This thesis explores how TUI can improve its online accommodation booking experience in the context of a changing tourism industry, including TUI’s implementation of its dynamic accommodation model. This model lets TUI offer a larger range of accommodations though third party providers, increasing their dynamic stability and reducing financial risk. This new model also results in a more complex booking environment for customers, especially couples. That is because they not only compare many options but also align preferences, communicate with each other, and make decisions together.

The project direction of this thesis is focused on a relevant challenge. Namely, that couples often struggle to come together and make decisions about their vacations together. Booking together as a couple proves to be a collaborative process, including lots of time pressure, fragmented communication, and difficulty maintaining an overview. TUI’s current digital booking platform is focused on the individual, meaning it does not give the support needed for shared decision-making.

The research done during this project was conducted following the double diamond process and combined literature research together with qualitative methods. During the discovery phase, seven couples were asked to map out their current booking process. Giving a better understanding of the current booking scenario of couples. This was concluded into a customer journey, displaying that the largest pain point was finding time to physically sit together and make decisions. The second finding was that couples were overwhelmed by the amount of accommodations they had to choose from, and comparing them. Research also showed that in the current scenario, certain psychological needs were not adequately supported.

Based on these insights, the final concept was developed, TUItogether. TUItogether is a digital platform integrated into TUI’s existing app that works as a shared planning environment for couples. It lets partners link their accounts, explore accommodations independently, communicate with each other, and make decisions together in a structured way. The concept's focus is on reducing friction between partners, supporting asynchronous collaboration, improving the overview, and finally increasing the confidence of the couple after they have made their final decisions.

The concept was validated with three couples and internally with an employee of TUI. The couples responded positively, saying they found the concept to be clear, organized, and supported then to make decisions together about accommodations. TUI also saw strategic value in the concept, especially the opportunity to increase app engagement and strengthen its app as a key touchpoint. While the concept was seen as realistic and valuable, further technical validation is still required.

Overall, this thesis concludes that improving the online accommodation booking experience for couples requires a digital environment that supports them in navigating complex decisions together. TUItogether offers them a way to do so.
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Digital transformation requires employees to adapt to new systems effectively, making onboarding a critical factor for adoption success. This project aimed to design a guideline that helps onboarding leads generate tailored onboarding methods based on employee profiles, ensuring smoother transitions during enterprise system implementation.

The research followed a multi-stage process, beginning with desk research and interviews, and progressing through iterative prototyping and testing. A six-dimensional coding system was developed to align employee profiles with onboarding methods, creating a structured framework for direct comparison and matching.

The final deliverable integrates backend logic with a frontend interface, providing onboarding leads with a clear, step-by-step flow: from inputting employee traits, to generating personalized method lists, and to merging group-level results. The framework has been initiated for testing within Amgen’s digital transformation program, and it shows potential for broader application in other organizations seeking structured and adaptive onboarding strategies. ... Read more

How can public transport go beyond moving people from A to B, and instead be something that actively fosters human wellbeing? That question is leading as this thesis explores and addresses the challenges of mobility and accessibility in Noord-Holland Noord, a non-urban area of the province of Noord-Holland, the Netherlands, where public transport often fails to meet the needs of the travellers and residents there.

This project, conducted in collaboration with Provincie Noord-Holland, envisions a design for a 2040 regional public transport system that prioritizes traveller wellbeing over operational efficiency.

The project follows a design process rooted in the Vision in Product Design method, supplemented by theory of Fundamental Needs and the usage of user personas, to enable a future oriented but human centered approach that integrates the needs of the users into a future concept design.

In the initial research, literature review, observational studies and user interviews were used to gain a baseline understanding of the context and users. Findings revealed a lack of accessibility and user satisfaction, as well as a risk for social isolation and car dependency.

Using these insights, a current day worldview was sketched, supported by five user personas, which could be used in combination with a trend and development analysis to develop future scenarios with user profiles. These scenarios highlight risks of over-optimization and social isolation in and outside of public transport. They also propose an alternative, more desirable vision instead, one of social vibrancy and a community oriented public transport system. A mission was then formulated to design an intervention to encourages travellers to reach out and connect with the people and the world around them, and to realize the desired vision.

