How can knowledge management improve the Tendering process in railway transport

Product-line development in railway context is challenged by the heterogeneity of the railway market, as a consequence of the fact that the reference solution cannot perfectly match each customer demand. Therefore, a process of further adapting the reference solution is necessary and this adaptation starts with the Tendering phase which thus becomes one of the most critical of a product life-cycle. A study carried out in the company A revealed that knowledge management could bring further improvements to the Tendering, in particular as regard to knowledge primordial for this process, which we generically call “intangibles” and to knowledge sharing. In this context, we think that knowledge management should be joined to organizational learning to support the Tendering process. Furthermore, we want to build a dedicated workspace to respond to these needs. In this paper we explain how knowledge management can contribute to the enhancement of the Tendering process in the company A and we propose an approach to support knowledge management and organizational learning through a dedicated workspace.