SINA News discusses IDEO, David Kelley, and the Stanford d.school.

Read the article here. (published in Chinese)

July 26, 2005 - March 5, 2006 at the V&A Museum in South Kensington, London

IDEO rethinks the future of hearing with fashionably designed “hearware.” Developed by RNID and Blueprint magazine with Wolff Olins, in association with the V&A.
The results of an innovative project to radically re-think the future of hearing, Hearwear displays designs and prototypes by some of the UK’s best designers, including Ross Lovegrove, Priestman Goode, Industrial Facility, and IDEO. The display will show how fashionably designed “hearwear” can be as desirable and accessible as ‘eyewear’, and will change the way people think about hearing.

IDEO’s contribution to the exhibition comes after a number of conversations with hearing impaired people and an insight-filled visit to a noisy pub. Table talk

Each year, the best in design is honored with the Industrial Design Excellence Awards, sponsored by BusinessWeek and presented by the Industrial Designers Society of America. Read the story here.

IDEO has topped the list every year since 1991. In 2005, we won 7 awards for work in consumer products, research, and concepts that look into the future of technology.

Read the article here.

IDEA Silver:

• Leviton Acenti Collection: Minimal and intuitive switches and outlets for the home
• Avid Mojo: Powerful and portable desktop video editing hardware
• Hewlett-Packard Masher concept: Working prototype for portable digital DJ console
• Chicago PT Research: Human factors work guiding advanced technology for physical therapy

IDEA Bronze:

• Hewlett-Packard DJammer concept: Working prototype of new music instrument for DJs and turntablists
• Microsoft Home Center PC: Working concepts for an integrated entertainment and home computing system

By Tim Brown

“In order to do a better job of developing, communicating, and pursuing a strategy, the head of IDEO says, you need to learn to think like a designer. Here’s his five-point plan for how to make the leap.”

“It’s remarkable how often business strategy, the purpose of which is to direct action toward a desired outcome, leads to just the opposite: stasis and confusion. Strategy should bring clarity to an organization; it should be a signpost for showing people where you, as their leader, are taking them - and what they need to do to get there. But the tool executives traditionally use to communicate strategy - spreadsheets and PowerPoint decks - are woefully inadequate for the task. You have to be a supremely engaging storyteller if you rely only on words, and there aren’t enough of those people out there. What’s more, words are highly open to interpretation - words mean different things to different people, especially when they’re sitting in different parts of the organization. The result: In an effort to be relevant to a large, complicated company, strategy often gets mired in abstractions.”

Download the PDF

Tim Brown is interviewed on why it’s now necessary for consultancies like his to get involved ever-earlier in new-product development.

Read the article here.

IDEO’s Q concept finds a place in the San Jose Museum of Art’s first exhibition of industrial design, March 6, 2005 – July 10, 2005 in San Jose, CA

With the influx of consumer products defined by smooth-formed, “blobby” silhouettes peaking in the mid-1990s, Blobjects & Beyond: The New Fluidity in Design was a not-too-distant retrospective, filled with curvaceous product, furniture, graphic design, media, and architecture from the past two decades. Demonstrating significant advances in prototyping and manufacturing, Blobjects & Beyond tracked such “classic” superfluids as the Apple iMac, the Nike Triax watch, the Smart Car, and a handful of recognizable Alessi designs, among others. Also included in the exhibit was IDEO’s Q mobile workstation concept for Steelcase, a desktop prototype of a capsule-like space that illustrated the need for new levels of adjustability in the work environments of the future. This and other forward-looking designs brought an element that, according to the San Jose Museum of Art, “goes ‘beyond’ the upbeat, friendly blobject toward a design language reflective of the darker post-9/11 mood.”

Also in conjunction with Blobjects & Beyond was a conversation between Yves Behár and IDEO co-founder Bill Moggridge on April 7, 2005, at the San Jose Museum of Art.

“Among the models in the new collection Emma may well look the most conventional, but as regards the technology inside it really is the most unconventional of the four.”

Download the PDF

Each year, the best in design is honored with the Industrial Design Excellence Awards, presented by the Industrial Designers Society of America and sponsored by BusinessWeek. In 2004 IDEO tops the IDEA list, winning ten awards for projects that explore a range of design thinking and innovation, from medical devices to the future of multimedia home PCs.

Read the article here.

IDEA Gold:

• Kickstart (ApproTEC) MoneyMaker Deep Lift Pump: A human-powered well pump for Kenyan farmers
• IDEO Heimspiel: Enchanced experience with everyday objects
• Vocera Communications Badge: The focal point for a voice-command communication system
• Logitech KeyCase: “Smart fabric” makes possible a folding keyboard and PDA case
• Vodafone Interactive Cube: An interactive sculpture you control with your mobile phone

IDEA Silver:

• Advanced Bionics HiRes Auria: A modular hearing aid device with a signature look
• Organ Recovery Systems LifePort Kidney Transporter: Making more kidneys available for transplants
• BBCi Showcase: Interact with the BBC from the street as you walk by

By Aaron Sklar and David Gilmore

May-June 2004

Download the PDF

IDEO wins Medical Design Excellence Awards for work with Organ Recovery Systems and Gyrus.

Gold:
- Organ Recovery Systems LifePort Kidney Transporter: Making more kidneys available for transplants

Silver:
- Gyrus ENT Diego Powered Dissector: Surgeons helped design this otolaryngology tool

More on the awards here.

Empathic Research Can Help Uncover Latent Passenger Needs, by Alan South

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Metropolis profiles IDEO’s work at the Stanford Center for Innovations in Learning and Memorial Hospital.

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“IDEO redefined good design by creating experiences, not just products. Now it’s changing the way companies innovate.”

“Kaiser Permanente, the largest health maintenance organization in the U.S., was developing a long-range growth plan in 2003 that would attract more patients and cut costs. Kaiser has hundreds of medical offices and hospitals and thought it might have to replace many of them with expensive next-generation buildings. It hired IDEO, the Palo Alto (Calif.) design firm, for help. Kaiser execs didn’t know it then, but they were about to go on a fascinating journey of self-discovery. That’s because of IDEO’s novel approach. For starters, Kaiser nurses, doctors, and facilities managers teamed up with IDEO’s social scientists, designers, architects, and engineers and observed patients as they made their way through their medical facilities. At times, they played the role of patient themselves.”

- “The Power of Design” by Bruce Nussbaum

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IDEO’s receives Red Dot Awards for work with Lufthansa and Zyliss.

High Design Quality:
- Lufthansa Nice System: Elegant remote control for in-flight entertainment

Red Dot:
- Zyliss Salad Spinner: A stylish way to clean your leafy vegetables, in two sizes.
- Zyliss Mandoline: Slice fruits and vegetables cleanly and safely

“The in-house group was an intentionally motley collection—physicians, nurses, managers and support staff, even the resident chaplain. ‘Half of the value of our process,’ comments Ilya Prokopoff… ‘is bringing people together in the hospital who’ve never worked together before.’”

Read the article here.