Through various steps of ideation, development and iteration, the 2040 concept, Sociaal-waardig OV, is designed, a reimagined public transport system which transforms public transport into a socially enriching experience. The proposed system is built on three core elements:
- Empowered Hosts: Bus drivers evolve into community hosts, fostering positive interactions and creating welcoming social environments.
- Inviting Spaces: Creating dynamic (buses), static (hubs), and digital spaces that evoke warmth, inclusivity, and connectivity.
- Seamless Supporting Network: Background technologies handle logistics like payments and scheduling, allowing travellers and hosts to focus on meaningful social interactions.

Validation through discussions with experts highlighted the system's alignment with regional goals of Provincie Noord-Holland towards social connectivity and accessibility.

Finally, to guide implementation, a roadmap is proposed, providing guidance towards future steps over three time scale, aligning with three concession periods (2018 – 2028, 2028 – 2038 and 2038 – 2048) towards gradually integrating the redesigned system, before scaling, expanding and evolving the system. Additionally, design guidelines are given as well to aid in adapting the core ideas of this project into different contexts and design challenges. ... Read more

Challenges of supplier engagement in early stage technology development in the context of hydrogen propulsion equipment development for aircraft are uncovered. The challenges are viewed from the perspective of the engineering team members within the Liquid Hydrogen storage and distribution department in Airbus’ ZEROe project. A qualitative action research approach is taken to gain an in-depth understanding of the context and the stakeholders’ perspectives. Through interviews, observational studies, and document analysis, a code base is developed and analysed.

At the highest abstraction level, the analysis finds that uncertainty around hydrogen technologies for aviation drives the supplier engagement challenges. When requirements, specifications, deliverables, and development timelines are uncertain, suppliers are in many cases unable to engage. Concretely, the technological uncertainty leads the engineers to be overly cautious in the development of their equipment’s requirements. Over-caution leads to very challenging or impossible requirements which overload suppliers, especially non-aerospace suppliers. This ultimately leads to unsuccessful engagement, limiting the learning potential. Consequently, the lack of learning fuels the uncertainty in a perpetual positive feedback loop.

This research proposes two roadmaps detailing behavioural change through a ‘mindset shift’ of the internal stakeholders to break the uncertainty-fueled cycle mentioned above. The roadmaps link the ZEROe developments until 2030 with the value proposition to suppliers, assets and processes, and the development deliverables. Additionally, the research findings are implemented in the communication materials the engineers use during the Request For Technical Information (RFTI) phase towards suppliers. Through using lessons learned from earlier engagements, the requested RFTI process deliverables are tailored. By building up the technical complexity and load throughout the development, suppliers are less overwhelmed at the start, improving the chances of successful engagements.
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This project aims to improve the EV charging experience in the Netherlands due to the growing European EV market and rising Battery Electric Vehicle (BEV) driver expectations of their charging experience. Despite standardization efforts, fragmented charging services developed in siloed business lead to user inconvenience. It is imperative to identify the reasons behind drivers' less-than-ideal customer experiences and address them to support the transition to electric cars. Thus, this study represents a collaboration between VanBerlo, TU Delft, and KAIST to address the initial question: “What are the primary challenges and limitations experienced by Dutch BEV drivers that impede a seamless customer experience when using public charging infrastructure?”

To address this, a literature review is first conducted. Two research gaps arise. First, empirical research concerning the entire user charging journey and service integration is lacking. Additionally, more influential factors should be identified while predicting user preference of charging decision. To bridge the gaps, semi-structured interviews is carried out to examine the journey from charging intent to completion and explore factors influencing driver decisions. User pain points are clustered into a journey map, revealing three main challenges hindering the seamless charging experience. The research suggests that addressing these challenges during planning phase can streamline the overall journey. Thus, the design goal is: “How might we design an effortless planning phase that adapts to user needs and contextual factors, ensuring a seamless public charging experience for BEV drivers.”

Based on literature and qualitative research, a route and charger suggestion service is proposed to enhance the overall charging experience. The mechanism behind the scenes is first outlined. Subsequently, five design guidelines are developed to inspire the creation of this new service, providing application strategies for potential service developers such as vehicle manufacturers and E-Mobility service providers (EMSPs). Moreover, interactive prototypes are created as a tool to validate the concept. At its core, this concept integrates factors from the vehicle, charging network, user behavior and preferences, as well as road and environmental conditions to deliver personalized and optimal charger suggestions in realtime. This minimizes cognitive effort, enabling informed and efficient charging decisions while driving, and ensuring compatibility between chargers, BEVs, and user preferences.

