A practical toolkit for (re)designing products for sustainable PSS in industrial B2B contexts

Purpose: This paper aims at investigating the product (re)design techniques for implementing sustainable PSS in industrial B2B contexts. The Design-for-X approach is adopted in order to identify the suitable practical levers to be adopted depending on the sustainability strategy addressed by the company. Design/methodology/approach: Based on an existing taxonomy present in the literature, a list of four DfX types has been as the most suitable to be applied to achieve sustainable PSS in B2B industrial companies. Moreover, a practical tool for practitioners is developed aimed at evaluating the DfX techniques according to the results of the literature analysis. The toolkit has been developed with the support of three manufacturing companies participating in a EU-funded project. Findings: This paper presents four sustainability objectives, related to product (re-) design features, that can be pursued by an industrial company implementing PSS, namely: decrease maintenance costs, facilitate reuse, reduce LCC/TCO and extend product life-cycle. Indeed, the developed tool is characterised by a list of gaps that are to be filled based on the sustainability objectives addressed and a procedure that helps in prioritizing the possible practical DfX actions to be taken. The paper also presents the application of the toolkit in a pilot case company Originality/value: Despite the literature acknowledges the importance of product design for achieving sustainable PSS, how the DfX approach can represent an effective lever to implement PSS is an under- investigated topic. Moreover, there are no contributions concerning practical toolkits to be used for the evaluation of DfX techniques for PSS implementation.