cMDF – Spain

Description of the use case

"As-is situation": A furniture manufacturing company is involved in an innovation process and has detected new trends that fall under their target consumers. They start looking for maker groups and FabLabs in order to carry out the idea of a bed headboard with lighting, sound, and sensors. The company is currently unable to manufacture the product, since they do not possess the manufacturing processes or the machinery. However, they encounter great difficulties in finding the right partners.

"To-be situation": The furniture producer can use the iPRODUCE OpIS to look for the cMDF profiles, so that the company can find a suitable cMDF, in order to share their idea. In fact, this new market-driven idea has complex specifications that the furniture producer is not able to challenge alone. Thanks to iPRODUCE, the company is able to contact the cMDF in order to co-design and materialize the concept into a prototype through the open collaboration.

Objectives

The objectives of UC1 are to:

• Reduce the time finding the right partners to materialize the product idea.
• Increase the ratio of ideas related to new innovative products brought to market.
• Reduce the product development cost.
• Increase the company’s portfolio of innovative products.
• Motivate co-creation practices between the industry and users.

Methodology

Initial ideation process: Lagrama requests cMDF profiles that can adapt to its needs and specific cMDF services to the matchmaking which selects the most adequate cMDF. After the acceptance of the cMDF to work collaboratively on the manufacturer's idea, there will be a request for an IPR contract to be accepted by both parties using the Ricardian Toolkit.

Design thinking: A co-creation design process starts when the cMDF requests the product requirements to the Generative Design Platform which are provided by the Manufacturer asking for support. During the ideation process, the cMDF provides the design and detailed technical specifications getting feedback at all times from the Manufacturer. Finally a design brief is elaborated with all needed specifications and entered into the Generative Design Platform.

Design, prototyping and industrialisation: The cMDF provides the 3D model to the 3D Configurator and the manufacturer provides feedback. Once both parties have agreed, the manufacturing process modelling step takes place

Planning and prototype creation (validation): A selected focus group targeting Lagrama’s clients validates the virtual prototype. The cMDF provides the resource planning of all the tasks and processes in order to manufacture the prototype.

Expected results

• Increase the number of proposals for the conceptual design of the prototype based on the initial idea brought by the manufacturer to more than 3 proposals through the Generative Design Platform.
• Reduce the time spent searching for the right partner less than 2 days through the Marketplace, Matchmaking tool.
• Increase the number of actors in the co-design phase to more than 2 actors through the OpIS platform.
• Increase the number of opinions while assessing the virtual prototype to more than 100 actors through the Mobile app.
• Reduce the time management for the complete prototype collaborative process to approximately 30 days through the Digital FabLab Kit.
• Reduce the time gap between the manufacturer first contact and the final prototype production to less than 60 days through the OpIS platform.

Description of the use case

"As-is situation": The furniture manufacturer gets ideas from potential consumers through online surveys, internet searches, questionnaires, etc. A process that sometimes ends up with abandoning the idea. A gamer has an idea for a new piece of furniture for a youth bedroom. The individual would like to combine his two passions and at same time, provide fellow gamers with a proper tool that could bring gaming to a next level by dealing with health, something that gamers may not be aware of due to the nature of their hobby. In this scenario, both the furniture manufacturer and the client gamer are not connected and do not know each other.

"To-be situation": The manufacturer can use iPRODUCE to get ideas from potential consumers and find a suitable cMDF and the gamer can approach the cMDF. Both stakeholders are put in contact through the cMDF and can start collaborating to co-design and materialize the concept into a prototype.

Objectives

The objectives of UC2 are to:

• Fill the gap of this category of products for young people.
• Improve the overall well-being of gamers while spending countless hours playing games.

Methodology

Initial ideation process: A gamer visits a nearby cMDF in the network of iPRODUCE community to speak about a gaming chair idea. The cMDF finds the idea very interesting and enters it into the system via the Generative Design Platform along with all requirements. The cMDF contacts the gamer and the manufacturer since the needs of both can be aligned. A working collaboration starts. A request for an IPR contract to be accepted by both parties using the Ricardian Contract Toolkit component is performed.

