design-people

A Scandinavian design consultancy with an international mindset

Double iF award for new ventilation control experience

Airmaster

Airlinq provides fresh air through intuitive interaction, empowering end-users in schools and offices to control indoor climate. At the same time, the slim panel blends discreetly with its environment. design-people's innovative solution for ventilation control has resulted in two iF 2013 awards - an iF product design award and an iF communication design award for the interface design. The iF award is an internationally recognized seal of quality which is awarded to excellent design. A great recognition of our ambition to create meaningful user experiences that seamlessly integrate product and interaction design!

Our initial user studies revealed that end-users would often like to adjust the ventilation program, but are reluctant due to the technical character of current control panels. Airlinq therefore focuses on giving end-users a simple interaction with the primary function of the panel - adjusting the air exchange. Our thinking was verfied through the involvement of female teachers, who would be typical users of the panel, in a concept focus group.

By simply swiping clockwise or counterclockwise along the Airlinq panel's distinctive circular element, the air exchange in a room increases or decreases. The circle elements light up while swiping and settle into an unobtrusive single element indicating the setting that has been chosen. Secondary functions are accessible to advanced users only through a PC software. Overall the new design encourages end-users to influence the indoor climate when needed, but prevents them from accidentally adjusting settings that result in a lower system efficiency.

The new Airlinq panel is the latest addition to the successful ventilation design line that design-people has created in close cooperation with Airmaster over the past few years. Airlinq lifts the user experience of the Airmaster system to new heights - and further strengthens Airmaster’s position as an innovative ventilation brand.

Development partner: JE electronic a/s

Services: user research, interaction design, product design, user feedback

Female Interaction boosts Design Summit in Holland

What are the latest trends within innovation & design that can improve the way companies use design to make better business?

This was the question to be answered by the team, who prepares the 2013 Marcus Evans Design Summit, to be held in Nordwiik aan Zee near Amsterdam - a meeting place for representatives from design consultancies and the industry to discuss future challenges and to explore collaboration potentials.

Female Interaction was chosen as the topic for one of the Keynote presentations, that are to inspire the attendees at the to-days Summit starting, February 4th. On the delegate list are companies like Audi, Carlsberg, Alessi, Nestle and Samsung.

Rasmus Falkenberg, innovation director and Klaus Schroeder, strategy director are the partner team representing design-people at the Design Summit. The keynote held by Klaus Schroeder will explain how you as a company make yourself ready for womenomics (the emerging buying power of women) and how the female benchmark can help you to deliver more succesful products and user experiences - for the sake of all your future customers and the competitiveness of your business.

One-to-one meetings to be arranged by Marcus Evans during the Summit will give the delegates the opportunity to discuss how they could benefit from the research based Female Interaction innovation strategy and -tool box offered by design-people. We look forward to meet you!

Female Interaction is a female driven innovation strategy, that was co-developed with scientist and leading tech-companies during a 3 years research project, co-financed by the Danish Government and finalised in 2012. Since then companies like Nokia, Vertu, Grundig and Logitech have used design-people's Female Interaction team to challenge their own innovation- and design culture with a female benchmark.

A holistic user experience

Danfoss

Noi is a concept for maintaining indoor climate in private homes. The case study was made in collaboration with the company Danfoss, and is a part of the research project, Female interaction. Noi shows how female tech preferences can drive user experience innovation. Noi supports a woman’s sense of providing for a healthy home and family and lets her be in charge of not only having a healthy indoor climate, but also of the economic and environmental impacts that follow.

Women want to feel in control instead of being overruled by an intelligent, automatic system. Noi provides transparency of when it is controlled automatically or when manual adjustments have taken place. Understanding the link between air quality and temperature and the events, which take place in the home, such as running tap water or burning candles relates to family economy, environmental responsibility and well being. Noi provides awareness and action tips of these factors as a means of helping her make smarter decisions. Due to her understanding the subtle signals the shape changing visual display portrays she is able to take the appropriate actions in order to improve the air quality. This transparency is also reflected in the iPad application, which encourages her to teach her children about their energy consumption, and they can donate to environmental charities. When she is on the go and remembers that she forgot to turn down the heat, she has instant access to her home climate system from her mobile device.

Services: female interaction, interaction design, product design, user exploration

Icebreaking interaction

Epoke

To keep the rest of us safe from the hazards of winter’s icy roads, Epoke delivers industrial high-end salt spreading systems. The key to controlling these systems is a remote control located in the drivers cab. With the new EpoMaster X1, Epoke introduces a more visual approach, to make it easier for the driver to understand and adjust how the salt is currently being spread behind the truck. Being able to spread salt precisely is the key, since this means higher road safety and less salt wasted. To maximize traffic safety, the primary settings are also adjusted using physical controls so they can be controlled while keeping the eyes on the road.

