NEW: DFMA ROI Calculator — estimate Year-1 ROI, payback, and 3-year NPV in minutes. Try it now
Total annual savings $0. Year 1 ROI 0%. Payback –.

How it works

For engineering and sourcing leaders evaluating DFMA, this calculator splits ROI into three levers that share a simple scope: DFMA Product Simplification, Should-Costing, and Engineering productivity.

  1. Pick Small / Medium / Large effort sizes in each section based on the initiative you plan to run.
  2. Use Conservative / Typical / Aggressive savings presets, calibrated from DFMA case studies, for fast “what-if” scenarios.
  3. Optionally open Advanced assumptions to tune NRE, analysis effort, and financial assumptions—then see ROI, payback, and 3-year NPV.

Average DFMA cost reductions

Labor Costs Part Count Separate Fasteners Total Cost Weight Assembly Time Assembly Cost Assembly Tools Assembly Operations Product Development Cycle 0% 50% 100% 42% 54% 57% 50% 22% 60% 45% 73% 53% 45% Top ten responses from 170+ case studies
  • The bars reflect published averages from DFMA case studies. The presets below are intentionally lower and easier to hit.
  • “Total cost” on the slide is 50%. The calculator breaks savings into DFMA simplification, should-cost price moves, and scrap reductions for auditability.

Configure your DFMA ROI scenario

1. DFMA Product Simplification (scope, baseline & NRE)

Effort size (simplification):
Savings preset:

Effort size presets set software, training, projects per year, and typical purchased-part scope for simplification. Savings presets only change the savings percentages (how conservative vs aggressive you are).

Small: roughly 1–2 DFMA projects/year, up to ~40 purchased parts in scope.
Medium: about 3–5 projects/year, ~40–120 purchased parts.
Large: 5+ projects/year, 120+ purchased parts and/or multi-site or global rollout.

Scope & baseline (shared across levers)

Advanced: NRE & change effort

Capture one-time engineering, change, and IT effort needed to implement DFMA redesigns and deploy the software. These roll into Year 1 cost so the ROI reflects “is it really worth the effort?”.

Total NRE (one-time): $0

Annual DFMA product volume
0
DFMA simplification savings
$0
Savings per product
$0

2. DFMA Should-Costing & supplier negotiations

Effort size (should-costing):
Savings preset:

Uses DFMA as a should-cost baseline on purchased parts. Split parts into simple (≈15–30 min analyses) and complex (≈1–2 hour analyses) to reflect the engineering effort behind the savings.

Small should-costing initiative: roughly one or two key suppliers or commodities, ~45 parts/year in scope.
Medium: several suppliers or product families, just over 100 parts/year in scope.
Large program: multi-commodity or multi-site backbone for negotiations, roughly 200+ parts/year in scope.

Advanced: Analysis effort & should-cost software
Annual purchased-part volume
0
Net should-cost savings
$0
Net savings per part
$0

Should-cost analysis workload: 0.0 hours/year.

3. Engineering productivity & avoided changes

Savings preset:

Captures engineering hours saved and avoided tooling changes when DFMA shifts work earlier in the development process.

Advanced: Capture rate & tooling changes
Engineering savings, captured
$0
Avoided tooling savings
$0
Program total
$0

Calculation: (projects × hours × rate × capture%) + (tooling changes × cost per change).

Advanced: Financial assumptions (NPV & escalation)

The discount rate is used to calculate 3-year NPV. Savings escalation (inflation) increases savings each year in the 5-year chart.

How DFMA shifts the development process

DFMA Design Process Conventional Design Process 0 50 100 20 13 22 5 3 27 55 15 Source. Plastics Design Forum
  • DFMA moves work out of late-stage design changes and into concept and first-pass design.
  • That shift is what drives the engineering hours saved and avoided tooling changes in the calculator.
  • The engineering section uses conservative assumptions versus the averages shown here.

How we calculate ROI and NPV

  • Total annual savings = simplification savings + should-cost savings (after analysis effort) + engineering & tooling savings for included levers.
  • Year 1 cost = simplification + should-cost software + trainings + one-time NRE.
  • Year 1 ROI = (Total annual savings − Year 1 cost) / Year 1 cost.
  • Steady-state ROI (Year 2+) = (Total annual savings − recurring software) / recurring software only.
  • 3-year NPV discounts Year 1 and Years 2–3 cash flows using your chosen discount rate.

Schedule a Demo & Get DFMA Pricing

We’ll discuss ROI for your scope and demonstrate how DFMA helps you achieve it.

DFMA® Software and Services | Boothroyd Dewhurst, Inc.