Luca Mastrogiacomo

Polytechnic University of Turin | polito · DIGEP - Department of Management and Production Engineering

Ranking aggregation is an ancient problem with some characteristic elements: a number of experts, who individually rank a set of objects according to a certain (subjective) attribute, and the need to aggregate the resulting expert rankings into a collective judgment. Although this problem is traditionally very popular in fields such as social choic...

In the vision of Industry 5.0, collaborative robots (or cobots) play a central supporting role in various industries, especially manufacturing. Close interaction with cobots requires special attention to user experience to fully exploit the benefits of this paradigm. Consequently, understanding the impact of a cobot’s physical size on user experien...

The integration of eye-tracking technology in manufacturing is emerging as a powerful tool for optimizing human performance and well-being in the workplace. Advances in various fields enabled the recent development of smaller, wearable, and wireless eye-tracking devices which are suitable for naturalistically studying manufacturing processes, such...

Investigating assembly complexity is a continuing concern within the manufacturing field, as it may impact the quality and costs of products. A growing body of literature is aimed at developing novel and reliable methods to assess assembly complexity. The first aim of this paper is to provide an extensive literature review, identifying the main app...

The primary module of Quality Function Deployment (QFD) is the House of Quality (HoQ), which supports the design of new products and services by translating customer requirements (CRs) into engineering characteristics (ECs). Within the HoQ framework, the traditional technique for prioritizing ECs is the independent scoring method (ISM), which aggre...

The construction of cruise ship hulls is a complex process that involves various stages: it begins with the fabrication of panels, which involves marking, cutting, and shaping metal plates of considerable length, followed by the welding of rigid structural components onto these panels. To minimize delays and cost overruns, it is crucial to detect a...

The advancement of Human-Robot Collaboration (HRC) in industrial environments has underscored the importance of establishing harmonious and symbiotic relationships between humans and robots. This study, in line with the principles of Industry 5.0, proposes an approach to support the integration of human capabilities with advanced robotics, enhancin...

Due to the growing demand for customised products, companies have faced increasing product and process complexity levels. To address this issue, manufacturing processes should become more flexible. One of the most promising technologies to achieve this goal is collaborative robotics (or ‘cobots’). In collaborative assembly processes, human and robo...

Shared mobility is transforming urban transportation. The increasing demand for more efficient and sustainable transportation options has driven the growth of the shared mobility sector, attracting operators ranging from new entrants to traditional manufacturers looking to diversify their markets. Despite its popularity, there is currently a lack o...

One of the main paradigms of Industry 5.0 is represented by human-robot collaboration (HRC), which aims to support humans in production processes. However, working entire shifts in close contact with a robotic system may introduce new hazards from a cognitive ergonomics perspective. This paper presents a methodological approach to monitor the evolu...

The advent of collaborative robotics has enabled humans and robots to collaborate closely in carrying out manufacturing activities. Together, they can leverage their unique strengths and capabilities to tackle complex tasks. This partnership between humans and robots is often described as symbiotic in literature, but this concept is frequently over...

Recent technological innovations make some measuring instruments – that would have been considered unthinkable one/two decades ago – available in the shipbuilding industry, where dimensional errors of a few millimeters are generally tolerated. This article offers a structured comparison of three of these state-of-the-art instruments: a wireless las...

Research and teaching are the two most characteristic activities of the professional life of academics. Since the second half of the last century, a plurality of studies focused on the link between these activities, with often contrasting conclusions. While some studies are in line with the von Humboldtian view of research and teaching as synergist...

Assembly complexity assessment is a widely addressed topic in manufacturing. Several studies proved the correlation between assembly complexity and the occurrence of defects, thus justifying this increasing attention. A measure of complexity provides control over quality costs and performances. Over the years, many methods have been proposed to pro...

Human–Robot Collaboration (HRC) represents an innovative solution able to enhance quality and adaptability of production processes. However, to fully exploit the benefits of HRC, human factors must be also taken into account. A novel experimental setting involving a repetitive assembly process is presented to investigate the effects of prolonged HR...

Nowadays, word of mouth and the Voice-of-Customers have largely left their physical and relational dimension to be replaced by online digital platforms where users can describe their experiences and share them openly. However, the increasing availability of user-generated content, related to the usage of products and services, poses several challen...

Investigating assembly complexity is a continuing concern within manufacturing field, as it may impact quality and costs of products. There is a growing body of literature aimed at developing novel and reliable methods to assess assembly complexity. The first aim of this paper is to provide an extensive literature review, identifying the main appro...