After creating the concept and prototypes, validation was conducted in person with several previous BEV drivers participating in the interview section, along with some experts. Feedback was collected through concept demonstrations, focusing on whether it aligns with the design goal and how BEV drivers perceive the new planning experience. The audience responded positively. Compared to the current fragmented planning experience, a more effortless route planning and charger selection process was validated, and users appreciated the context-aware service that made their charging experience relevant. However, further research is essential to gauge real-world feasibility by consulting stakeholders in the EV charging ecosystem. Additionally, exploring what other influential factors out there and how developers weighted them differently based on user preferences and situations is recommended. ... Read more

The development of Fully Autonomous Vehicles would fundamentally change the nature of user interactions, behaviors, needs, and activities within vehicles. Passengers who are free from driving would expect to undertake diverse in-vehicle Non-Driving-Related Tasks (NDRTs) to keep themselves occupied and free from boredom. Conversational Artificial Intelligence with its ability to have free-flowing conversations could offer a solution to improve in-vehicle user experience. To explore design innovation opportunities that Conversational AI may offer within Fully Autonomous Vehicles, this work first researches what roles and relationships can Conversational AI play towards users of fully Autonomous Vehicles. These are investigated by conducting qualitative interviews of end-users and subject matter experts, and analyzing these interviews using the Thematic Analysis method. Second, this work examines how end-users qualitatively assess the embodied user experience provided by Conversational AI roles and relationships designed for Fully Autonomous Vehicles through the means of user-technology interaction experiments. These are conducted by employing a combination of participant role enactment method and a Wizard of Oz experimental setup with a mock Conversational AI operated within a prototyped Autonomous Vehicle under laboratory conditions. Ensuing these interaction experiments, the qualitative assessment of these in-vehicle Conversational AI roles and relationships was done by conducting guided brainstorming sessions using the parameters outlined in the Subjective Assessment of Speech System Interfaces (SASSI) questionnaire along with two free-from questions. Results from both phases are presented in the form of user-desired in-vehicle Conversational AI roles, aspects that would enable the forming of Human-Autonomous Vehicle relationships mediated by Conversational AI, and user experience evaluation of the embodied idea. Based on these results, design guidelines are articulated that are aimed to inform design professionals as well as internal design strategies of Autonomous Mobility and Artificial Intelligence companies looking to innovate.
Finally, we reflect on our methodological approach to indicate directions for future studies on similar lines and discuss our research’s implications for professional practice. ... Read more

As automation technology continues to transform various industries, achieving both high operational reliability and high efficiency emerges as a critical challenge in task delegation between humans and Automated Systems (ASs). This project, conducted in collaboration with the Royal Schiphol Group (RSG), investigates the intricate dynamics of Human-Automation Collaboration (HAC) in the context of Passenger Boarding Bridge (PBB) operations at the Amsterdam Airport Schiphol. The design goal is for organizations to strike a balance between the decision-making authority retained by humans, and that can be transferred to ASs.
Through a combination of literature study, context research, in-depth interviews, and surveys, this study synthesizes insights to understand the changing nature of tasks, identify influential factors, and determine the appropriate level of human involvement with the main research question: “In the different PBB operation types (e.g., semi-auto controlled in a PBB, semi-auto controlled outside PBB), which tasks can be delegated to automated systems, and which tasks should be performed by humans?”
The main insights indicate that high-precision tasks are identified as potential candidates for AS delegation, while tasks requiring clear communication and meticulous inspection align better with human management. The study underscores the significance of effective information exchange, emphasizing the multifaceted roles of humans beyond mere data exchange.
To address this, two main outputs were introduced: one is a decision-making board game as a speculative probe called PBB, and the other one is a roadmap for RSG’s future vision, which can empower organizations with insights into the evolving nature of tasks for both humans and ASs. The PBB game is expected to allow diverse stakeholders to enact multiple scenarios in various decision pathways aligned with different levels of automation. Further, the roadmap will envision the optimal future scenario, leading to actionable plans for organizations with a holistic understanding of Human-Automation Collaboration (HAC).
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With the imminent rise of vehicle automation the human driver will have increasingly less responsibility for driving. At one point this will even mean that cars will be able to fully drive themselves, so that the driver is relieved of all driving related tasks. In this situation the car effectively becomes a robot, resulting in a novel relationship between human and car. This project explored that relationship by looking at the possible overlap between autonomous vehicles and robotics, aiming to answer the following research questions:

What emerging phenomena can be identified from the combination of AVs and robotics?
In what way could the combination of AVs and robotics add value to humans’ lives?

