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The
main categories: Indian Industries as categorized by their approach
to new product development. [An assumption made is that industrial
design can only thrive in an active innovative industrial culture
]
The
Craft Sector - Product development exists as an activity where
craftsmen have been organized into larger groupings by NGO's or their
own need to organize themselves to access demanding markets. Sometimes
through the initiative of exporters. Product development is initiated
by the organizing body and driven in many cases by designers.
Many industrial
designers post the Jawaja experiment initiated by NID have been able
to contribute meaningfully in this sector.
Significantly, several initiatives started five to ten years ago are
coalescing into recognizable models of sustainable innovation.
Unorganized
manufacturing: Survival manufacturing - Product development happens
through copying and is characterized by being unbranded or misleadingly
branded. Selling strategy is under pricing. These industries exist
because there is a demand for cheap products, which look like, branded
products in the same categories, which people cannot afford.
Typically the scenario runs like this: here is a product can you please
make a technical drawing for it. Or father went to Italy and has come
back with this product can you make us a technical drawing which is
similar but not exactly like it.
Medium
sized industries: Have known brands in the market.
Product development should be called Product tweaking and is again
confined largely to copying and making minute changes euphemistically
called USP's. The drivers for this kind of product development is
decreasing market share. Often because they are being threatened by
competition from the unorganized sector. These industries are looking
purely at Regional or national markets. The MD can be the sole Product
development officer with two or three people who are pulled in from
time to time to help.
Medium
sized Industries - foreign collaborations, at least among the
top two or three, Highly recognized brands, Collaborations with firms
abroad, are already selling or have ambitions to sell in the global
markets.
Product
development in these industries is a mixture of product tweaking to
genuinely improve the product, and develop new products, which define
new product categories. Will be characterized by clear-cut Product
Development teams put together specifically for the purpose of carrying
through the Product development exercise. Product Development will
also have it's own clearly demarcated bud jets and resources, with
direct involvement from the top management.
Large-scale
manufacturers: Market leaders, at least among the top two, Highly
recognized brands - in India, collaborations with companies abroad,
are already selling or have ambitions to sell in global markets.
Typically these companies themselves are driven by the technology
and the products received from their foreign collaborators. The products
which these companies sell are completely developed abroad and sold
to a market which has nothing better to compare it with. These companies
do have Product Development teams, which are engaged in adding trims
to products for extending the product range. The products themselves
are being driven by technologies which large-scale Indian companies
have no control or no access to.
Large scale Indian industries, which do have genuine Product Development
are industries where the core technologies are already largely frozen
[ex: Titan, VIP] It is our analysis that at least for the foreseeable
future we are not going to see large scale Indian Industries in sectors
like consumer appliances which are involved in genuine Product Development.
These industries, at the outer edge, are being driven by technologies,
which we have no access to, and research and development processes
for which there is little or no infrastructure.
Multi-nationals:
Companies accessing global markets, global standards, setting benchmarks
against which other products are evaluated. These companies are constantly
in a product development mode because at their level survival is dictated
by innovation [Apart from the marketing hype] Their only means of
survival in mature markets is better products at better prices or
at least one of these attributes. These companies are also often the
owners of proprietary technologies. Product Development in these companies
is absolutely strategic and they have clearly defined teams and resources
managed at the level anything is managed when it is a crucial for
survival. Their drive, because of their size will be towards standardization
with so called variation dictated by pricing standards.
The
Packaging Industry: Consumable packaging, Durable packaging, Showroom
interiors, corporate exhibitions: The consumable as well as the durable
industries need to package their products to enhance their brand,
tweak product interest and explain their ware to consumers. This is
a huge industry and will only get bigger, with more and more multinationals
who want to also project a Desi - image, or make their brand look
and feel like anywhere else In the world. The issues in these exercises
are largely brand related, and is driven purely from a marketing perspective.
The
Software and the Internet boom: Product Designers have a significant
role to play in the Software and the Internet space. Product Development
in these industries is present and the markets are global. This also
immediately means that products have to meet international quality
standards. There are three levels at which Product Designers can participate
in product development exercises.
Usability
Engineering:
In many ways analogous to complex display control problems.
Information Architecture: Our traditional
expertise in analyzing and synthesizing will have to be complimented
by understanding complex business scenarios, A far more sophisticated
approach to understanding the User. Extremely good understanding of
language, Understanding how people access information and use it.
Understanding human learning. Indexing and other library skills.
New Product Developers: The roads are
going up the shops are not yet up. This is the level of the Internet.
It is an open field, which is still forming, ripe for those of us
who can take on the challenges of defining new product experiences.
This has to be done as a collaborative effort between business men
and technologists.
The
confusion with the description of Product designer in India.
Product Designers: It is our suggestion that the word "designers"
should be reserved for those who are engaged in the complete activity.
Definition to implementation. Therefore there is no problem in calling
people Fashion designers, Ceramic designers [when they are engaged
in a full product development exercise] Furniture Designers, Interior
Designers or Exhibition designers. The scenario is quite different
with people who are and will be part of large interdisciplinary teams
involved in complex product development activities. In these scenarios
we are not THE designers. We have something to contribute only in
a specific area of the Product Development process. Calling ourselves
designers in these scenarios creates all kinds of tensions with other
professionals who think that [and rightly so] they are engaged in
the same activity. It also sets up wrong expectations [ in industries
which are still immature ] that we are going to sort all their problems
out. Because in the course of our work we have to talk about and consider
marketing, manufacture, cost constraints etc. So a clear distinction
needs to be made in our minds and communicated to clients when and
in what contexts we are indeed the designers. However against the
grain this may sound designers have to become specialists. This is
the trend of the future. Designers are going to have to become specialists
with all the positive things that it entails and being careful to
avoid all the negative things that we have come to associate with
specialization.
This specialization is going to be called something along the lines
of "user experience designers" This specialist is going to be the
person who defines all the aspects of a product which directly impinge
on the user experience. He will define it, he will design it, and
his design will be the first visualization, which will be accessible
to the senses of the interdisciplinary teams that he works with. It
will form the first level idea around which all the stakeholders of
a project reach consensus on what needs to be built.
This role needs definition in the context of our hyper technological
times.
Excerpts
from a presentation made at NID - George
Mathews
of Icarus Design, Bangalore
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