This project investigates the influence of brand elements (logo, color, illustrations, and font) on the premium perception of packaging within the packaged foods sector. Utilizing a mixed-methods approach, the research comprises qualitative focus groups and a quantitative online survey to understand how these elements shape consumer perceptions of premium quality. The findings indicate that color is the most influential element, followed by logo, illustrations, and font. Color sets the tone for perceived premiumness, while prominent and well-designed logos enhance brand recognition and trust. Illustrations that tell a brand story contribute to authenticity and superior quality. The qualitative phase provided rich insights into consumer preferences, likes, and dislikes, which were then drafted into guidelines and tested and validated through statistical analysis in the quantitative phase. The study culminated in developing a practical guidebook for designers, particularly those in small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in India, to create packaging that conveys added value and quality. This research offers valuable insights concerning packaging design, highlighting the crucial role of specific brand elements in influencing premium perception while acknowledging limitations such as the focus on visual assessment and specific product categories. The study sets a foundation for future research to explore additional product categories. Overall, the findings provide actionable insights for designers aiming to enhance the premium appeal of their packaging.

This thesis addresses the issue of bulky waste management in Rotterdam. The processing methods are underdeveloped, and inefficiencies in the current collection system result in valuable materials being frequently incinerated. The city strives to achieve its circularity goals: to prevent waste, improve separation, and ensure high-quality processing. This thesis presents a circular service system that integrates citizen behaviour, innovative waste management, and stakeholder engagement to give bulky waste a second life and save valuable products and materials from incineration.

The research used the principles of Effectuation to create opportunity spaces within the scope. With the use of participatory design methods the collaboration with citizens and municipal employees was ensured. This was needed for emphasizing practical engagement and real-world solutions. This thesis is structured by integrating Effectuation with the New Product Development process. This entrepreneurial thinking approach and iterative design explored possibilities for adaptive problem solving.

RepurposeRide is the final design. It is a transportation network using cargo bikes to redirect bulky waste within neighborhoods, giving items a second life through reuse at Wijkhubs and giveaway stores. Materials of lower status are delivered to environmental parks for high-quality processing. This system prevents waste from being crushed in compactor trucks, contributing to waste prevention, improved separation, and high-quality processing.
It demonstrates a citizen-centered, circular bulky waste collection service for Rotterdam’s waste management. Circularity, convenience and community engagement are the foundations to support reuse, enhance material recovery and prevent waste. While limitations remain, the project provides a basis for further development. RepurposeRide strives to combine environmental responsibility with social impact, establishing an identity rooted in sustainable entrepreneurship.

High-tech startups are shaping the world of tomorrow, striving to make it a better place through innovative technologies. Only a fraction of them is however able to succeed, often because they are unable to take direction and build the requisite customer base to transition to the next stage of the company. A brand strategy can support decisions and bring the customer closer to the startups innovation.
This thesis aims to build a brand for Plense, that supports the early-and later stage development of their innovative technology, leading to a successful market introduction.

To understand Plense, their current sensor prototype and idea about the future, a vision workshop was conducted. To explore the startups context, this thesis studies the most promising customer, industry developments, potential collaborations and competition, through desk research and qualitative interviews with customers.
The findings throughout this discovery phase illustrate Plense’s unique value proposition; a greenhouse integrated co-pilot that provides actionable plant-based data, towards a strategically important customer; the greenhouse ‘business-man’, who decides what happens within the greenhouse business, and their growers, who use technology to control the greenhouse. A key insights and distinction of the business-man is their drive to expand and constantly improve the greenhouse business. The grower is central in this business, and since the growers working pressure increases because of the limited labour force and expertise available, Plense’s co-pilot could support the grower, to focus on what is most important during and after work and therefore support the business-man to explore new opportunities.

The brand DNA for Plense captures these findings with the brand position statement and brand purpose, while the brand personality; exciting, ambitious and reliable translate the brand DNA to the visual appearance incorporated into the redesigned logo, sensor and other brand touchpoints. The brand promise made for Plense summarizes the brand DNA into one central idea communicated towards the customer: ‘your plants in top form’. This promise was evaluated as desired and new towards the business-man and grower and therefore used as basis for the brand building strategy.