The project started by reviewing previous shifts in this relationship that came about with technological developments, and a similar analysis of robotics and its relationship to humans. After providing historical context and formulating the current state, the project continued with an exploration of existing work in academia and industry. The findings from this initial exploration helped define a further focus into the relationship between an AV and a community of people that surrounds it.

To gain user insights a co-creation workshop was conducted. In these workshops the participants were all part of a certain community, and their task was to envision how a ‘shared mobile space’ (an abstract term used in substitution of AV) and robotics could add value to their lives. The outcomes of these workshops were analysed and together with insights from the related work review they served as input for finding a design analogy for the envisioned future role of the AV. The selected analogy was that of a language buddy, which acts as a sort of catalyst for expats or refugees to be included in a community.

To finally bring all findings together and link them to the envisioned future role, a set of design principles was created. After iteration with mobility-related experts they were formulated as follows: when researchers and designers are working on future AVs, they should keep in mind that AVs should be considered shared mobile spaces rather than self-driving cars. Because of the robotic characteristics of the AV, its use-opportunities are far greater than just an evolution of current-day car use. To help with this notion, the following principles should be followed.
AVs provide opportunities for interest-based communities to be nonsimultaneously connected in a physical space;
Tailored NDRAs should be used to catalyse community inclusion;
Adaptability should be a core characteristic of an AV, therefore also of its design process.

The work that is presented aims to contribute to both academia and industry. Firstly by shining light on the overlooked community perspective on AV design. By providing the aforementioned design principles this work advocates researchers and practitioners to take on this perspective, to ensure a positive impact on the community level as well. Secondly, by promoting a less car-centric approach to AV design, broader and more experience-focused AV use opportunities may arise.
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Roads are currently governed by relatively static rules communicated via road signs, road surface markings and navigation apps. However they could also be dynamic, allowing road space to be allocated for a multitude of activities over time. The Code the Streets project envisions a digital system for managing urban mobility in Amsterdam that would allow for this dynamic allocation of road space. Road rules are intended to be used to foster specific civic values such as livability or sustainability within the city. But how do we ensure fairness within such a system? This project explores how we can reimagine the smart allocation of road space in Amsterdam for fairness. Fairness is framed within this project as an ideal that cannot be reached but can be approximated through continuous adaptation. Inspired by literature on contestable AI, the continuous adaptation of the system is approached through stakeholder participation. The project relied on research in the form of literature review, expert interviews, and hands-on experimentation as well as the review of related design work. This research inspired design goals and criteria for the project’s design outcome: a system map and a speculative prototype. The map presents a system in which stakeholders have substantial influence over the values that the system and its design process foster. The speculative prototype, a low-tech user experience installation, makes parts of this system tangible and presents a provocative proposal for an alternative perspective on the current practice of road space allocation. The project ultimately produced several insights contributing to existing literature in the fields of public AI and design methodology research as well as delivering recommendations for Code the Streets. ... Read more

Vehicle automation will increasingly release car drivers from driving tasks, allowing them to engage in previously inconceivable activities. Experiential components are therefore expected to become central in human automotive mobility. In this context, the design of future in-vehicle experiences is a research gap to still discover, that concerns both academia and industry alike.

This graduation project explored the opportunities of using robotics and AI technology for the provision of meaningful autonomous in-vehicle experiences. In that aim, different user interfaces (UIs) were analyzed, as a way to visualize and study different user-technology interactions. The outcomes of the research comprise recommendations about promising scenarios that could be included in autonomous vehicles as well as insights into how different UIs shape user experiences differently.

The project first reviewed prior academic work on the topics of fundamental needs (from positive design), vehicle automation, user experience design, robotics, AI, and user interfaces. A research approach was proposed based on that analysis; because robotics and AI present ample capabilities, in-vehicle scenarios should be designed first, to later define (through UIs) the role that technology should have in those scenarios. These are the research questions that were proposed:

1. What in-vehicle scenarios can be designed to support
fundamental needs?
• How do different user interfaces enable those use cases?
• How do different types of user interfaces affect the in-vehicle user experiences?