In the landscape of the emerging Industry 5.0, human–robot collaboration (HRC) represents a solution to increase the flexibility and reconfigurability of production processes. Unlike classical industrial automation, in HRC it is possible to have direct interaction between humans and robots. Consequently, in order to effectively implement HRC it is...

Human-Robot Collaboration (HRC) represents an innovative solution able to enhance quality and adaptability of production processes. In a collaborative process, man and robot cooperate symbiotically. However, to fully exploit the benefits of HRC, human factors must be taken into account. A novel experimental setting involving a repetitive assembly p...

Purpose The paper aims to define a dashboard of indicators to assess the quality performance of higher education institutions (HEI). The instrument is termed SMART-QUAL. Design/methodology/approach Two sources were used in order to explore potential indicators. In the first step, information disclosed in official websites or institutional document...

Thanks to recent technological innovations, some large-volume-metrology measuring instruments-that would have been considered out of context one/two decades ago-are now effective for the shipbuilding industry, where dimensional errors of a few millimetres are generally tolerated. This paper considers three state-of-the-art instruments: a laser trac...

Within the context of Industry 4.0 and of the new emerging Industry 5.0, human factors are becoming increasingly important, especially in Human-Robot Collaboration (HRC). This paper provides a novel study focused on the human aspects involved in industrial HRC by exploring the effects of various HRC setting factors. In particular, this paper aims a...

The introduction of collaborative robots aims to make production more flexible, promoting a greater interaction between humans and robots also from physical point of view. However, working closely with a robot may lead to the creation of stressful situations for the operator, which can negatively affect task performance. In Human-Robot Interaction...

Purpose Quality 4.0 is a new paradigm of quality management, which emphasises the need to adapt to recent technological innovations by updating traditional quality approaches. Amongst the most important factors for adopting Quality 4.0 is the leveraging of big data to collect insights and quality perceptions from clients. Therefore, user reviews ha...

Purpose: Digital Voice-of-Customer (digital VoC) primarily consists of textual feedback posted by users of products or services on the web. Digital VoC may represent a valuable source of information for quality management, and its promising potential is also receiving a lot of attention in the new Quality 4.0 framework. However, manufacturers and...

Manufacturers and service providers need new tools to leverage the value of the digital Voice-of-Customer (VoC). These unstructured and disorganised data need ad-hoc approaches for their analysis and interpretation. In this view, this article proposes an innovative methodology aiming at classifying the Key-Attributes (KA) of products and services t...

This chapter formally defines the ranking aggregation problem, focusing the attention on the characteristic input and output data. Regarding input data, a mathematical definition of the concept of ranking is provided, identifying the most common ranking types (e.g., linear, partial, and incomplete); then, typical ways of establishing a hierarchy of...

This chapter explores the concept of ranking from the perspective of the so-called Measurement Theory and its derivations.The first three sections carry out an extensive theoretical digression on the Theory of Scales of Measurement and the Representation Theory of Measurement, aiming to recall some basic concepts, such as that of measurement and sc...

This chapter focuses on ranking aggregation techniques, which are the core of the whole book. The initial part of the chapter suggests a taxonomy based on three characteristic features: (a) input data characteristics, (b) aggregation mechanism, and (c) output data characteristics.Without any ambition of exhaustiveness, the rest of the chapter offer...

This chapter introduces a typical decision-making problem concerning the aggregation of rankings formulated by multiple experts. These rankings, which are inherently subjective and concern a specific attribute of a set of objects of interest, must be aggregated into a collective judgment, which is supposed to reflect the opinion of all experts.Afte...

For a specific ranking aggregation problem, the application of different aggregation techniques may lead to different results. For the aggregation to be effective, the resulting collective judgment should reflect the relevant input data, i.e., experts’ rankings and importance hierarchy.This chapter describes some quantitative tools to check the deg...

This chapter presents several examples of practical applications of the ranking aggregation problem in the field of Engineering, mainly in the context of design, development, and evaluation of the quality/reliability of products, services, and manufacturing processes.These examples prove (1) the diffusion of the ranking aggregation problem within t...

This chapter focuses on evaluating the degree of concordance of the expert rankings. First, it provides a description of two consolidated rank-correlation coefficients—i.e., the Spearman’s ρ and the Kendall’s τ—which are used to assess (1) the degree of association of two rankings and (2) the significance of the relationship between them. Next, it...

Large-Volume Metrology (LVM) instruments – such as laser trackers, photogrammetric systems, rotary-laser automatic theodolites, etc. – generally include several sensors, which measure the distances and/or angles subtended by some targets. This measurements, combined with the spatial position/orientation of sensors (i.e., the so-called extrinsic par...

