DINOS CORPORATION began the second phase of an industry-academia collaboration project on product design at Nagaoka Institute of Design on July 2024, 7. The project, which will continue into 31, aims to develop product designers who can create "sellable" products that meet the needs of real consumers by learning the process from planning and design to manufacturing and sales.
The industry-academia collaboration project on product design began because students learn product design in class, but have few opportunities to implement it in the real world while they are in school, and the challenge was to bridge the gap with commercial design. Students who participated in 2023 commented that they were able to experience real-life manufacturing, saying, "I had never really thought about the client's requests, the detailed structure, or the cost aspects," and "It was fun to develop ideas while thinking about the selling points for mail order, and it was a valuable experience."
The second phase will narrow the conditions further, aiming for commercial manufacturing with a variety of overlapping constraints. The specific task will be to propose a design for a "hanger rack" that can be sold at Dinos, and the condition is that the product must be able to be produced by a local manufacturer. Requirements such as target, price, structure, and quality will also be set. As with the previous phase, seven students taking the Regional Collaboration Exercise at Nagaoka Institute of Design will participate.
First, until September, there will be lectures on design and mail-order business, students will plan and design products, and finally make a presentation to select a design proposal as a potential product for sale at the mail-order brand "Dinos." From October, there will be final adjustments to the design, prototyping, and sales promotion planning, allowing students to systematically learn the actual manufacturing process.
The Tsubame-Sanjo area, close to Nagaoka City, Niigata Prefecture, where the university is located, is known as a "town of manufacturing," and the university plans to commission local manufacturers to prototype and produce the selected design. In addition, by linking the ideas and concepts of the students with Niigata in various ways, such as by conducting research into manufacturing issues in Niigata and making it a prerequisite for product planning to incorporate materials produced and produced within the prefecture, the university aims to revitalize local manufacturing for the future of Tsubame-Sanjo as a "town of manufacturing."