To realize this brand promise Plense can only start their brand building strategy when able to communicate their first test results. At that moment targeting the business-man through the personal visits becomes crucial to build the first relationships with the brand and further understand the technology through user tests. Once these user tests show in which way Plense is able to keep plants in top form, Plense is ready to share the brand to the market and all its stakeholders through an interactive horticulture fair stand experience. While bringing the brand and its products to the market, website and newsletters should inform and excite every stakeholder in order to further strengthen the brand image.

This thesis ends with perhaps the most important brand building element for now; internal branding. Making sure the brand which now reflects the outside, the customer, is understood and lived, by making the brand part of the startups daily routine and working together on future brand building activities.

Company X is a renowned engineering and technology corporation based in Germany that has established a prominent presence in China for over a century. Company X is actively promoting and leading the way in adopting environmentally friendly technological projects in response to the green energy trend worldwide. A significant step in this direction is introducing their new air-sourced heat pump product line in their Chinese HVAC department, specifically designed to cater to the unique requirements of the local environment and market.
This study aims to assist Company X in its transition towards green technology by developing a strategic plan for introducing its new product in the Chinese market. Upon joining Company X, the author assumed the role of an external observer and started the research by reviewing internal documents to understand the company’s current situation and the product itself. The author concludes that a go-to-market strategy is an essential bridge for its product launch since it can help to meet the company’s transitioning from product-driven to emphasising meeting market demands and enhancing user experience.
Since this study focuses on developing a go-to-market plan for Company X, highlighting the product’s unique selling point is critical to differentiate from intense market competition. To achieve this goal, the author conducted thorough market and consumer research, which involved studying existing literature, conducting field studies, and gathering feedback through surveys and interviews.
From the gathered data, a strategic product launch roadmap was created for Company X. This roadmap offers advice on highlighting features that make the company's heat pump different from others and on effective launch strategies. A key observation was the varied nature of the Chinese market and the specific demands of its consumers. Since user needs and preferences differ from region to region, it is crucial to adapt strategies and, when needed, test them with local partners before a widespread rollout.
Interestingly, the research also showed that many consumers are not fully aware of the ASHP product, signalling opportunities for educational initiatives. For Company X to truly resonate with its audience, it is essential to reimagine its brand image, emphasising sustainability and user experience. The ultimate objective is for Company X's new product to resonate with its target audience and capture a significant portion of the ASHP market share.

By 2050, the Netherlands aims to achieve a climate-neutral society, however over 90% of buildings currently use natural gas or fossil fuel oil as their main resource of energy. To align with this goal, the Dutch energy company is taking measures to phase out natural gas and promote district heating. This research outlines a strategic path for the energy company to connect existing residential areas to district heating, utilizing a combination of roadmapping and the double diamond process model.

The initial phase involved stakeholder and competitor analysis, along with qualitative research through interviews with the energy company employees. Housing categories were established and prioritized, while the identified problems were refined. Additional interviews were conducted to look into the desirability of the to be developed solution.

The subsequent phase involved individual brainstorming and various workshops, utilizing different methods to select and further develop the most promising solutions. Roadmaps were created, outlining strategic directions and required activities. Simultaneously, a future vision is formulated through strategic trend scanning and clustering, providing a long-term perspective and comprehensive understanding of the broader picture of the energy business in 2050.

This study suggests the energy company to focus on five new innovations. All innovations propose the use of either new HIU’s or ways of connecting district heating to the HIU. These solutions combined have the maximum potential of connecting 67.2 percent of the buildings.

Furthermore, the recommendation was made that, to meet future customer needs, the energy company should transition from their current role of organizing the energy transition to becoming a provider of knowledge and expertise.

Lastly, it was found that to overcome challenges in adopting district heating, the energy company should improve their communication about their process, progress, and the benefits of district heating to the residents.