2. What are the most promising scenario and user interface
combinations?

To answer those questions, a co-creative workshop was designed, with the aim of collecting user needs and perceptions as data. The participants were asked to envision future needs in AVs, based on the typology of 13 fundamental needs, as well as to design meaningful scenarios that would fulfill them. Through a questionnaire, they voted for the most promising scenarios (i.e., most attractive and most innovative scenarios). The workshop was conducted three times and a total of 18 participants were recruited.

The preliminary results from the workshop were 13 meaningful scenarios, each of them aimed at fulfilling one fundamental need; additionally, those scenarios were adapted to ambient, graphical, and tangible UIs. Besides, promising UI and scenario combinations were identified, according to the participant‘s perspective. Finally, insights were clustered on how different UIs shape the in-vehicle user experience. Those outcomes were contrasted and enriched in validation sessions, where a total of six field experts contributed. The experts brought in insights from the HCI, future mobility, and positive design fields.

This research aims to contribute to both industrial and academic practices. First, fundamental needs and sub-needs have been explored in the context of autonomous vehicles. Second, design directions and examples are offered for the development of meaningful in-vehicle experiences. Additionally, conclusions on how users perceive tangible, graphical, and ambient UIs are given, which could be used as guidelines for designing interactions. Finally, insights are offered about how end-users perceived innovations, as well as how innovative and attractive solutions are differently framed.

Finally, additional research paths were revealed through the study, that future research may consider. For instance, activity-based fundamental need hierarchies could vary across different demographic groups. Apart from that, further work could be done in the classification of the UIs, as well as in mapping out the interactions that they enabled. Finally, in-vehicle scenarios could be related to the concept of ’innovation adoption’ to study what solutions to develop further in the coming years.
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This thesis investigates how strategic design contributes to the venturing architecture of New Business Development at Philips Domestic Appliances (DA). Based on eight in-depth interviews and a six-month embedding, a new co-designed venturing architecture is introduced (Figure 1). The proposed architecture guides innovation teams and executives at Philips DA to build the capabilities and processes for venturing into new territories of consumer value. Additionally, the new architecture reflects the newly established vision of the New Business Creation & Scaling (NBX) team and integrates a new ‘value shaping’ perspective, based on original research findings.

As Philips Domestic Appliances was disconnected from Royal Philips in 2021, the need for new ‘ventures’ emerged in order to remain a leading innovator in the domestic appliances industry. The key questions are what new business opportunities to pursue and how to increase success in bringing meaningful innovation, fostering a forward-looking culture, and facilitating the development of new skills & capabilities. Eight in-depth interviews shed light on the current new business development practice at Philips DA. Four baseline results that highlight areas for further analysis were identified: ‘daring culture’, ‘consumer value’, ‘future visioning’, and ‘design strategy.’

Based on these baseline results, an inductive analysis yielded three themes: ‘Using design to unlock new value spaces’ (I), ‘Insight-driven value shaping’ (II), and ‘Visions that embrace risk’ (III). These themes orient venturing as a design-driven endeavor, in which consumer value is not only anticipated but actively shaped. Through co-design, the concept of insight-driven value shaping was developed into a new framework. The framework visualizes how the interface between an insight-driven perspective (e.g. trends, consumer needs), and a value shaping perspective (e.g. visions, value spaces) supports the client to identify new ‘seed’ opportunities.

This thesis adopts a design-driven venturing perspective and positions design-driven venturing as a subdomain of new business development. In discussing how NBX can pursue its vision of becoming an industry-leading venturing arm, the distinction between inbound change (how the environment changes Philips DA) and outbound change (how Philips DA can change its environment) clarifies how change affects NBX. The new architecture allows NBX to continuously adapt its practice and re-align capabilities and processes to cater to changing contexts of new business development, both inbound and outbound. ... Read more

