Core77

Gus Rodriguez, Vice President, Partnerships and Consulting, Philips Design gave me a few moments of his time when we discovered we had both studied at the IIT Institute of Design, Chicago. Gus is an alumnus from the undergraduate program back in the early eighties and until he took up his most recent role this year, he was Director of Design for Phillips Consumer Electronics.

Phillips Design took an unusual decision about ten years to deliberately offer design consulting services to companies outside the organization. About 10% of their projects are for clients like Nike, Coca Cola, P&G among others. They do this to encourage cross pollination of ideas from outside, to learn and to keep the creative juices flowing. Its a challenge sometimes to stop thinking like a Phillips designer, and take on a project in very different brand or design language, but Gus added, "that's exactly what designers can do, step outside of their comfort zones and think on behalf of their clients.

We also talked about Phillips' Philanthropy by Design initiative begun after a series of conversations in 2005, where Philips Design internally worked on a smokeless stove meant for those at the bottom of the pyramid - the photograph above is only a window display at HQ in Eindhoven not the actual product.

More after the jump, including Nico von Saurma of BMW Group Designworks USA

'Chulha' is the Hindi word for stove and their redesign cuts the smoke and toxic emissions which are claimed to cause 1.6 million deaths a year. It also burns more efficiently to reduce the load on the existing energy supply chain, without involving dependence on non-renewable energy sources. The product is ready for distribution and they're working to find the right partners.

Nico von Saurma is the Director of the BMW Designworks Asia office based here in Singapore. He talked about the need for young designers to overcome any hesitations about pushing the creative envelope. He encouraged them to speak up, assert themselves and display their passion. Particularly in Asia, where culture and education is less participatory, designers often worked to the brief rather than asserting their creative ingenuity and exploring innovative alternatives. Being flexible, ready to change and explore beyond boundaries was the only way for creative growth.

He also talked about the role of market research - 'You can't ask people what they want, they don't know what they want' - meaning that it was the designer's role to take that intuitive leap forward to imagine what an entirely new product should do and be for genuine innovation. At some point in the creative process, its a leap of imagination that can envision the entirely new. Design by consensus was not design.