In pursuit of a more sustainable future, more and more firms are seeking alternative sustainable packaging and corresponding packaging communication strategies to signal its eco-friendliness and stimulate ecological consumer behaviour. Despite the majority of research focusing on the pre-purchase stage of the packaging life cycle, limited attention has been given to enhancing post-consumption packaging disposal. This study examines the effect of both implicit (design strategy: imitation vs. differentiation), and explicit (packaging visualization and claims: long vs. short supply chain) packaging design cues on sustainability perception and disposal behaviour. Results from a laboratory study demonstrate that packaging following a differentiation strategy (vs. imitation) has a positive effect on both perceived sustainability and disposal behaviour. Furthermore, the length of the supply chain, manipulated through on-packaging visualization and claims, significantly influences disposal behaviour, with a significantly higher proportion of consumers correctly disposing of the packaging when the supply chain is depicted as short (vs. long). The findings contribute to environmental psychology and packaging design literature, providing valuable insights to designers, marketers, and policymakers in formulating effective and sustainable packaging design interventions.

This graduation project carried out within the master ‘Strategic Product Design’, deals with the strategic expansion of Salmari into the German market. The company Salmari, a salmiak liquor, is increasingly popular and growing in the Netherlands. The company has a short-term ambition to increase sales in the Netherlands by 2023 and a long-term ambition to grow into a global brand.

The project involved in-depth preliminary research that began with a comprehensive analysis of geography, distribution, competition, market share, culture, taste preference and trends. This analysis revealed that northern Germany, particularly the cities of Hamburg and Berlin, offered significant potential for Salmari due to the striking similarities in culture, atmosphere, audience and product affinity between the two cities.

The focus of the project was explicitly on Hamburg and Berlin, with the primary objective being to develop a launch strategy that would enable Salmari to launch successfully in these German cities, with a particular focus on a new, chosen target audience.

The analysis is followed by creating a market segmentation and interviews with the German target audience. This led to identifying crucial ‘touchpoints’ that would significantly impact Salmari’s marketing efforts. Based on these selected ‘touchpoints’, a detailed launch strategy was developed. The strategy began with creating a new ‘buyer persona,’ the ‘night badger,’ and included a roadmap with three phases: visibility, expansion and commitment. Each phase was supported by a comprehensive launch campaign focusing on specific communication platforms and options between Salmari and its new target audience.

A vital aspect of the strategy was building brand equity for Salmari by positioning it as a drink that promotes social interactions and unique experiences. The brand is presented as inspiring and in line with the target audience’s values.

Recommendations for further action included are included in the report, such as
Additional validation with the target group in Berlin, maintaining close contact with the target group and monitoring changes in the market.

Finally, the effectiveness of the launch campaign was tested using the ‘communication optimisation model.’ With validation based on criteria such as desirability, feasibility and viability, the final design can be presented. This final design is the starting point for Salmari to successfully enter the German market and ultimately achieve its long-term goals.

In this graduation thesis, a (sandwich) spread with spirulina, called Spirucijn, has been developed for Alga.farm. The main goal of the project was to create a strong market strategy for their food harvest of spirulina in line with their values.

The final results are the brand touchpoints, consisting of the final product design and communication designs. The final product is a spread for eco-conscious and -friendly people, and consist of nutritious and local ingredients. The report covers the design brief of the spread, the design of the packaging and flyer, the construction and a visual of the website, visuals of Instagram posts,  and a product launch campaign.

Challenged to innovate towards full circularity and sustainability, both the waste management and inner-city transport industry are drastically changing in the Netherlands. Being a waste management organization that operates in these markets, PreZero is looking for new waste collection solutions to facilitate the transition towards circularity.

An envisioned solution for this new context could be in collaboration with parcel delivers that operate via hubs on the outskirts of cities. By letting them collect waste streams from inner-city customers while also delivering parcels, the electric vehicles that would otherwise return to the hub empty would be cleverly used.

The client is piloting this system in The Hague but is looking for a custom solution to fit the needs and wishes of all involved stakeholders. Therefore, the research question of this master thesis is:

How can a scalable product-service system for smart return logistics of source-separated commercial waste streams in an inner-city environment be designed and implemented by the client?

With the project aiming to develop a new business model and product, the entrepreneurial theory of ‘effectuation’ is applied as the theoretical framework of this thesis, and co-creation and qualitative research methods are selected for the approach. In a series of interviews and case studies, insights about the existing pilot are gathered, resulting in a set of means and potential goals to work with. Additional exercises like customer journey mapping the waste stream and value flow modeling the complex stakeholder context, enable the means and goals to be translated into a set of six potential value propositions for the future.

