Electronic Product Design Revealed

What innovative practices have emerged in product design in the global electronics industry, and what are the future trends? Compared with the global advanced level, what are the similarities and differences in the product design of China's electronics industry, where are the gaps, and how can we catch up?

With these hot issues that China's electronics industry is generally concerned about, the author has interviewed Lorraine Justice, dean of the School of Imaging Arts and Sciences at Rochester Institute of Technology, and author of the book "China's Design Revolution", Brookstone, USA. Chen Yonghe, Chairman of the Far East Region, Mo Lianghua, Deputy General Manager of Duntai Technology (Shenzhen) Co., Ltd., Wu Xiongang, President of ARM China, and Zheng Yonghui, Vice President of ADI, and other senior managers and experts in the industry.

In interviews, I found that industry veterans hold the same or similar views on some trends and practices in product design, while others have very different or even diametrically opposite views on other trends and practices. This just reflects the diversity, dynamism and potential of electronic product design.

Global Trends

Due to the increasing speed, larger capacity and lower cost of electronic devices, the global electronic product design is developing in the direction of artificial intelligence, wireless interconnection, integration and entertainment .

Artificial Intelligence Wanders around the International Consumer Electronics Show, and you can see various applications of artificial intelligence in product design everywhere. For example, intelligent braking, which emphasizes the automatic emergency braking of the car, does not make the driver consider and judge, but helps the driver to consider and judge.

"As long as the car in front is stopped, it will help you judge how fast your car is going, how dangerous it is to hit, etc. It will help you judge and even help you brake. It already has an intelligent crystal, and in the future all the There will be cars," said Chen Yonghe, Chairman of the Far East Region of Brookstone Corporation in the United States.

For example, the car's navigation system, it is not just a voice reminder, but has the function of automatic steering and automatic parking. Moreover, "good cars, like Mercedes-Benz and BMW, don't have keys, they are all chips. As soon as you go, the car will open the door; as soon as you leave, it will automatically lock and never start, so as to achieve the purpose of anti-theft. So I think artificial intelligence will More and more, and help mankind solve many problems." Chen Yonghe said.

Not only high-end products, but even the most common devices have chips. Chen Yonghe said: "For example, a coffee pot has chips in it, which can help you burn it when you want, when you turn it off, and have all functions. Not only a small coffee pot has chips, but a small toaster also has chips, and the vacuum cleaner finds the floor dirty. When the speed is automatically accelerated, because there are chips in it, this is artificial intelligence."

The ultimate goal of intelligence is to improve human life. Among the many challenges of human life, urban transportation and energy delivery are important areas in which electronic product design can play its part. According to Zheng Yonghui, vice president of ADI, the biggest innovation in urban transportation comes from so-called intelligent monitoring. "In big cities, monitoring equipment makes mass transportation run more efficiently, and both the electronics industry and the semiconductor industry provide a lot of convenience."

And in the power transmission, once the grid is interrupted , repair is very difficult thing. ADI's converters and digital processors have helped its customers accurately detect the entire grid, locating the exact location of damage when a transmission line between two towers is damaged. Zheng Yonghui said that this is a considerable innovation, which can greatly shorten the entire restoration time. This example reflects the intelligence in the design of electronic products, and more importantly, there are many innovations in intelligence.

Intelligence has become a trend, mainly due to the continuous expansion of storage capacity. "Our previous computers, 328 or 528, couldn't even break through one M byte. Now we are talking about hundreds or thousands of G bytes. The rapid growth of memory can be achieved by artificial intelligence, because This capacity holds enough data to make intelligent judgments." Chen Yonghe said.

Wu Xiongang, President of Wireless Internet ARM China, said that an obvious trend in the electronics industry is to integrate through mobile Internet and cloud drive. "That said, the smartphone is not just a device for communication and Internet access, but it becomes something that connects us to a wide variety of other consumer devices and services around the world."

He explained, from CES International Consumer According to the list of Design Innovation Awards of Electronics Show 2012, most of the winning products are controlled by smartphones through mobile Internet. For example, the mobile phone controls the Ford car, the mobile phone controls the home temperature, energy saving, the mobile phone controls the opening and closing of the door, and so on. "The future trend is that all the devices in our lives and work will be connected to each other through the Internet or the mobile Internet, and the smartphone will become the main tool for controlling, filtering, managing and communicating information between these devices."