Purpose Digital voice-of-customer (digital VoC) analysis is gaining much attention in the field of quality management. Digital VoC can be a great source of knowledge about customer needs, habits and expectations. To this end, the most popular approach is based on the application of text mining algorithms named topic modelling. These algorithms can...

Human–robot collaboration (HRC) is a gradually consolidating paradigm of the modern industry which combines human and robot skills to make production more flexible. Since the effective implementation of HRC requires a careful analysis of different aspects, related both to robots and humans, there is a real need for a structured methodology to suppo...

The concurrent availability of an ever-increasing volume of User-Generated Content (UGC) and text mining techniques has enabled methods to conduct both qualitative and quantitative research that was unimaginable a few years ago. These investigations have proved to generate interesting insights with potential implications in manufacturing and engine...

Purpose The paper attempts to address the following research questions (RQs): RQ1: What are the main research topics within PSS research? RQ2: What are future trends for PSS research? Design/methodology/approach Twenty years of research (1999-2018) on product-service systems (PSS) produced a significant amount of scientific literature on the topic....

User-Generated Contents (UGCs) are gaining increasing popularity as a source of valuable information for companies to manage the quality of their products, services and Product-Service Systems (PSS). This paper aims at proposing a novel approach to identify and categorize quality determinants through the analysis of an extensive database of UGCs. I...

Purpose - This study aims at identifying the quality determinants of car-sharing services, analyzing unstructured User-Generated Contents (UGCs) and, more specifically, online reviews generated by users of the same car-sharing service. Moreover, this paper discusses the implication of the proposed data-driven approach on engineering design. Methodo...

Purpose: Human-Robot Collaboration (HRC) is a paradigm that is gradually consolidating in the industrial field. The goal of this paradigm is to combine human and robot skills to make production more flexible. An effective implementation of HRC requires a careful analysis of its different aspects, related to both robots and humans. For this reason,...

The servitization process, i.e. the gradual shift from product-centred value propositions to complex product-service systems offerings, has led many manufacturing companies to modify their business models and internal organization. It is clear that this is a rather short-sighted definition not taking into account how much a company is product or se...

Research funding is essential to promote the scientific activity of researchers and the dissemination of their results. Simplifying, funding schemes can be classified in two categories-competitive and non-competitive-with several corresponding advantages and shortcomings, which are widely discussed in the scientific literature. The researchers of P...

Human-Robot Collaboration (HRC) is a form of direct interaction between humans and robots. The objective of this type of interaction is to perform a task by combining the skills of both humans and robots. HRC is characterized by several aspects, related both to robots and humans. Many works have focused on the study of specific aspects related to H...

The introduction of advanced technologies and new production paradigms has led an increasing number of manufacturing companies to adopt business models that include an integrated provision of products and services. This process is generally referred to as servitization. This article addresses two primary research questions: (a) How do the commodity...

For manufacturing companies, the integration of service elements to support product offering has become a key factor in gaining competitive advantage. Product-Service Systems (PSSs) are value offerings that combine tangible products and intangible services. To date, their design process is still critical. There are several aspects that designers ne...

ISO 9001 certifications for quality management and assurance are widespread worldwide. Since their introduction, more than two decades ago, their geographical diffusion has been studied and analysed by academics and practitioners, in order to understand dynamics, drivers and trends. This work enriches the state-of-art research on European countries...

Manufacturing servitization is defined as the process of innovating companies’ capabilities and procedures to support the shift from providing products to providing product-service systems. Many studies have focused on this process, with particular regard to the potential benefits. Despite this general interest, a major void still concerns the quan...

Human-Robot Collaboration (HRC) is a form of direct interaction between humans and robots. The aim of this form of interaction is to complete a specific task combining the abilities of both the human and the robots. HRC is characterized by many different aspects. Many works have focused on the evaluation of specific aspects related to HRC, e.g. saf...

Recent studies show that the combined use of large-volume metrology (LVM) systems (e.g., laser trackers, rotary-laser automatic theodolites, photogrammetric systems, etc.) can lead to a systematic reduction in measurement uncertainty and a better exploitation of the available equipment. The objective of this paper is to present some diagnostic test...

Purpose This paper dissects the diffusion of the number of organizations that implemented multiple management systems (MSs), considering the ISO 9001, ISO 14001 and OHSAS 18001 standards (QES) in the South European countries: Italy, Portugal and Spain. In addition, based on the data collected, forecasting models were developed to assess at which e...