While most mobility providers likely have a sustainable or environmentally friendly goal at heart, a poor implementation strategy can do more harm than good within a city. The lack of awareness about the city’s environmental, socio-demographic or socio-economic characteristics or the absence of a clear vision of the local government about how to deal with new mobility providers plays a crucial role in this. The design of a new tool called ‘cityzona’ can aid in creating a better connection between local government and mobility provider by making urban planners and/or designers more aware of the relations between variables influencing the modal split but also by improving the communication about the city between stakeholders. This paper aims to take the first steps in the development of the cityzona by designing early versions of the cityzona in an iterative process. For the design of the cityzona quantitative data is used in combination with semi-structured interviews. The results are qualitatively interpreted for the creation of the cityzona concept. Interviews showed that the cityzona has potential to function as a tool to align stakeholders for the design of a long-term mobility strategy as well as a tool for exploring and reinventing city level services for the implementation in different types of cities. Regardless of the function, the cityzona provided most useful in the early stages of a design process. However, more research is needed on the use of cityzonas in practice to further validate the fit with these potential functions. ... Read more

As cities are cutting polluting cars off the picture and promoting the use of sustainable transport modes, the number of multimodal journeys that involve more than one transport mode will grow. Intelligent systems and smart assistants will fill in the gap and take their role to guide travelers along their way on the trail of mobility infrastructure weaved in cities., Smart travel assistants will not only enable seamless journeys through navigation, but also make many decisions on our behalf. How should we handle these tools to enrich our multimodal trips while not losing control of the relationship when they are equipped with capabilities to better understand and predict travelers’ needs and behavior? This thesis describes how multimodal travelers plan and make a journey and how to support this process with a personal travel assistant called a travel buddy. During the Mind Mapping session with users, it was found that they want smart assistants to know everything about themselves. However, since they believe machines can’t think like a human, they want to be more involved in customizing routes. On the other hand, there is a responsibility for such apps to deliver only accurate and necessary route options and travel information while making the interaction between a user and an app easy and intuitive. However, simplicity can bring negative consequences such as losing congruence with travel patterns of users by neglecting factors that are important determinants in human decision making. Aiming to establish a collaborative relationship between a traveler/user and a travel buddy, the final prototype depicts a future scenario in which a travel buddy actively learns, and asks for participation, and defines a travel type of a user to optimize the journey together. A defined travel type can be used as a tool for users to observe and reflect on their travel behavior. The impact of defining a travel type can change travel behavior when it’s treated well. This thesis concludes with a manifesto that delivers considerations when developing a travel buddy that will shape future mobility together with users. ... Read more

One of the critical questions in the current era is how to provide broadband internet for all and second how to realise the digitally connected city of the future. The Covid-19 pandemic painfully exposed a crisis of internet access in many low-income and rural areas in the world. While many people in the Western world could easily shift to teleworking and online education, still 3.7 billion people worldwide do not have access to reliable and high-speed internet (United Nations, 2021). Terragraph, an intellectual property technology that emerged from the Facebook Connectivity group, aims to bridge this digital divide and has a mission to bring more people online to a faster internet. This thesis is executed at BrightSites, a technology venture within Signify. It is the result of almost six months of work covering multiple domains in the intelligent street lighting industry. The main research question of this thesis was to analyse the role of Gbit luminaires in the digitally connected city of the future. Gbit luminaires are innovative fixtures that can enable wireless connectivity on the outdoor lighting grid. These fixtures can provide fibre-like speeds due to the incorporation of mmWave radios that utilise Terragraphs' technology. ​​One of the research outcomes is a theoretical framework that shows stakeholders value capture and value creation motivations. In this project context, value capture is defined as how a particular stakeholder wants to be rewarded for becoming part of the Gbit luminaire ecosystem. On the other hand, value creation is defined as how a specific stakeholder can deliver value and strengthen the Gbit luminaire ecosystem. The findings show that the Gbit luminaire is part of a conservative regulatory environment in an interdependent ecosystem. Furthermore, the framework sheds some new light on the gaps between BrightSites, market players and municipalities. In the Gbit luminaire ecosystem, the following gaps are perceived: 1. The value gap, 2. The knowledge gap, 3. The financial gap, and 4. The urgency gap. The opportunities for technology-driven organisations to solve gaps and prepare for the future lay in user-centred roadmaps. The type of roadmap developed in this project is a design roadmap, which is still limited in use but getting more attention in the literature and across industries. Design roadmaps differ from traditional technology or product roadmaps as it centres on end-user's values, rather than the technology portfolio and organisational goals. The design roadmap is developed from a European municipal decision-maker perspective while considering the shared desirability in the ecosystem. The main conclusion that can be drafted is that the product proposition should be perceived, developed and pitched from an ecosystem level. In addition, the author suggests that the (Gbit) luminaire should be positioned as a hosting solution rather than a wireless fibre extender. The main argument is that every stakeholder in the Gbit luminaire ecosystem should feel that a specific problem is solved since this is considered as the only way to succeed and achieve widespread deployment. ... Read more