However, in According to Chen Yonghe, chairman of Brookstone's Far East region, wireless may only be a temporary solution. "Many people say that wireless has many side effects, such as radiation. Now people don't have time to worry about it. Sooner or later, they will come out of the table and say, 'You have a transmitter switch station above your house, your family is not easy to get pregnant'. This is troublesome. It will be dismantled in the future, what should I do if the communication is dismantled?"

Mo Lianghua, deputy general manager of Integrated Duntai Technology (Shenzhen) Co., Ltd., said that now there is a trend of integration of electronic equipment. Electronic equipment integrates all requirements. "If we call this device a mobile phone, it should integrate MP3, MP4, camcorder, camera, computer, MID, PDA. In the future, this so-called 'mobile phone' device will be very powerful and powerful enough to use the All electronic devices are integrated, including monitoring of personal health, for example, it can monitor your health. We think it will be an integrated device in the future, and this device may be called a mobile phone, a personal affairs assistant, or something Name, this is not necessarily, but integration must be a trend."

He said that from a microscopic point of view, the trend of integration is feasible. Electronic devices are getting faster, larger, and cheaper, and the cost of integration is far lower than the cost of separate.

Due to integration, there will be fewer and fewer types of electronic products in the future, and product functions will become more and more similar. "A few years ago, Nokia launched 100 mobile phones a year, and when Apple launched the iPhone in 2006, they found that a company only had one phone, and it sold well. We found this to be a trend reversal. , Now the strategy of the machine king is that I must launch a star machine, and the star opportunity accounts for 80% of the company's sales." Mo Lianghua said.

Another trend in entertainment electronics design is entertainment. One of the driving forces behind this is a change in social attitudes. In the past, people's concept was to work to live, work hard today, and enjoy happiness in the future; now, many people think that they should live to work, pay more attention to the present, enjoy happiness now, have fun now, and play games now , do what you love now, not just work hard now and spend 20 years later. "So I think entertainment is a very important trend. The company's product positioning is also developing in this regard, which is to really meet everyone's entertainment needs, not just the original office needs." Mo Lianghua said.

ARM China President Wu Xiongang also believes that entertainment is an important trend. He cites a company in the US that has changed the way music is recorded. "In the past, music was recorded with a complex professional equipment system, a microphone, a PC, a tuner, a complete set of equipment. This company basically uses an iPad and a professionally made microphone, Professionally tune in and adjust, control, filter and edit directly on the iPad after recording."

China Practice

Chinese electronics companies have made active efforts in product design, but compared with the world's advanced level There is a gap. This is mainly reflected in core technologies, business models, industrial design and design engineers.

Core Technology With the adjustment of industrial structure or the increase of investment in innovation of Chinese electronic enterprises, some innovations have appeared in their basic technology or core technology. For example, a quad-core processor developed by Huawei's subsidiary HiSilicon can be said to be the world's leading processor in terms of performance and design capabilities. Last year, ARM and HiSilicon jointly made an eight-core network processor, which is the world's first eight-core network processor, and its leading position is also very obvious. "Based on our understanding and cooperation with customers, we can see that in the next 12 months, there will be more core chips of this type that are completely world-leading," said Wu Xiongang, President of ARM China.

However, according to Mo Lianghua, deputy general manager of Duntai Technology (Shenzhen) Co., Ltd., many Chinese electronics companies still do not have the core technology and are unable to make the main chip. "Without the main chip, the upper-level things are illusory. Without the main chip, the computer can't do it, the mobile phone can't do it, and the TV can't do it. Another core technology is the core software, such as the operating system. Do secondary development."

In this case, many Chinese electronics companies have to purchase the core technologies of foreign companies, including core components and software, and the software is mainly the operating system. "And now our understanding of core components and software operating systems are not deep enough, which affects our application and use of them. For example, HTC's understanding is deeper than ours. For example, after the Android system came out, it was not very deep. Perfect, there are quite a few small bugs, but Samsung and HTC mobile phones have done a good job of fixing these bugs, while these domestic manufacturers, some bugs have not been fixed." Mo Lianghua said.

Business Model ADI Vice President Zheng Yonghui said that compared with the international advanced level, the most important difference or deficiency of Chinese electronics companies is the business model. And changes in the business model will affect the design of the product. "A considerable proportion of business models in China put more emphasis on the so-called hardware part, while for the software part, the value that can be directly derived from the business model is relatively small. In other words, in the Chinese market, many electronic products still rely on Selling hardware to make profits, while many developed countries integrate hardware, software and services well. It will take some time for us to catch up with this gap."