A design intervention is used to rapidly prototype the next iteration toward these potential value propositions and show the client how the effectual approach can be implemented. This design phase focuses on the various stakeholder contexts and uses a compact waste container and an MVP version of the waste collection bin to pilot the envisioned product-service system. Using phenomenological research, the designs are evaluated, resulting in a rich set of insights about the requirements and wishes for the system, container, bin, and involved partners.

All gathered insights are combined into four future visions that describe the potential strategic positions that the client could aim for. By detailing the business model, needed partners, targeted customers, and steps to be taken, the client is enabled to start implementing tomorrow. Posters visualize each future vision to bring the business models to life and empower the client’s project team to get the internal support needed to develop solutions towards one of these future roles.

Concluding the report, recommendations are given about what future vision to aim for and how to get there. With a drastically changing environment that is hard to predict, effectuation delivers a risk-limiting approach to co-create the future with involved stakeholders. Implements these insights from the report will support the client in its iterative journey towards the new business model.

Rubber is by the European Union stated a critical material (Critical Raw Materials, 2020). For our society the material is essential but can be depleted. The search for circular solutions for rubber is urgent.

In 2020 27.4 million metric tons of rubber has been produced globally (Tiseo, 2021). Around 70% of all produced rubber is used to create tyres (About rubber, z.d.). creating one of the biggest single product waste streams in the world.

Rubber granulate is a material made by recycling tyres. Stockz is a company which creates rubber sports flooring solutions for fitness gyms and sport clubs from these rubber granules. Delivering a safe space for athletes, reducing sound and protecting the base floor from the impact of falling weights. The life of the rubber material is extended but still after this 2nd life cycle the product ends like waste.

In this project circular strategies are examined to prolong product and material life as long as possible. The 3 most promising circular strategies, Reusing, Remanufacturing and Recycling were chosen to evaluate on feasibility, viability and desirability. Based on tests to create 2nd cycle granules and rubber sports flooring solutions the feasibility is proven for the recycling strategy. Reusing flooring is also possible. Remanufacturing is based on interesting ideas and therefor is plausible but not proven feasible.

Interviews with clients, end-users and production partners gave valuable information on their view on the strategies. An idea generation session to redesign for remanufacturing gave new ideas how to create a more circular product. Life Cycle Analysis were made for the current situation and the 3 strategies. Resulting in a decrease of CO2 with the use of the strategy reusing by 11%, remanufacturing by 15.5% and with recycling by 17%.

Next to this circular business models were examined which led to 2 different retrieval services for indirect sales clients and a rent/hire business with direct sales clients. Cost calculations were made and discussed with clients and end-users. The viability of the reuse strategy is proven. The viability of the remanufacture strategy is because of the new idea not certain but plausible after some investments. The viability of the recycle strategy was not proven because of a higher price than the current product which was not desirable. A 2nd cycle recycled flooring solution could be viable for other clients or end-users than interviewed who are willing to pay more for a more sustainable product.

From these results a strategic roadmap was made towards the vision of Stockz having a circular business. A MVP to start the retrieval service in 2023 is the first horizon going towards the second horizon in 2024 were pre-loved (used) products and 2nd cycle products are being sold.

Hereby, you are reading my graduation project for the Master’s program in Strategic Product Design on the TUDelft. The research has been formulated from my interest in both customer-centric design and the automotive industry.

This research started with the aim to introduce short-cycle feedback loops in pre-development departments to enable customer feedback in the early development stages to enable designers and developers to validate their product concept. The departments that will be targeted are the UI/UX pe-development departments of BMW, to be exact teams and departments that work on Natural User Interactions. The BMW Group introduced the term BMW Natural User Interaction (NUI)*, at the Mobile World Congress 2019 in Barcelona. The NUI combines advanced voice command technology, gesture control and gaze recognition to enable more real-world interaction between the user and product.
Earlier gained knowledge and insights enabled me to see many benefits of implementing customer feedback as early as possible. To analyze the possibilities of customer feedback, literature research was combined with a company analysis. From an outsider’s perspective, it seemed that the automotive industry is a bit careful and hesitant to involve customers in development processes. Therefore, the motivation of this industry could still benefit from novel customer feedback implementations. Both the customer side and the business side, benefit from streamlined customer feedback implementation in product development. Therefore, this research aims to validate if customers would sense an ability to influence the end products of BMW.