The advent of a society in which autonomous technology coexists with humans is an inevitability. The project focuses on one such autonomous technology in the form of autonomous vehicles or self driving cars. The benefits of such automation is well documented in academia and is supported by the investment by some of the biggest automobile and technology manufacturers in the research and development of autonomous vehicles. However, there exist certain challenges in realizing the full potential of autonomous vehicles. One such challenge is the attribute of trusting an autonomous vehicle. The project looks at the idea of trust in automation and dives deeper into the concept of calibrated trust as an approach to designing autonomous vehicles for increased acceptance of autonomous vehicles. The project is conducted in association with the Cities of Things Design Lab and People in Transit. Calibrated trust is defined as the balance between the capabilities of autonomous vehicles to the expectations of the end user. In essence it is the creation of an appropriate mental model by the end user. Through literature research and qualitative analysis, prominent challenges in achieving calibration were identified as: approach to designing for socio-technical systems, misalignment in communication between stakeholders, product branding and customer experience. Since, the focus of the project was towards the design and development team, the first two challenges i.e. approach to designing for socio-technical systems and misalignment in communication between stakeholders were selected to define the final design question and direction. The final design intervention is a Calibrated Trust Toolkit that can be used by development teams during the product development process to aid in designing for calibration of trust. It consists of four parts: A sensitizing session package, autonomous function visualization canvas, user decision matrix and trust enhancing communication. Collectively, the four parts allow for addressing the two challenges as selected previously. Each part of the toolkit was tested with designers and engineers and further iterated. The complete toolkit was validated by conducting interviews with experts and triangulating the data with the test data gathered during the testing phase of the design process. The testing and validation of the final outcome shows merit in the use of the toolkit for designing for calibration of trust and at the same time provides the flexibility for further modifications and adjustment. During the testing phase the participants found the use of the toolkit easy and intuitive. The digital method of testing suggested the deployment of the toolkit was possible in a digital setting. However, there were certain limitations to the project, the toolkit was not tested as a whole because of the time required and the unavailability of the necessary stakeholders. These limitations have been detailed out in the recommendation section of the report. Further research directions have also been suggested as a continuation of this project or start of new projects. In conclusion, the project is a step in the right direction when designing for calibrated trust by building on the work of other researchers like Ekman et al.(2016) and Mirning et al.(2016), but requires further research and design in other areas to fully realize the idea of designing for calibration of trust, such as the work of Anika Boelhouwer at TU Twente and David Abbink at TU Delft . In a broader perspective the insights and toolkit designed should not be limited to autonomous vehicles but extrapolated to designing other social robots or autonomous technologies that will coexist in future societies. ... Read more