The new interface is based on thorough user studies, feature workshops, and situated interviews to understand the drivers and the context of use.
Since the profession of spreading salt is seasonal, the remote has been designed to make it easy - especially for new users - to get familiar with the system and get started.

Especially the startup menu guides the users through the initial configuration and is accessed using a touchscreen.
This simple approach benefits Epoke, by minimizing the amount of time it takes to train new drivers and the amount of support required by users in the beginning of season.
"The money we have used on designes have been really well spent" - Jørn Christensen, CEO, Epoke A/S

Services: User research, interaction design, product design

Sleek audio design

Jamo

How to design a classic satellite speaker to fit into the modern living environment as companion to flat screen TV’s? And how to make it attractive for the female part of the world?

Our product design team converted these challenges into a discreet, yet unique speaker design for Jamo. The overall shape is an evolution of Jamo’s design language; there is a clear overall form statement while refined, soft form details catch the attention when you get closer and touch the product. The signature element is a characteristic grill pattern that gives the product identity and style.

Services: trend research, product design

Discreet ease of use

DEVI Danfoss

Danfoss is a leader in indoor climate solutions. The Devireg Touch thermostat is taking the lead in intuitive operation of floor heating.

The ambition with DEVIreg Touch has been to create a thermostat that stands out with a clear and restrained interface. The primary goal was to improve usability and accessibility for all users of comfort regulation and to bring awareness of environmental aspects closer to the user.

User involvement has helped focus interaction on essential and beneficial features. The straightforward first touch experience makes the user feel empowered. It confirms the expectation arising from the clear cabinet and graphical design that the interaction is accordingly intuitive. Advanced features like 'timer' and 'away' are accessible in the second level through the comprehensive 'home menu' screen.

The installer UI is based on wizards that guide the installer through the setup process.

DEVI is a Danfoss product brand

Services: interaction design, product design, focus group concept feedback, usability test

Watch the DEVIreg Touch video here

Female Interaction goes TED

Live talk in Amsterdam (video)

A one-minute video qualified Female Interaction amongst hundreds of applicants for the TED X event in Amsterdam June 20th 2012.

TED (standing for Technology - Entertainment - Design) is a global nonprofit organization devoted to support world-changing ideas. Along with 21 other speakers from science, art, computing and design, Klaus Schroeder, design-people partner and head of Female Interaction research, gave a 5 minutes live talk in front the enthusiastic audience.

Under the motto of “ideas worth spreading” Klaus presented an extract of the Female Interaction research about how differently women experience technology design. His mission was that Womenomics and the preferences of women will revolutionize male biased tech industries and make them deliver far better user experiences - for the sake of all users of advanced tech products.

See the 5 min TED Talk titled Designing technology for women here

A Female Interaction year

Order our Female Interaction Strategy guidebook

Our Guidebook to a Female Interaction Strategy has now been launched. The guidebook sums up research, methods and conclusions from our 3-year Female Interaction project. It signals the start of a year where implementation of the research findings and Female Interaction know-how in the industry is a top priority.

Womenomics potentials for the industry are rapidly growing year by year. With Guidebook to a Female Interaction Strategy you acquire new grounds for user insights and decision making, helping you to successfully innovate and develop products for the emerging female target group.
Order the guidebook by sending an e-mail to our office manager Karin Bech Hansen kbh@design-people.dk with your post address. The price is 45 euro plus transport.

Rethinking tech-products – the female way

A focus on female values can innovate tech-products

In our Female Interaction research project a group of scientists, tech-companies, market analysts and designers have worked with female approaches to advanced technology during the last 3 years. Parts of the results are new female design concepts developed by design-people within the fields of Music and media in private homes, Climate control in private homes, and Wireless and handsfree communication. The new concepts are developed in cooperation with Bang & Olufsen, Danfoss & GN Netcom - based on their case products.

The idea behind is to show how new female user-driven design concepts will enter the lives of the female users delivering the kind of value benefits that women appreciate – focusing much more on social relations than tech-performing details. The new Female Interaction design concepts are meant to inspire you to consider how your products and services can be modified to respond even better to "her" needs and desires.

Our team of Female Interaction experts is ready to support you with a development toolbox consisting of user intelligence, innovation vectors, concept reviews, user experience testing and/or concept-, interaction - and product design - all based on the insights and know-how from our 3 year research project.

Read more about the Female Interaction project at www.femaleinteraction.com

Watch our user experience films for Bang & Olufsen, Danfoss and GN Netcom below.