The company analysis started from researching how departments function and interact with each other, to their development processes and finally the data gathering analysis. From the company analysis, the assumption of potential for early customer feedback was validated.
From this point onwards a search for suitable customer feedback methods was started, after considering and analysing many combinations from contemporary methods with new user interaction technologies, a 3-step method was designed to test my proposed VUI IN-Car method.

I am proud to say that promising results have been found from the 3-step test method. Interacting with a speech interaction while giving feedback on speech functions, results in a higher amount of creative ideas from participants. And adding a more realistic context to this setup results in more creative input. These results were compared to a contemporary questionnaire with the same content. The detailed steps I took will be explained in this report.

This master thesis for Strategic Product Design at the TU Delft presents a design for a personalised Volkskrant-app. The goal of this project was to explore the different possibilities of personalisation and see how it could help de Volkskrant fulfil its mission to enrich their reader’s life through news.
Why?
During my whole project I have involved readers, journalists and the product developers at DPG Media. Within the theory analysis, interviews and conversations I had with these stakeholders I have identified four reasons for implementing personalisation in the digital news distribution product of the Volkskrant:

Facilitating the fulfilment of the diverse reader needs of the subscribers.
The current home feed of the app and website of de Volkskrant mainly focus on the update-me need.

Developing the platform of de Volkskrant into a product that takes full advantage of the possibilities of digital news distribution.
The current digital news distribution product offer of de Volkskrant is still seen as a digital translation of the physical newspaper. It is time to look at what digital developments can offer something different.

Offering an extra service for the users of the platform of de Volkskrant
The rise of competitive platforms for news put pressure on the business model of de Volkskrant. Personalisation could offer an extra service to bind readers to the app of de Volkskrant.

Limiting the news overload that readers experience in current day and age.
De Volkskrant should help subscribers to find the articles they look for and offer a clear overview.
How?
To create an algorithm that would facilitate more needs of the readers, I came up with co-curation of the news. The digital news will now be curated by both journalists and an algorithm, both having a different responsibility:

Journalists: Delivering on the promise of creating the most relevant news events and productions that make de Volkskrant stand out.

Algorithms: Bringing the niche articles to the right readers by fulfilling their personal habits, deepening their knowledge in specific topics and surprising them with suggestions out of their filter bubble.
What?
The final design proposes two newly designed interfaces for the app of de Volkskrant. Focusing on two scenarios:

Getting the right article to the right reader: the home feed
The newly designed home feed is co-curated. A horizontal scroll bar was added to the home feed saying ‘de belangrijkste verhalen voor jou’ - the most important stories for you.

This addition is based on three key principles for personalisation: transparency, autonomy and diversity. The horizontal scroll bar is distinctive because of its look, title and scrolling direction, allowing the users to dive into it or leave it out in their session.

