The paper presents results from a retrospective case study in the automotive industry with the purpose to identify dependencies in product concept decisions taking into consideration social aspects, decision structures and technology. Interviews and document reviews, such as gate reports and design reviews, formed the empirical base. The company in question has a documented and mandatory product development process with defined instructions, process maps and a basic chain of command. In spite of the operational support, the company still suffers from a certain amount of rework based on incorrect concept decisions. Results from the empirical study show how both formal and informal factors did affect the concept decision in the studied case.