteristics with which the article was registered in the WKB form. Taking up the example of the previous section, the questions that will be asked to the user during the consultation phase are the following: "How does the door strike the side? what material is the door made of? how thick is the door? how much does the door surmount on the side in mm? what opening angle should the door have? how should the hinge be fixed? what kind of center-to-center distance do the hinge holes have? what color should the zipper be? what type of closure should the hinge have? "

The possible answers to these questions are exactly the lists of values established within the WKB module and which are shown below together with the definition of the characteristic, in brackets, as reported in the WKB module: "How does the door strike on the side? Type of door stop on the side: external door, half door, central internal flush; what material is the door made of? Door material wood, MDF, chipboard, blockboard, aluminum, glass.

By answering these simple questions, the navigation system WNS module is able to filter the list of items in the WKB module to return only those that possess the required characteristic to the craftsman.

In conclusion, if you want to create an entire piece of furniture for a specific environment, by selecting the necessary items using the system 100, it will therefore be possible, starting from the target environment of the "made-to-measure" piece of furniture, to navigate through the different levels to reach the complete list of components. making up the piece of furniture and, through the filters, select for each of these the article of interest most suitable for what you want to achieve. The advantages of this navigation mode are immediately noticeable that it can be used by anyone (even non-domain experts) and the automatic provision of useful information about the components necessary for the creation of a piece of furniture.

To underline, as regards the selection of articles based on questions and answers, the features that can be implemented are completely "general purpose", that is, the articles can be classified according to any type of information (color, material, size, type of assembly, etc ... ). Furthermore, the characteristics and, consequently, the questions that will be asked to the craftsman / designer during the article selection phase, can be implemented within the WKB unit according to two types: single answer, i.e. the craftsman / designer can choose only one value from those in the list of values (for example: the hinges have an opening angle exclusively of 90 °) or multiple response, i.e. the craftsman / designer can choose one or more values from those in the list of values (for example: the white or black hinges).

In general, the answers to different questions in the consultation phase of the list of articles are aggregated together with the logical operator AND: given two questions X and Y with their possible values / answers X {a, b, c, d, e , .. n} e Y {p, q, r, s, t ... z} the selection occurs according to the following formula:

question X - answer n AND question Y - answer q or answer t Example: select all the hinges <white or black> AND <which have an opening angle of 90 °>.

A third WAS module configured to proceed immediately with the order of the selected material. Before creating the real order, the WAS module queries a management software connected to the WKB unit which for each product is able to check and calculate the following parameters: stock availability for the store that is using the system or for the distributor from which it is supplied, price of the single product for the specific customer who is operating on the WOE system (for each customer there is a possible association with a customized price list with different discount policies), expected delivery date (calculated in based on actual availability and / or supply frequency for the specific product and average delivery times of the manufacturer). This information allows WAS to show (on the WT screen which will be displayed later) a summary, called estimate, of the list of products ordered with price and expected delivery date. At this point, the customer can save the quote to consult it later or confirm the quote itself and proceed with the order. In this second case, WAS proceeds with the actual calculation of delivery dates and prices, as these may have changed and requires further confirmation to proceed with the order. In case of acceptance by the end customer, the quote is transformed into an actual order.

As mentioned, it is possible that the desired products come from different suppliers and distributors and therefore to be able to satisfy the final customer's order, it is not enough to execute a single order, but as many as the different manufacturers involved: WAS takes care of exactly this. Through a dedicated management software, the component is able to divide the list of products desired by the customer into groups, classifying them by manufacturer. For each of these groups, the WAS system generates a specific order to the supplier in a completely transparent way to the end user. The different orders are processed by WAS and sent digitally to individual producers who send the goods to the point of sale. This will then collect all the products of the individual order placed by the customer and ship them to the destination indicated by the end user.

A fourth WT interface module, configured to consult the WKB module through the navigation mode provided in the WNS module and including an information totem to be placed inside the stores of both single-brand and multi-brand hardware components. Through the interaction by the end user with the WT module, it will be possible to consult the WKB using the described WNS navigation system. The WT module is made as a plastic panel with customizable finishes depending on the host exhibition space (colors, logos, supplier or retailer's brand, etc.). Inside there is a modern large LCD monitor (42 '' or larger) mounted vertically and equipped with a touchscreen (sensitive and responsive to touch screen) to interact with WNS. Inside WT there is a computer with pre-installed software that implements WNS to be shown to the user on the WT screen. The touchscreen display allows the user to interact with the unit of the system 100 and, as mentioned, starting from the selection of the environment it will be possible to select the components necessary for the construction of the piece of furniture and arrive directly at the purchase of these. This can take place either directly at the point of sale.WT interacting with WAS will automatically send the shop assistant the list of products to be purchased or deferred, that is, by sending the same list to the headquarters of the supplier who will take care of the home delivery of the requested material.

Although at least one exemplary embodiment has been presented in the summary and detailed description, it must be understood that there is a large number of variants falling within the scope of the invention. Furthermore, it must be understood that the realization or achievements presented are only examples that are not intended to limit in any way the scope of protection of the invention or its application or its configurations. Rather, the brief and detailed description provide the technician skilled in the art with a convenient guide for implementing at least one exemplary embodiment, it being clear that numerous variations can be made in the function and assembly of the elements described herein, without departing from the scope of protection of the invention as established by the attached claims and their technical-legal equivalents.

Claims (6)

R I V E N D I C A Z I O N I 1) Modular system (100) for the creation and composition of interior furnishings including: - a first module (WKB) configured to contain the information assets for the selection of the components that make up the furnishing accessory, - a second module (WNS) configured for navigation that the user uses to access the information contained in the first module (WKB) to search and select components. - a third module (WAS) configured to proceed with the order of the selected material - a fourth interface and control module (WT) configured to consult the first module (WKB) through the navigation mode provided in the second module (WNS) and comprising a controller to which a touch screen monitor is enslaved, the modular system (100) being characterized by the fact that said fourth interface and control module (WT) is configured to manage with said second module (WNS) the search and selection of the components of the furnishing accessory through the first module ( WKB) and to automatically and completely manage the orders of all the individual components necessary for the creation of the furnishing accessory according to the chosen environment with a third module (WAS). 2) System (100) according to claim 1, wherein said first module (WKB) is configured for cataloging through a precise classification of the articles of different suppliers on the basis of their main characteristics. 3) System (100) according to claim 1 or 2, wherein said first module (WKB) is configured to group the information according to the navigation by environments and the component selection model based on the characteristics of the individual articles. 4) System (100) according to claim 1, wherein said module (WNS) is configured to perform the taxonomy ENVIRONMENT → MACROCOMPONENT → SUB-COMPONENT → COMPONENT → FILTER → ARTICLE. 5) System (100) according to one of the preceding claims, wherein said module (WNS) is configured according to a navigation by filter based on a series of questions that the system asks the user to help him in the selection of the most suitable article for his needs . 6) Method for the design and selection of components for the realization of furnishing accessories, including the following phases: - define the intended environment of the piece of furniture; - navigate within the different levels to reach the complete list of the components making up the piece of furniture; - select for each component the most suitable article for what you want to achieve, using filters or the selection of articles based on questions and answers; - check the availability of stock for the point of sale or distributor from which it is supplied; - check the price of the single product and any discount for the specific customer; - estimate the expected delivery date; - prepare the estimate including a list of the products ordered with price and expected delivery date; - confirm the quote itself and proceed with the order; - calculate actual prices and delivery date; - reconfirm the estimate; - prepare the actual order, one for each supplier involved.