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The ever-increasing complexity and environmental constraints associated with aerospace and defense projects are putting pressure on traditional organizational structures for design decision making. No longer can the design problem be assimilated and steered by a single chief engineer. Rather, to find consensus, design involves a complex iterative process between the different specialist committees (weights, aerodynamics, structures, cost, etc.). Furthermore, there is a growing need to take into account the life-cycle implications of low-level design decisions in addition to their more direct implications on performance. The Decision Environment for Complex Designs project at the University of Southampton aims to explore how the design process may be streamlined under these circumstances. The case study presented here centers around a maritime surveillance unmanned aerial vehicle for search and rescue tasks, developed in association with the U.K. Coastguard. The focus is on "value-driven" design and how advances in software engineering, rationale capture, operational simulation, and rapid prototyping can be leveraged to create an integrated design suite that allows the rapid design and manufacture of low-cost civilian unmanned aerial vehicles. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]