At Jissen Women's University, 11 students from the Product Design Laboratory, Department of Living Environment, Faculty of Life Sciences, are working on the development of living tools that take advantage of the characteristics of sponges at the request of Inoac Corporation.
This initiative is part of research activities through industry-academia collaboration between Jissen Women's University and Inoac Corporation.For four months from September 2017, the students gathered information and factory tours through market research and questionnaire surveys on sponges, and worked on devising concepts from both the user's perspective and the characteristics of the material.
In December, we narrowed down the design after receiving an evaluation of novelty, technical difficulty, and feasibility of commercialization, and confirmed that there was no deviation in the design intention and direction when making a prototype. Based on the prototype completed in April 12, we further identified issues including processing technology and cost, and attended the presentation on June 2018.
The students proposed good sleep goods focusing on the sound absorption of the sponge material, educational toys that can be played in the bath by making the most of the lightness, and memo pads that make the best use of the processed shape.In the future, based on these design proposals, Inoac Corporation plans to proceed with preparations for commercialization.
Regarding the request for design by the students this time, Inoac Corporation said, "When developing products, we will originally prepare various evidences and set out differentiation and concepts from other companies, but this time we will be caught up in them. Instead, I focused on getting suggestions based on the ideas of the students' sensibilities. I heard that many of the naming uses hiragana, which expresses the softness of the sponge material. I'm grateful that I was able to experience that kind of sensibilities. "The student commented, "I was surprised that sponges are used in various scenes. When I think about (the product), it was already a product and I had a hard time creating a new one." It was sent.
* Inoac Corporation is a company that develops materials based on urethane, rubber, plastic, and composite materials and handles products closely related to various aspects of daily life, from automobiles, information / IT equipment, housing / construction-related products to cosmetics. ..
