The Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) is a decision-making tool for product development and other complex multi-criteria problems where both qualitative and quantitative aspects of a problem need to be incorporated. AHP clusters decision elements according to their common characteristics into a hierarchical structure similar to a family tree or affinity chart.
AHP provides a systematic and structured approach for dealing with complex decisions and has been used successfully in a wide variety of product development applications. AHP can be used to identify the key factors that need to be considered in a product development decision and to prioritize those factors according to their importance. AHP can also be used to generate alternative solutions to a product development problem, and to compare those solutions against each other in terms of their relative merits.