Product Global

Solar Decathlon Underdog, Santa Clara University, Shows That Team Diversity in Product Development and Design Can Do Wonders

Beating out the likes of MIT, Carnegie Mellon, Georgia Tech and the University of Colorado at Boulder, Santa Clara University (SCU), located in the Bay Area of California, took third place in an international solar house decathlon.  The U.S. Secretary of Energy dubbed the SCU team the "Cinderella story from California".

The Solar Decathlon is an international contest drawing entries from Germany, Canada, Spain, and the U.S., in which students actually construct a small house representing the best in design and construction of an eco-friendly home.  I've posted a video below that depicts what a bunch of students go through to build a cutting-edge eco-house and enter the contest.  Previously unknown for its engineering resources and talent, SCU was a clear underdog from the outset (a German university took first and the University of Maryland took second). 

After taking a couple weeks to rest my blogging brain, I'm proud to come back with a story like this one.  Thankfully, this story offers more than the fact that it has to do with SCU, an institution near and dear to my heart.  When asked what contributed to their unprecedented success, SCU team leader James Bickford replied:

"Our strength was in the diversity of our team," Bickford said. "We are dominated by engineers, but we brought on communications majors, philosophers, anthropologists, artists."

While the group debated various aspects of the project, "those struggles are what made it a good house," he said. "Those diverse and creative thoughts produced a better product than any one discipline could have by themselves."

The benefits of a diverse team in product development aren't a novel concept.  IDEO, a world-class design company that describes itself as specialists in human factors, psychology, business, design, engineering and manufacturing, is renowned for its ability to create diverse teams for the development process and create truly innovative and effective products.

Although the concept of capitalizing on team diversity isn't new, it's so rarely used effectively.  One of the major reasons is the presence of "struggle" that comes with dissenting opinions.  Generally, hashing out conflicting opinions with others just isn't fun.  But, as demonstrated by the SCU students' Cinderella story, the benefits of doing so can be great.  Is everyone agreeing with you?

T2SE. Time to Shoot the Engineer?

What is this product?

A) Photon blaster from the set of Startrek

B) One of those solar-powered racing go-karts designed by MIT students, upside down

C) Don't even go there...

The Answer:  None of the Above.

Ladies and Gentlemen, this is a ballpoint pen.

The Free Ride pen sells at $150. 

But before I rush off to the website to buy this over-the-top, engineering wonder (brought to my attention by the OhGizmo blog) and make my check-writing experience even more intriguing, I have to ask myself:

Is there a time to "shoot the engineer"? 

I googled this exact saying and got a page of search results which tells me: I am not alone in this question.  Or is it that, in the schoolyard of product development, the marketing bullies have simply come up with new ways to give a "marketing wedgy" of sorts to the engineering kids?  "For once and for all, go play sales and stop breathing down our necks!", the engineers scream.

As OhGizmo blog exclaims, the design and engineering of this pen may have been taken a stretch too far.  This company at least got this pen to market (I wonder how it's selling...).  You've got to hand it to them, because the dirty alley of product development is littered with projects and products that never got into the marketplace and made money for their companies.  If only there was a blackmarket, or even an EBay for works-like prototypes and unfinished CAD drawings...

At some point, you've got to save the next batch of engineering changes for a future product release.  At some point, you need to take the reams of Excel files, Bill of Materials docs, Engineering Requirement docs, and drawings, and stamp "Final" on them.   At some point, you have to look at the money you have in the bank, the calender, and the state of your product design, and figure out that you needed to get your design package to the manufacturer yesterday. 

I'm sure that even the FreeRide pen had only so much time to be designed and engineered before it was built and shipped. 

Your product may be the next space machine or just a better mousetrap.  It doesn't matter.  Just make sure you stop engineering and you start selling before you run out of money or someone designs and sells a better photon blaster than your's.

Video of Chinese Factories: Injection Molding and Tooling

Want to see how millions of everyday products all around you, including the one your are typing on, are made in China?

I've been sitting on quite a bit of video footage of Chinese factories from recent trips over there and thought I'd put some up to give people a quick peek into some of the people, places, and processes that often take place.  This video focuses on the process of plastic injection molding and mold building.  Plastic injection molding is used to create millions of everyday products.

The video is shot at a few different locations in the Dongguan area of southern China.  The factories shown range from "good" to "excellent" in the way of organization, cleanliness, quality of product, technical abilities, etc. 

A quick overview of what's depicted in this video, in sequential order:

• Injection mold planning taking place in CAD designs
• Mold building shop, including very large and small injection molds as well as the polishing/texturing process
• A few processes used to create molds, including CNC machining and EDS machines
• Plastic injection molding machines, in which the tools are loaded and used to shoot off large volumes of parts
• Product painting, assembly, and packaging

There is no speaking in this video--but video seems to convey a great deal regardless.  I have included some lively music ("Roll it Up", by Crystal Method) to keep you entertained, so dance or move if needed. Forgive me if the handheld video quality makes you feel like you are watching Tom Hanks storm Normandy beach in Saving Private Ryan.  I need to invest in a tripod.  Or have one manufactured... 

Enjoy.