Do you remember the phrase “they grow up so fast”? Personally when I hear this, I immediately get flashbacks of my grandmother smiling proudly from ear to ear while saying this about me and my siblings. Maybe for you this was a parent, a neighbour, a teacher or a family friend. Or maybe you have a different memory with this phrase altogether. Babies turn into children, children grow up to be teenagers and before you know it those little munchkins have graduated and found their first ‘real’ job. Do we not all wish we could be forever young? We are all full of hopes and dreams for the future, never having enough time to do it all. Always studying, working and growing day by day. Some of us may already have dreams like travelling the world for when retirement comes around. Others may have different plans like learning to play the violin. Either way, you want to make sure that you can enjoy your retirement to the fullest, worry-free.
Do you know whether you will have enough saved by then to turn your dreams into reality? Have you ever actually looked into your pension before? And do not lie to me, or rather yourself, now. This is a safe space, no judgements. In fact, most of us have never really bothered to look into it before. So you are definitely not the only one if you have not. But why not?
A new pension system is on its way, which makes this the perfect time to dive deeper into this topic from now on. The upcoming changes should make pension more transparent and personal for participants. One of the consequences of these changes is the fact that the emphasis of pension accrual will be even more so on the start of people’s careers. This, along with the fact that they still have plenty of time to accrue their pension and make any changes if preferred, makes it especially interesting for young participants to engage with their pension. This way they can ensure a worry-free retirement. However, especially younger people have a difficult time imagining their future self and making plans for the long term. All these big life decisions can be rather overwhelming.
The goal of this project is to make younger participants [21-35 years] in the care and welfare sector feel more in control of their own pension by making them aware of the impact that they can have on it themselves. The idea is to develop a concept of a ‘future self’ tool for this that uses predictive knowledge.
A process of literature research, two rounds of interviews with participants and interactive workshops has led to a set of criteria for this ‘future self tool’. One of the main findings is that participants, of all ages, are just not that interested in their pension. Some can worry about it or feel bad that they have not looked into it before, but no one really does anything about it. No matter someone’s age, it just still feels too far away. This is why a pension specific tool is not going to do the trick here.
The Toekomstplanner (EN: Future planner) therefore does not focus on pension, but rather on the life events that younger participants are interested in already. From the interviews I have learned that especially decisions regarding moving to a new home or career related events are things that the target group already thinks about or even works towards. These decisions also have an impact on a person’s future, including their pension. The Toekomstplanner is an add-on to a participant’s Email platform. Participants can use the tool to create a checklist for a life event they plan to look into. The Toekomstplanner uses predictive knowledge to help the participant make a checklist for this life event that fits their current and future personal situation well. Pension tasks related to the life event are included in the checklist to introduce the participant to their pension in a more low key way. Next the Toekomstplanner again uses predictive knowledge to help the participant find a suitable moment to sit down and work on the checklist. In addition, The Hooked model by Nir Eyal was applied to the concept to design for a habit-forming tool that is ingrained in participants’ daily lives.
When people are more knowledgeable, this decreases negative emotions like worry and increases their feeling of being in control. When people feel more in control they are also more likely to prefer delayed rewards like pension over instant gratification. Positive experiences with the Toekomstplanner elevate PFZW’s customer satisfaction to a new level and the tool provides PFZW with an easy way to connect with this younger target group that is relatively hard to reach for the pension fund.
The concept of the Toekomstplanner is not ready for implementation yet. The discussion section of the report reflects on the concept so far and presents recommendations for further research and exploration.

This report proposes a strategy to develop a circular business model for Feelou, a company that has worked on a sustainable pregnancy bra. The circular business model aims to improve the lifespan of the bra and reduce resource usage. This report consists of a research phase and a conceptualisation phase. The research phase explores the current industry and the challenges for the resource flows in the circular business model. The conceptualisation phase aims to solve the challenges that are found in the research phase, resulting in a roadmap for development of a circular business model.
The main challenges for a sustainable company in the current clothing industry are competing with greenwashing companies and finding sustainable alternatives for currently common practices, as the industry is a long way from becoming sustainable. Three paradoxes describe the dilemmas that Feelou faces in launching a circular business model for their bra.
Firstly, the Business model paradox shows that a sales model would be easier for Feelou and the customer. However, it would be less sustainable than a lease model, in which Feelou would keep ownership of the product. Secondly, the Perceived hygiene paradox is an important challenge for the reuse of bras: many women find pre-loved bras unappealing, however this is influenced by familiarity with the previous owner. Finally, the Circular impact paradox considers the scale versus quality of impact. Doing it perfectly mostly means doing it on a smaller scale, which affects overall impact. To grow, concessions need to be made.
The Butterfly Diagram (Ellen MacArthur Foundation, 2013) inspired the Resource flow diagram (RFD), a model that was used to explore possibilities for a circular business model. The analysis showed that Feelou should focus on the inner loops as this is where Feelou has a direct influence. The main challenge in the inner loops lies in the Perceived hygiene paradox. As a lease model creates many additional challenges, a sales model is pursued in the conceptualisation phase.
The conceptualisation phase started with a co-creation session with the target group. Many solutions were provided by the participants, noteworthy findings include: accompanying the product by a letter that describes the ideal life cycle of the bra, emphasising the value of sustainable behaviour as the reward itself and a focus on positive communication.
The RFD exploration and brainstorm provided enough material to fill in the service blueprint, providing an overview of the circular business model and its components. An interesting insight of the service blueprint is that Feelou can inspire customers to treat the bra sustainably on three different moments: during sale, during use and after use.

