Dr. Mark Martin is the CEO of design4X. He has taught hundreds of teams in the use of QFD and other "design for X" methods. His master's thesis was on the use of QFD and product development methods to improve product design and has written extensively on the subject. He has trained and consulted with Sun, Toshiba, HP, Cisco and others on the use of QFD and other methods.

His PhD research focused on new design and manufacturing methods. His previous work experience has been in project management and quality assurance. He focused on hardware design and manufacturing issues during his masters at MIT and Ph.D. at Stanford. He has toured over 100 manufacturing facilities around the world and works with numerous companies to help improve their design and manufacturing processes.

Current Employment:
design4X
Chief Executive Officer

Education:
Ph.D. Stanford - Mechanical Engineering (2000)
M.S. MIT - Mechanical Engineering (1994)
M.S. MIT – Management (1994)
B.S. Univ. of Oklahoma - Mechanical Engineering (1987)

Work Experience:
Texas Instruments
Marlow Industries
Kodak

Research:
Researches design and manufacturing methods, including management of product variety and product platform planning.

Awards & Honors
- Stanford University FPM Fellowship (1994 - 1999)
- Department of Energy Integrated Manufacturing Award (1994 – 1997)
- MIT Leaders for Manufacturing Fellowship (1992 - 1994)

Papers:

• Martin, M.V., and Ishii, K. (2002). “Design for Variety: Developing standardized and modularized product platform architectures.” Research in Engineering Design. Springer-Verlag. Berlin.
• Martin, M.V. (1999). "Design for variety: A methodology for development of product platform architectures." Ph.D. dissertation. Stanford University Mechanical Engineering.
• Martin, M.V. and Ishii, K. (1998). "Developing a DFX course using structured methodologies." ASME Design Theory and Methodology Conference. September 1998. Atlanta, GA. DETC97-DFM5746. ASME DTC/CIE Proceedings CD, ISBN 0-7918-1953-1. Presented at the 1998 ASME conference.
• Martin, M.V., Kmenta, S. and Ishii, K. (1998). "QFD and the designer: Lessons from 200+ Houses of Quality." World Innovation and Strategy Conference. August 1998. Sydney, Australia. WISC 98 Proceedings, ISBN 1-875760-97-0. Presented at the 1998 WISC conference.
• Martin, M.V., Hausman, W. and Ishii, K. (1998). "Design for variety." Product Variety Management (Teck Ho and Chris Tang, editors). Kluwer. Boston, MA.
• Martin, M.V. and Ishii, K. (1997). "Design for variety: Development of complexity indices and design charts." ASME Design Theory and Methodology Conference. September 1997. Sacramento, CA. DETC97-DFM4359. ASME DTC CD, ISBN 0-7918-1243-X. Presented at the 1997 ASME conference.
• Martin, M.V. and Ishii, K. (1996). "Design for variety: A methodology for understanding the costs of product proliferation." ASME Design Theory and Methodology Conference. August 1996. Irvine, CA. DETC96-DTM1610. ASME DTC CD, ISBN 0-7918-1232-4. Presented at the 1996 ASME conference.
• Martin, M.V. “Increasing the effectiveness of product development teams: A study of QFD and time to market drivers.” MIT Masters Thesis in Mechanical Engineering and Management. May 1994.