In terms of business model, Wu Xiongang, President of ARM China, observed that China Electronics Co., Ltd. One of the innovations of enterprises is cross-border development. "Whether it's Xiaomi, Ali, Baidu, or Shanda, they all release smartphones; some video websites have launched their own IP set-top boxes, and radio, television, and telecommunications are also considering launching their own network-based set-top boxes. I think this cross-border innovation will happen in China. There is quite a bit of success, and there will be all kinds of constant improvements and trials."

Design Concept The concept of product design is changing. Take mobile phones as an example. In the past, mobile phones were sold to make money, but now they are sold to occupy users. "The interface between the user and the Internet is the mobile phone, and the carrier is the mobile phone. I will give the mobile phone to you, and then sell the service to you. The purpose of the former is to meet consumers' needs for mobile phone functions, while the purpose of the latter is that consumers buy through mobile phones. My stuff. The concept is different. Under the latter concept, the design of mobile phones pays special attention to mobile interconnection, and the target group is very concentrated. For example, it is aimed at people aged 20 to 40 years old. Internet users, not all the public." said Mo Lianghua, deputy general manager of Duntai Technology (Shenzhen) Co., Ltd. In his view, Xiaomi, 360, QQ, and Ali are here for the purpose of getting involved in smartphones.

Industrial design The progress of electronic product design in China is relatively obvious. Zheng Yonghui, vice president of ADI, said: "If we look at domestic electronic products now, there is a big difference between 10 years ago and 10 years later. Now we see more and more domestic and even foreign users. Not only products made in China are used, but quite a few of them are also designed locally."

Zheng Yonghui said that this progress is more clear from the development stage of the domestic electronics industry. In the early 1980s, China's electronics industry was dominated by Made in China, entirely manufacturing, and learning from manufacturing.

After entering the 1990s, it began to become Made by China. Made in China is different from Made by China, because a lot of Made in China comes from what others have done. Domestic companies assemble and combine it. When Made by China in the 1990s, the source of design began. demand from China.

Since 2005, quite a few products have become Design in China. A very important source of this comes from the increasing expectations of customers, and domestic enterprises also invest a considerable amount of funds in R&D and innovation.

However, the industrial design of Chinese electronic products is still constrained by the lack of core technologies. Mo Lianghua, deputy general manager of Duntai Technology (Shenzhen) Co., Ltd., believes that industrial design cannot be done without technical accumulation. For example, it is difficult for domestic companies to design products such as Apple and Samsung that are greatly affected by core technologies. "Under this status quo, China's biggest bright spot is cost reduction or cost innovation, and then the appearance. For example, Huawei has made the world's thinnest mobile phone. But the general feeling is that the industrial design highlights of domestic electronic products are not enough. , there is a certain homogeneity."

In the view of Wu Xiongang, President of ARM China, design engineers, in addition to the gap in hardware, software and industrial design, there is also a gap in scale effect in China's electronic product design. "The design scale of China's chip companies is still relatively small, and the gap with developed countries is relatively large."

In fact, there are not only quantitative gaps, but also quality gaps, even major gaps. Mo Lianghua, deputy general manager of Duntai Technology (Shenzhen) Co., Ltd., said that there are senior engineers abroad who have been focusing on technology, while Chinese engineers are relatively young, among which excellent engineers enter the ranks of managers and assume many management responsibilities , when doing technological innovation, time is not enough, and innovation ability is not enough. "I have contacted many domestic companies and found that they lack senior engineers to guide the development of technology. This is an important difference between our domestic and international first-tier manufacturers."

In addition, the work rigor of domestic designers is not enough. "Maybe it's too utilitarian. When you make something, you just want to sell it for money. You don't focus on the product itself. For example, we want to make a perfect product. Apple's success, Jobs said, 'I want to make a perfect product. , not just use this product to make money'. Different concepts will result in different work attitudes and different work rigor." Mo Lianghua said.

The way to catch up

How does China's electronic product design catch up with the world's advanced level? The industry veterans interviewed by the author suggested that breakthroughs should be made in terms of customer experience, industry chain, creativity of design engineers, and application of new technologies.

Customer-centric, emphasizing customer experience Product design must first meet customer needs. Lorraine Justice, dean of the Rochester Institute of Technology's School of Imaging Arts and Sciences and author of "The Design Revolution in China," suggests observing trends in customers' movements to find clues about their needs.

One of the future needs of office workers in major Chinese cities is to have breakfast, lunch or dinner in the car they drive to and from get off work, she said. Adding the ability to safely boil a glass of water on the dashboard of your car will be very popular with these commuters.

