Product Design, Efficiency and Innovation

After reading the lecture notes-week 2 (A) and subsequent readings from the course packet, I became amazed at the level of innovation and modern features of Gordon Murray's T.25 and Nano Cars. Specifically, the level at which companies are innovating in their manufacturing processes is quite brilliant. Overall, I think it narrows down to the consumers' taste for trendy designs and efficient products. Based on that, I decided to web surf to find products that have trendy designs, efficient usages and innovative. Luckily, I bumped into this article "Innovation in design: Successful design must be consumer friendly" culled from The Economic Times online.

The article stated verbatim "A successful product is one that serves the user's need, is easy to use, attractive and efficient at the same time. In other words, it needs to be designed in a way it makes sense to the consumer". With this assertions, I couldn't agree more with the article because consumers nowadays are so fascinated about fashionable products at the same time with an eye on efficiency. The global chorus on global climate change and its effects have transformed consumers knowledge on demanding products that pass the test of efficient and environment-friendly features. In my opinion, all these link to supply chain management, in part, due to tendency to foster the smooth transition between supply and demand on both side of the economy.

The article listed couple of products such as: Z-Refrigerator, IThe Moop: The Intelligent Mopper, Air-O-Swiss, Ultrasonic Travel Humidifier and The Mini Blender. What is interesting about these products are they are use for multiple purposes and highly efficient. For example, according to the article, the Z-Refrigerator works as a professional cook's fridge and it the size of a double-door fridge. The fridge has Z structure when the door is open to the left and has bigger space to the right where drinks and snacks can be kept. The awesome feature of the fridge is its ability to save energy by reducing the amount of cold air leaving at once.

That being said, firms need to contemplate innovative products that are efficient and trendy designs so as to increase revenues and profits at the same time maintaining competitive advantage in their specific industry. Also, manufacturing such products will foster smooth interactions between the demand-side and supply-side of the market.

Reference:
http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2013-05-25/news/39521434_1_fridge-dirty-water-design