For Swedish manufacturing companies active on the global market, high-performance production systems that contribute to the growth and competitiveness of the company are essential and one way to keep production in Sweden. Among a wide range of Swedish manufacturing companies it is becoming increasingly acknowledged that superior production system capabilities are crucial for competitive success. This being said, major attention has been paid to improving the operational performance of the production system. The focus in industry is mostly on the serial making of products, rather than on the prior development of the corresponding production system. At the end of the day, the real root cause of many problems and losses in production stem from issues that emanate from the development process of the production system. The potential of gaining a competitive edge by improving both the way the production system is developed and the way it is operated is hence ignored, even though it is a well-known fact that it is during the design phase that the most important decisions are made. In todays industry, production system development is often still made ad hoc on the basis of past experiences and without any long-term perspective. If the production system is not designed in a proper way, it will eventually result in disturbances during both start-up and serial production. This leads to low capacity utilization, high production cost, and hence low profitability. To succeed, commitment is required as well as a shift in attention from the operations phase to the under-utilized potential of the design of production systems. The ideal outcome of production system development is the best possible production system that can easily be realized and is high-performing in operation. This will contribute to the growth and competitiveness of the company. To stay competitive, a shift in mind-set is required at many Swedish industries. Production system development is not only something that should work; it must be regarded as a competitive means and consequently be worked with systematically.