A perspective on the future

The issues related to the developments of Six Sigma, a business strategy, and its potential impact are discussed. Six Sigma has proved to be successful in reducing costs of poor quality, improving cycle times of various processes, eliminating errors or defects from processes, and enhancing customer satisfaction. It promotes the concept of statistical thinking for both engineers and business leaders. Some of the research trends of Six Sigma include integration with lean thinking and agile manufacturing, development in new application areas such as health care, finance, sales, human resources, and software engineering.