She also said that electronics often go hand in hand with quality of life. Gadgets for oral hygiene, grooming, timing, health monitoring, food preparation and office work are always a necessity. People's lives have become hectic, and these appliances help keep people clean, safe, healthy and on time.

She believes that by combining two emerging technologies and materials, it is possible to create a new product. Electric shavers are one such example. When the motor became small enough, coupled with the new technology of the blade, the electric shaver was born.

On the basis of meeting customer needs, emphasize customer experience. Apple's products are the pinnacle of the pursuit of customer experience, and are worthy of learning from Chinese electronics companies.

In the opinion of Mo Lianghua, deputy general manager of Duntai Technology (Shenzhen) Co., Ltd., Apple's research on users is very deep. Why does Apple's mobile phone always use a 3.5-inch screen? Because its user research results show that a person's hand is most comfortable with a 3.5-inch screen. When it designed the capacitive touch screen, it studied the range of fingers from children to adults and what it looks like when they touch the screen. "It emphasizes people's most instinctive reactions and the most pleasant experience, giving people a natural and close feeling when using Apple's products." Towards the development of integration and intelligence, which determines that an electronic enterprise must focus on the entire industrial chain to integrate and utilize the resources of the industrial chain to make perfect products. This is Apple's success.

When Apple made capacitive touch screens, it bought a company that made capacitive touch screen ICs to develop this technology. After the technology was developed, it went to the manufacturer to produce it. After the first batch of products was produced, Apple gave the factory 1,000 suggestions for improvement. In this way, by integrating the industry chain, Apple strives to make the most perfect products.

In the opinion of Wu Xiongang, President of ARM China, in the next few years, China's electronics industry chain will have the opportunity to compete or keep pace with the world. This provides a good opportunity for Chinese electronics companies to utilize industrial chain resources.

He said that in the next 5-10 years, the global electronics industry chain will form two camps: the emerging country industry chain targeting emerging consumer groups in emerging countries, which is dominated by the Chinese electronics industry chain; The industrial chain of international first-line products with national high-end consumers as the target market.

He predicts that the scale of the entire Chinese electronics industry chain, including upstream, midstream and downstream, will definitely surpass that of North America within 5 years. Targeting consumer groups in emerging countries, enterprises in China's electronics industry chain have the opportunity to show their skills in product design.

Stimulate the creativity of engineers and designers According to Zheng Yonghui, vice president of ADI, stimulating the creativity of engineers can be achieved by setting up career development channels for engineers and creating platforms to encourage innovation.

In ADI, engineers have an entire career plan and can have so-called career development paths just like management. The feature of ADI's career path for engineers is that ADI has established academicians, and academicians are selected every year. The main criteria for selecting these academicians are to see how many valid patents he has, how much his innovation has brought the company's turnover growth, his personal behavior example such as how many engineers he has promoted, and so on. Academicians are a respected position at ADI. Excellent engineers at ADI are not the only way to become management, because some people are suitable for management work, and some people are not suitable.

Zheng Yonghui said that to create a platform that encourages innovation, in addition to creating a corresponding corporate culture, scientific management methods can also be used. Since it is a scientific method, it can be verified, tested, reviewed, and rethought. China has lagged behind in industrial development in the past few years, and it also comes from the fact that too many verbal discussions in China have not been translated into words.

Looking at a relatively simple example, there is an obvious phenomenon in developed countries. The realization of their innovative ideas into words is much higher than that of Asian countries. Innovations that can be realized in words refer to patents, books, definitions, and theories. "From a management perspective, it is very important to have a way to recognize and encourage these things and create a platform to encourage innovation."

Applying high-tech electronic product design is very taboo to be complacent and stagnant. Lorraine Justice, author of "The Design Revolution in China," has a piece of advice: Don't be complacent and think that everything stays the same.

In people's brief lives, technology has obsoleted many products and made them anachronistic, she said. So actively explore new product technologies, materials and manufacturing processes as an investment in the future. If confused about which technology to choose, choose one and reduce the number of products manufactured to test the market response. If possible, design the product as a collection of parts, and the technology can be easily transferred inside and outside the parts, such as rechargeable batteries.

In the view of Chen Yonghe, Chairman of the Far East Region of Brookstone Corporation in the United States, it is very important to integrate high technology into the design of electronic products. "Our company often asks if we can design something for our customers when we see new high-tech."

Products designed under this habit are often favored by customers. The company's Rover Wireless Spy Tank toy, which uses Apple's remote control, stands out among 4,500 products submitted by manufacturers around the world with its high-tech and innovative designs such as infrared and Apple technology. RedDot Award for Product Design 2012".