Designing Smarter Products in Smarter Ways

Prof Steve BenfordThe Smart Products beaconUniversity of Nottingham

Making Smarter Products in Smarter ways

GoodsYou own

ExperiencesYou do and remember

Smarter products …

ServicesAre done

for you

Hybrid products combine physical &

digital materials

… made in smarter ways

Personalise

Appropriate

Provenance

Storytelling

Crowdsource

Upcycle

Differentiation

Design

Narratives

Data allows product offerings to be differentiatedManufacturers personalise products to consumersConsumers appropriate products

Data enables product narrativesManufacturers give evidence of provenanceConsumers associate them with personal memories

Data informs the design of future products Manufacturers crowdsource requirements and ideasConsumers upcycle products, putting them to new use

Man

ufactu

rers

Co

nsu

mers

A multidisciplinary approach

Making Smarter

Products in Smarter

Ways

Artificial Intelligence

Machine Learning

Data Science

Computer Vision

ASAP, AgentsMixed Reality

Virtual Reality

Augmented Reality

Internet of Things

Advanced Manufacturing

Advanced Manufacturing

Technology Research

Food, Water, WasteAdditive

Manufacturing

Additive Manufacturing

Research

Manufacturing Metrology

Human

Art & design

Human Factors & HCI

Responsible Innovation

Business

Service Innovation

Marketing

Neo-demographics

Research Challenges

- Producing together - enabling humans and intelligent systems to collaborate in rich and productive ways

- Production flows – supporting data-driven product lifecycles spanning design, production and consumption

- Producing value – understanding how smart products and co-creation deliver value

- Producing responsibly - ensuring the smart products reflect human values and address societal concerns

Sectors

High Value Products

Physical goods with bundled digital services and embedded intelligence created in agile factories driven by data

Digital Media

Digital media increasingly connect to physical objects

and locations created in distributed digital studios

driven by data

Physical goods connect to digital media to deliver

product experiences that are completed or co-created by

consumers

Demonstrator projects

Designing with Diverse Stakeholders

- Ideation cards for:

- Bite size engagement

- Structured & flexible process

- Democratic turn taking

- DeniabilityMixed reality game design cards

Moral-IT cardsVisitor Box Museum Cards

The Mixed Reality Game ideation cards

The structure of the cards

Opportunities Questions Challenges

Sensors Manual Interaction Suitable sensors Inaccurate Sensors

Audio Compelling Audio Noise

Locations Fitting Locations Indoor/Outdoor Accidents

Time Episodic Content Duration

Physical Weather Input Nothing Physical Rain & Snow

Players Roleplaying Number of Players Real World Rules

Gameplay Exergaming Fun and Joy Feature Creep

Technology Public Display Nothing Digital Phone Zombies

Management Open Authoring Observing Players Testing

Process

Co

ncep

ts

Using the cards

1. Random draw for rapid idea generation

2. Choose the best idea

3. Expand with further opportunities

4. Introduce questions

5. Introduce challenges

6. Make a concept sketch or design document

Capturing Designs

Probing Design Data

Concept space Realisisation space

Implications for the use of cards

- Student perspective

- Use of cards depends on the brief

- Useful for reflection

- Teacher perspective

- Review teaching

- Design fixation

- Rebalance the deck

- Card designer perspective

- Collapse or expand cards

- Introduce scarcity

Future work:• Physical or digital cards• Capture rationale and discards• Towards intelligent ideation

Designing Smarter Products in Smarter Ways

• Smart products beacon:• www.nottingham.ac.uk/research/beacons-of-excellence

• Ideation cards:• Darzentas et al, Card Mapper: Enabling Data-Driven

Reflections on Ideation Cards, Proc ACM CHI 2019