The development of assist ive technology product concepts using design thinking

This work presents the proposal of a reference model for research projects for the development of assistive technology (AT) product concepts for the air transport sector based on a design thinking approach. The proposed model is a result of the evaluation of a set of research projects conducted by teams of researchers and undergraduate students. Based on information acquired from a literature review and the analysis of these projects, a set of specific characteristics and requirements were determined with the further objective of creating a reference model for the development of assistive technology product concepts based on a design thinking approach. The model could be used by other research groups and other universities, and could later be expanded to the industry. INTRODUCTION The ongoing population growth and population aging will demand new assistive technology solutions in the near future. At the same time, the worldwide growth of the air transport sector presents specific challenges for the development of assistive technologies (AT) as accessibility needs to increase in the air transport sector [1]. In an attempt to address these issues, the two projects analyzed in this paper focused on the development of AT solutions for people with disabilities and passengers with reduced mobility to improve passenger’s mobility during the air travel experience. The projects were conducted according to a design thinking approach, and the results are compiled together with literature findings to provide input for the creation of a reference model for the development of conceptual assistive technology products based on design thinking approach. Design thinking (DT) has been popular in the last decade due to successful cases of application in big companies [2]. DT has been applied as a response to the increasing complexity of businesses and recent technologies in an attempt to allow interactions of people with technologies and services to be simple, intuitive and pleasurable. One of the main aspects of DT, together with prototyping iterations and multidisciplinary teams, is its user-centered design, which translates into building empathy with users and focusing on their experiences. Using this approach helps the team to better understand what users want and need [3]. DT also allows the team for a rapid immersion into the problem, facilitates the generation of new concepts and enables them to come up with unconventional solutions and contributes to the creation of solutions with better market fit [3,4]. The design thinking approach proposed at Stanford University has been extensively explored and tested in several research projects at the Stanford ME310 course, which is held yearly and involves groups of local students and students from foreign universities working together on a design challenge proposed by a partner company [5]. One of the DT proposals considers six project phases which starts with a need finding and a benchmarking for the immersion into the problem space. Next, a sequence of five ideation-prototyping-testing cycles starts. The scope of the problem is narrowed, the solution is improved through the prototyping cycles and a final prototype is built in the last phase [5]. Coming up with a successful product is not easy, but replicating the success in other projects is even harder [6]. Considering that, processes used in projects of product development can be modeled and become a reference for best practices, and can also shorten innovation lead-times and reduce costs [7,8]. Models such as the StageGate®, created by Robert Cooper in the 1980’s, have been successfully applied in several industries in the last decades [9]. So, it seems reasonable to establish a specific model to use the design thinking approach in other projects. Regarding the product development process (PDP), there are several industry-specific process reference models [10]. These models cover the pre-development, the development and the post-development phases of the process. The pre-development corresponds to the initial ideas and planning of the project. The development phase consists of informational project and conceptual project, followed by the detailed design and production process until the launch to market. The last phase includes the stages of production maintenance and product discontinuity [7]. For this study, the scope of the model is restricted to a part of the entire PDP, strictly from the project planning until the conceptual project, since the projects of the case studies were only research projects and their results had not reached the production stage neither the market yet.