2.3 Industry Collaborations


Overview

Design is a practice-based discipline and engaging in direct interaction with industry is a key component for understanding how my research and my students’ work can have a feasible application. I have found great companies that share similar interests on design strategy and have been strong supporters of RIT’s efforts in design research. 

Whenever working on sponsored projects, it is ideal to set them up as inter-disciplinary collaborations. Many of the most challenging problems in the world cannot be solved from a single angle and business models always integrate multiple disciplines that need to work together and understand each others' role, language and requirements. My design studios frequently have industrial design students working with other disciplines such as graphic design, mechanical engineering, psychology, business and sustainability. Having corporate sponsors adds a real-world scenario where students understand the power of their own discipline within complex environments and structures.

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Autodesk

HYBRID IDEATION AND FABRICATION: $20,000 (PI)
Research grant and sponsored student project  |  2013-14


PRESENTATIONS
Autodesk University 2013
Title: Unleashing the Power of Fusion360 in Product Design.
Alex Lobos & Keqing Song. Peer reviewed.

Autodesk University 2011
Title: Collaborative, cross-disciplinary courses for Innovation and Sustainable Design. Adam Menter, Dawn Danby & Alex Lobos. Peer reviewed.

Industrial Designers Society of America International Conference 2011
Title: Working Together to Advance the Practice of Sustainable Design.
Adam Menter & Alex Lobos. Peer reviewed.


FEATURES AND MENTIONS
Fusion 360 team meet-up 2013

Fusion 360 at I3D + Autodesk University 2013

Sustainable Design with Autodesk

Design, Emotion and Sustainability
  
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Staples

OFFICE OF THE FUTURE: $35,000 (Co-PI)
Research grant and sponsored student project  |  2013

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AT&T

TECHNOLOGY AND ENVIRONMENT AWARD: $25,000 (Co-PI)
Research grant and sponsored student project  |  2011

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Sustainable Packaging Design

Interdisciplinary course between Industrial Design (Prof. Alex Lobos), Graphic Design (Prof. Lorrie Frear) and Packaging Science (Prof. Karen Proctor). Offered since Winter 2011 and sponsored by the following companies:

Unilever: $10,000 (Co-PI)  |  2014

Sun Products Corporation: $11,400 (PI)  |  2013

Wegmans: $5,000 (Co-PI)  |  2012

Kraft Foods: $5,000 (Co-PI)  |  2011

Colgate/Palmolive: $5,000 (Co-PI)  |  2011

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Upcoming Collaborations

General Electric Appliances:  $20,000 (PI)  |  2014

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Featured Student Projects

Autodesk
Fusion 360 design concepts around Flow  |  2013
1st year Graduate Students in Industrial Design



Staples
Traveling briefcase |  2013
June Lee, Rachel Son, Calvin Au, Erica Nwankwo




Wegmans
BBQ Bottle |  2012
CJ Allessio, Sumeet Deshpande, Marco Fesyuk, Chen Guo, Simon Jones, Tuan Tran




Wegmans
Laundry Detergent  |  2012
Katherine Bukys, Dom Colaprete, Jess Crawford, Bailey Kennedy, Kai Lei, Victor Santiago




AT&T
farmLocal community-based Interface  |  2011
Julian Del Campo, Alex Freeman, Ben Hudson and Anton Siekmann




Kraft Foods
Planters Peanuts  |  2011
Isaac Alves, Hong Guo, Vicki Julius, Andrew Lakata, Keelyn Nori, Marc Priddy