Due to globalisation and technological advancements, the world is becoming increasingly complex. Volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous (VUCA) environments have called for organisations to become more agile in order to survive and compete in such changing environments. Large organisations are at particular risk for becoming stagnant due to operational inertia. In order to combat this and achieve agility, dynamic capabilities are developed. These capabilities allow an organisation to more effectively and efficiently change to incoming threats or opportunities. Such changes create uncertainty and insecurity amongst employees which translates into higher employee turnover and decreased performance. Stability therefore needs to be provided for individuals, while achieving dynamacy for organisations. This paradox of dynamic stability drives research into understanding relationships and effects caused by
disruptions. Covid-19 is used as an extreme use case in order to create these understandings. After primary and secondary research conclusions were developed, a conceptual framework was developed in order to orchestrate capabilities. This aims to help speed up the time taken for opportunities/threats to be translated into outcomes. This also aims to help improve the depth, diversity and accuracy of these outcomes.
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In a future where most of our transit system consists of autonomous vehicle, the question is raised how we as humans interact and communicate with them, and they with us. This project explores these interactions in the current time to uncover how humans interact and negotiate in traffic. More specifically how pedestrians do so. From the analysis it came forward that such interactions are mainly based on implicit communications – messages sent through behavioural cues that are not necessarily meant as a message. This contradicts the belief that humans use mostly explicit communications such as eye contact and gestures to communicate with fellow traffic participants. The disappearance of the driver might thus not have as much of an impact of the effectivity with which we humans can communicate with autonomous vehicles. However, many research currently study how more explicit communication tools, such as external human machine interfaces (eHMI) on the vehicle can help the pedestrian in making their decision to cross. These studies do find that there is a slight benefit to these eHMI systems, however they are not as significant as one might hope. eHMI systems also present several concerns including their visibility from afar, ambiguity and one sided communication. Especially that last concern is one that is central in this project. The process follows the guidelines of the Vision in Product design process, which explores current day interactions and context to then formulate a vision for the future. Based on this future and the gained insights a design statement is formulated that contains the goal to be fulfilled by the final design. The goal defined in this project is as follows: designing a cross walk that prioritises pedestrian transit while maintaining an efficient interaction between autonomous vehicle and the pedestrian. The final design proposal presents a cross walk that uses animations that come to life through lights integrated in the floor tiles. The cross walk is unique in its design as it extends onto the side walk to allow pedestrians to consciously show their intention to cross towards the autonomous vehicle. The cross walk is able to register the pedestrian. Since the cross walk registers the pedestrian early on, it can send a signal to the autonomous vehicle to slow down to give the pedestrian the right of way. The pedestrian receives feedback that shows them how safe it is for them to cross through the use of these animations. A series of animations have been designed and evaluated and based on the results a final set of animations has been designed. These animations will communicate that is either safe or not safe for the pedestrian to cross. As such, the pedestrian is able to actively communicate with the autonomous vehicle and receives personal feedback, instead of being told what to do by the autonomous vehicle what to do. Bringing both their different communication bubbles together and translating them through the cross walk so both understand what the other will do. ... Read more

The concept of collaboration has been used as an effective strategy to achieve an intended result by numerous entities across various points of time in history. Beginning from the societal nature of human civilisations and medieval kingdoms to its modern uses in trade and politics, collaboration has shaped the world in its many forms by creating significant impacts in the society. The field of education and innovation are also impacted by the merits of collaboration in developing new knowledge and implementing a wide array of innovative solutions to the benefit of society. In recent years, collaborative activities between universities and industries are regarded as a source of knowledge production and technological advancements by fostering the economic and innovative competitiveness of the involved stakeholders. Industries can benefit from the outcomes generated by scientific research at the universities. These outcomes include the fundamental understanding of a particular phenomenon, in the form of theories or principles that are channelled through scientific publications. Universities can benefit from the opportunity to explore the industrial context to generate knowledge and obtain additional sources of funding for research activities. Thus, the importance of University-Industry (U-I) collaborations is considered relevant for the primary operations of the stakeholders involved. With factors that continually support the collaboration between universities and industries in the present and the foreseeable future, it becomes necessary for the context of collaboration to be explored further. Hence, a real-time collaboration between a university and several industry stakeholders is selected for further research using design thinking methodologies, and its underlying factors and future needs of the stakeholders of the collaboration are identified, and a future context is developed that defines the characteristics of the collaboration in the future. Through the process of understanding the current context of the collaboration, it is understood that there are unfulfilled needs among the stakeholders that lessen the impact on the outcomes of the collaboration activities. To address these unmet needs and also to adapt to the future context of the collaboration, the future context is extrapolated to design future scenarios that can be used as an opportunity to add value to the collaboration by devising a Hub collaboration and evolving its activities across various points in the future. Initially, the collaboration can be improved by creating a knowledge platform that acts as a modified repository for knowledge that is created by the collaborative activities and also as a social network that connects the stakeholders, thereby providing new opportunities for collaboration. Further, the concept of a collaborative laboratory that is functionally connected to other laboratories that offer new expertise and knowledge domain is proposed to develop and execute multi-stakeholder projects involving interdisciplinary research. Following this, an Innovation Transfer office is proposed for the collaboration to integrate the elements of the society into the collaboration thereby developing a system of infrastructures that enables the implementation and the integration of the innovation outcomes into a desirable, viable and feasible systems. These solution concepts form as steps towards a vision for the stakeholders of the collaboration to create gainful impacts on knowledge, business and society by spearheading innovation through collaboration. Thus, a collaboration of this kind is not to be seen merely as a union of stakeholders trying to develop innovation but has the potential to improve people’s lives by providing the best travel experiences without compromising on the operational factors of the collaboration. ... Read more