We keep moving

By Tabea Estermann March 5, 2017 Discover ShuQi project

This week, we began with a feed back about the kick-off. After the conversation we agreed to explore different scenarios/ situation in which our object will be useful. In the same time, the first prototype is building gently. There is some work to do to the stability of the Bluetooth part.

In our project we use a technology of identification for differentiate the items, it’s the biggest chunk of work for the engineers, apart from the Bluetooth technology.

The RFID, the technology used for our smartbag is similar in a lot of aspects to a barcode. The barcode provide identification of the label at distance and the labels don’t consume any energy. In the RFID we have the same functionality as with a barcode but the tags do not need visual contact with the reader, which is a huge advantage for the user. The label RFID requires energy to communicate, but most of these labels are functioning without battery. They simply use the energy provided by the central device with the electromagnetic waves. For the next weeks, we must improve the source code of the respective parts.

Loïc, our designer had to define several cases and how the object could look like for each one of those situations. It is such a difficult step, because almost everything can be imagined and in the same time a lot of things are not possible for some different reasons. … When suddenly the ‘’fear gang’’ appears and try to hit her with their ‘’ doubt’’ fist and their ‘’ there’s no solution’’ low kick…. But it was important to keep trying, so … 加油 (courage)! He called the Geneva team and we brainstormed and discussed one more time about the possibilities we have. So the rest of the week was essentially to choose different materials, explore several ways of attachments, which was mainly done with sketches and image research.

Julia spent the week on refining the personas and getting started (or in her case, continuing) with the wireframes for the application. Now there are two task flows that are ready to be tested. There are lots of tiny but important decisions to make: is it easier if there are more, but smaller steps to complete a task or is it better to put everything on just 2 screens?

As for the personas, more interviews are needed to broaden our horizon and really think about user groups that are different from ours. It is more challenging to build and work with a persona that is very different from us, but in the end it may mean greater insights and rewards.

We also narrowed down the selection of Business Models Tabea had drafted. Most of us like the razor blade pricing model with the option of channeling sales either through places we are when we travel, such as airports, train- and bus stations or through a partnership with a bag company. We dismissed the B2B options, since it complicates the interview and consumer insight we can get. It is easier in our case to gather relevant data from a B2C Model. The interviews to confirm the Value Proposition Canvas are ongoing and are to be continued next week.

The project overall is more and more taking shape. In the same time, many questions are raised and we are keeping discussing them.