1、Product Development Outlook 2024SURVEY REPORTInnovation challenges of today and the future2Product Development Outlook 2024Executive SummaryWhat does the future hold for product development?At Protolabs,we wanted to gain an understanding of the issues and challenges product developers have faced rec

2、ently and those they are expecting to confront in the near future.So,this past fall our market research team surveyed more than 700 engineers,designers,and product developers from industries on the frontline of innovation.These include aerospace,automotive,and other industries we serve.The survey re

3、sults suggest that product development is at a potential inflection point as engineers and designers take on evolving challenges.First,those surveyed told us that their top product development challenge is the element of time.No matter what stage of development theyre in,there never seems to be enou

4、gh time for prototyping,for launching a product to market,and even for ongoing production.The takeaway?The amount of time(or,more accurately,the lack of time)and the related urgent need for speed are the biggest product development barriers to success as products move to production,a criticial obsta

5、cle for companies to overcome.Second,for the most part they are feeling optimistic about the years ahead,especially about potentially moving beyond pandemic-caused challenges such as supply chain disruptions and material shortages.Despite this,they acknowledge those pandemic headwinds persisted some

6、what over the last year and continued to affect product development.Also,they recognized that other factors are expected to have a larger impact moving forward,particularly the state of the economy and workforce development.Finally,they weighed in briefly on the future,giving us their opinions on ho