Digital Designer Robot: Assisted Self-Service Design For Customers In Bespoke Manufacturing

在许多行业，在线订单占销售额的很大一部分。大量生产的产品，从牙膏到保险单，或独特的产品，如房子，都同样可以在网上销售。常见的因素是所购买的产品是预先定义的项目或服务，可以放在某种形式的目录中。这同样扩展到定制产品，这些产品要么是配置的（例如汽车），要么是用户按需创建的（例如图片生日卡）。网上销售有很多优点，如覆盖范围、效率、接近客户等等。然而，一些行业尚未能够获得这些好处。尚不存在的产品不能列入目录。代替实际的网上销售，机构通过“联络我们”表格或公布电话号码或电子邮件地址来推广产生查询的能力和能力。然后，通过电话或电子邮件进行更传统的销售，伴随着时间延迟和相关成本。我们的主张是，用与人相同的过程和知识来训练软件模型是可能的，但避免了许多限制。通过这种方式，我们使组织能够在销售和售前技术角色中部署“数字助理”（虚拟员工），帮助客户找到甚至设计出满足他们需求的完美解决方案，从而使他们能够获得电子商务的诸多好处。在这个项目中，我们提供了一个“数字设计师机器人”，使客户能够创建一个定制的解决方案，为原型和后续制造做好准备。机器人与客户“交谈”以澄清和理解目标，协助设计的创建，并使用文本和图形交互的组合提供专家建议和指导，结果是按需提供专家服务，在适合客户的时间和地点创建定制的产品设计。

Online orders amount to a significant part of sales in many industries. Products created in bulk, from toothpaste to insurance policies, or unique products such as a house, are all equally saleable online. The common factor is that the product being purchased is a pre-defined item or service that can be placed in some form of catalogue. This extends equally to customised products that are either configured (for example cars) or created on demand by the user (for example picture birthday cards). There are many advantages of online sales such as reach, efficiency, proximity to customer to name but a few.Some industries however, have not as yet been able to access these benefits. Products that do not yet exist cannot be put in a catalogue. In lieu of actual online sales, organisations promote capability and competence to generate enquiry through "contact us" forms or publishing phone numbers or e-mail addresses. Progression to a sale then follows a more traditional route face-to-face, over the telephone or email with the accompanying time delay and associated costs.Our proposition is that it is possible to train software models with the same process and knowledge as the person, but avoiding many of the limitations. In this way we enable organisations to deploy 'digital assistants' (virtual employees) in sales and pre-sales technical roles to help customers find and even design the perfect solution for their need, thus enabling access to the many benefits of electronic commerce.In this project we deliver a 'Digital Designer Robot' to enable customers to create a bespoke solution ready for prototype and subsequent manufacture. The robot 'converses' with the customer to clarify and understand objectives, assists with the creation of the design and offers expert advice and guidance using a combination of textual and graphical interaction The result is an on demand, expert service to create bespoke product designs for manufacture at a time and place suitable for the customer.