Purpose – Product Service Systems (PSSs), i.e. integrated offerings of products, services and supporting infrastructures, represent the output of a growing number of manufacturing companies. This paper extends the Quality Function Deployment (QFD) method to the design of PSS. The proposed approach aims at the elicitation of functional requirements...

Purpose Service matching is defined in this paper as the process of combining a new service with one or more existing services. A recurring problem for service designer is to match new services with existing ones. This process may be seen as the fundamental action for the development of a service network. The purpose of this paper is to evaluate th...

A decision-making problem diffused in various practical contexts is that of aggregating multi-agent judgements into a consensus ordering, in the case the agents' importance is expressed through a set of weights. A crucial point in this aggregation is that the consensus ordering well reflects the input data, i.e., agents' judgements and importance....

This paper presents the service gap deployment (SGD), a new method to prioritise crucial to quality activities of a service that does not completely satisfy customer expectations. In the SGD, service activities (SAs) are related to gaps between customer expectations and perceptions so as to identify SAs that may need a redesign or improvement in or...

Quality function deployment (QFD) is a management tool used for the design of new products/services and the related production/supply processes. One of the goals of the method is to translate the customer requirements (CRs) into measurable engineering characteristics (ECs) of the new product/service and prioritise them, basing on their relationship...

The process that involves companies developing the capabilities to provide services and solutions that supplement their traditional product offerings is commonly called servitization. With regards to manufacturing, the servitization process has been found to provide many advantages, such as: increasing the value of the offering, enhancing product c...

Recent studies show that the combined use of Large-Volume Metrology (LVM) systems (e.g., laser trackers, rotary-laser automatic theodolites (R-LATs), photogrammetric cameras, etc.) can lead to a systematic reduction in measurement uncertainty and a better exploitation of the available equipment. Unfortunately, the sensors of a specific LVM system a...

Quality function deployment (QFD) is a consolidated management tool for supporting the design of new products/services and the relevant production/supply processes, starting from the so-called voice of the customer (VoC). QFD includes several operative phases, ranging from the VoC collection to the definition of the technical features of production...

The article entitled, "Multi-Target Modular probe for Large-Volume Metrology" submitted in Recent Patents on Engineering (RPENG) by Dr. Domenico A. Maisano has been withdrawn from the journal in accordance with BSP Editorial Policies.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to verify a possible relationship between quality management system certification according to ISO 9001 standard and risk of failure of Italian companies. Design/methodology/approach A synthetic index which summarize the most crucial economic/financial aspects of the studied companies is assumed as the response...

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to introduce the practice of service recycling. There is an end of life to every product. At this stage, recycling is one option: it is the process of converting waste materials into new products or raw materials. There is also an end of life to every service, which generally coincides with the end of service de...

The goal of this paper is to investigate the existence of a possible connection between Quality Management System certifications according to the ISO 9001 standard and the failure risk of a company. A sample of Italian manufacturing companies is studied in the period 2008/2010, characterised by the beginning of a severe economic crisis. The risk of...

In the last decade, a growing number of studies focused on the qualitative/quantitative analysis of bibliometric-database errors. Most of these studies relied on the identification and (manual) examination of relatively limited samples of errors. Using an automated procedure, we collected a large corpus of more than 10,000 errors in the two multidi...

ABSTRACT Purpose – This paper dissects the diffusion of Integrated Management Systems (IMSs) encompassing the ISO 9001, ISO 14001 and OHSMS 18001 standards in the South European countries. Design/methodology/approach – Data concerning the evolution of the amount of IMSs in Greece, Italy, Portugal and Spain were collected for the time period between...

Omitted citations—i.e., missing links between a cited paper and the corresponding citing papers—are a consequence of several bibliometric-database errors. To reduce these errors, databases may undertake two actions: (1) improving the control of the (new) papers to be indexed, i.e., limiting the introduction of “new” dirty data, and (2) detecting an...

This paper focuses on the problem of combining multi-agent preference orderings of different alternatives into a single fused ordering, when the agents’ importance is expressed through a rank-ordering and not a set of weights. An enhanced version of the algorithm proposed by Yager in (Fuzzy Sets and Systems, 117(1): 1-12, 2001) is presented. The ma...

Acceptance sampling is a statistical procedure for accepting or rejecting production lots according to the result of a sample inspection. Formalizing the concept of assisted acceptance sampling, this article suggests the use of consolidated tools for reducing the risk of human errors in acceptance sampling activities. To this purpose, the applicati...