Design thinking: Co-creation design process starts when the cMDF requests the product requirements to the Generative Design Platform which are provided by the Manufacturer asking for support. During the ideation process, the cMDF provides the design and detailed technical specifications getting feedback at all times from the Manufacturer. Finally a design brief is elaborated with all needed specifications and entered.

Design, prototyping and industrialisation: The cMDF provides the 3D model to the 3D Configurator and the manufacturer provides feedback. Once both parties have agreed, the manufacturing process modelling step takes place

Planning and prototype creation (validation): A selected focus group targeting Lagrama’s clients validates the virtual prototype. The cMDF provides the resource planning of all the tasks and processes in order to manufacture the prototype.

Expected results

• Increase the number of proposals for the conceptual design of the prototype based on the initial idea brought by the manufacturer to more than 3 proposals through the Generative Design Platform.
• Reduce the time spent searching for the right partner less than 2 days through the Marketplace, Matchmaking tool.
• Increase the number of actors in the co-design phase to more than 2 actors through the OpIS platform.
• Increase the number of opinions while assessing the virtual prototype to more than 100 actors through the Mobile app.
• Reduce the time between the manufacturer's first contact and the final prototype planning to less than 60 days.
• Increase the number of ideas for new furniture product design addressing young people as a target group to more than 3.
• Improve product innovation and co-creation activities to an increment of 20%.
• Improve user satisfaction to an increment of more than 50%.

Description of the use case

"As-is situation": A maker has a design idea that revolves around the manufacture of 3D printed components for assembling customized furniture, identifying a need for innovation around design and considers it could be interesting, either to start his initiative or propose it to a manufacturer or groups of manufacturers. The maker has problems when looking on the Internet for manufacturers and maker spaces in order to obtain support to carry out the idea.

"To-be situation": The maker is interested in the digital manufacturing technologies, particularly 3D printing, who develops 3D printed components that can be put into practice with the help of a cMDF or in collaboration with the industry. The maker uses iPRODUCE OpIS to find a suitable cMDF that can carry out this development and eventually industrialize it, consequently gaining access to collaboration within the cMDF spectrum to co-design and materialize the 3D-printed components through the open collaboration. In addition, the cMDF can offer contacts to furniture manufacturers who can collaborate with him incorporating the components into their current designs.

Objectives

The objectives of UC3 are to:

• Double the product lifecycle of furniture pieces by applying the 3D components, thus reducing the environmental impact.
• Find industrialisation partners to incorporate/ distribute the 3D components.

Methodology

Initial ideation process: A maker entrepreneur visits a nearby cMDF with an initial development of a 3D printed component for assembling furniture and wants to get it improved. After several talks, a working collaboration starts.

Design thinking: A co-creation design process starts and the cMDF requests the product requirements and specifications to the Generative Design Platform. The cMDF provides a design brief with all needed specifications and entered into the Generative Design Platform. This brief is then checked by the maker.

Design, prototyping and industrialisation: The briefing is a document composed by six sub processes containing all required specifications related to environmental aspects, regulations about health and safety, ergonomics, aesthetics, etc. The cMDF provides the 3D model to the 3D Configurator and the maker provides feedback.

Planning and prototype creation (validation): The cMDF and the gamer send a request to the AR/VR tool to see how the product will look in and to have a joint vision to continue co-creating the new product. Afterwards, the cMDF provides the resource planning of all the tasks and processes to the Matchmaking & Agile Network component to be conducted in order to produce the prototype, receiving the scheduling of all needed tasks. Once manufactured, another validation occurs. Finally, the maker will want to inquire into searching for partners to industrialize his product. To achieve this, a request is sent to the Marketplace component to look for partners for industrial alliances, providing a set of alternatives.

Expected results

• Improve the time in the decision making process in more than 20% through matchmaking.
• Improve the time in the product innovation and co-creation activities in more than 30% through AR / VR.
• Reduce the time spent searching for the right partner to develop the prototype to less than 2 days through the marketplace / matchmaking.
• Improve the makers and users satisfaction to an overall of 50% on user satisfaction.
• Increase the number of makers proposals based on an initial idea to more than 3 proposals through Generative Design Platform.
• Reduce the time for the final prototype planning to less than 60 days through OpIS platform.