Genichi Taguchi (1924-2012), Japanese engineer and statistician who developed an influential approach to quality engineering focused on robust design — making products insensitive to variation rather than controlling variation after the fact. Taguchi worked at the Electrical Communications Laboratory of Nippon Telegraph and Telephone, where he developed his "quality loss function" and methods of experimental design (Design of Experiments/DOE). While Deming focused on process control and management transformation, Taguchi focused on product design — optimizing parameters so that the product performs well despite noise factors. The two approaches are complementary rather than competing. Taguchi was influenced by the same Japanese quality culture that Deming helped create through his JUSE lectures, and his work was recognized with the Deming Prize for individuals. In America, Taguchi methods were sometimes promoted as an alternative to Deming's approach, which Deming found frustrating — he saw robust design as part of, not separate from, his system-of-profound-knowledge. Link to statistical-process-control-and-variation-theory, common-cause-vs-special-cause-variation, founding-of-the-deming-prize, japan-and-the-quality-revolution-1947-1960s, juse-union-of-japanese-scientists-and-engineers.