The business model canvas provided insight into the main challenge for the selection of the target group and value proposition: the dual focus on comfort and sustainability in the branding of Feelou. Further exploration through the brand DNA shows that this dual focus actually provides a competitive advantage. The comfort aspect focuses on the individual, while the sustainability aspect focuses on society and the planet, resulting in a branding strategy that is more resilient than comfort or sustainability alone would be.
The final deliverable, a roadmap helps to put all ideas and sides of the circular business model into perspective over time. It splits the development into the startup phase, the scale up phase and finally the ideal model. It provides a toolbox of resources that can be used to set up the circular business model and let it grow towards the next phase.

Sustainable production and consumption are becoming increasingly important to both consumers and businesses. Sustainability is defined as development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their needs. A distinction is made between social, environmental and financial sustainability, this thesis focuses on environmental sustainability in a fashion supply chain. The fashion industry has a significant impact on the environment, mostly because the textile industry relies heavily on non-renewable resources. When looking closer at the fashion supply chain, textile wet processing, which includes dyeing and printing of fabrics, contributes significantly to the environmental impact of the fashion industry by consuming and polluting significant amounts of water. Therefore, this thesis focuses on decreasing environmental impacts of textile wet processing for marlies|dekkers (MD). Fashion supply chains are highly decentralised and therefore, traceability of lacking. This leads to a lack in transparancy. Supply chain integration or supply chain alignment could overcome these challenges. The design challenge for this thesis is formulated as follows: How can a fashion company collaborate with suppliers in its supply chain to decrease the environmental impact of its textile wet processes? An analysis of the fashion industry is given, as well as a supply chain analysis and company analysis. Furthermore, suppliers and industry experts are interviewed. Finally, a collaboration strategy, that can lead to improved production processes to decrease the environmental impact of a fashion supply chain is delivered.

This thesis represents the result of a graduation project for the Master Strategic Product Design at the Delft University of Technology carried out in collaboration with citizenM. citizenM is a Netherlands based hotel chain and offers an affordable luxury lifestyle in the big cities of the world. The aim of citizenM is to become the leading transformational hotel inspiring a new generation. To achieve this ambition, citizenM needs to innovate the customer experience.  

Nowadays, we live in a world that gets more and more connected through customer innovations. Customers are transforming their behaviour from just consuming services and goods into being part of an experience. Customers prefer to feel that they belong to a company instead of being simply treated as customers. To become more customer-centric citizenM wanted to create a board of customers.  

The customer need and the citizenM ambition led to the project aim to find out if implementing a customer board for repeat customers will create a next level of engagement and a sense of belonging to the citizenM brand. The intended result is fulfilling the customer need, a sense of belonging, by a next level of engagement. The challenge that followed was to design a unique platform, a customer board, where customers can give their opinions and advice, and to demonstrate how customer feedback is shaping company decisions. 

The process consists of three phases; research, conceptualization and validation. The research phase included a literature review regarding customer co-creation, attitudinal loyalty and customer engagement. Next, an analysis of the competitors, customers, company and future trends was conducted. The research insights were the basis for the conceptualization. The presented solution, offering a sense of belonging to the guests by a next level of engagement, is called the citizen board. The citizen board is a digital co-creation platform integrated in the citizenM app called citizenship and will be an extension of the digital passport concept. 

The final design proposition, a visualisation of the app user flows, illustrates an innovative process for citizenM guests to interact with citizenM. The citizen board is focussing on creating micro moments and a feedback loop for repeat customers who are interested and willing to share their suggestions. Besides creating a next level of engagement and a sense of belonging, the customer board is also there for customers to create enjoyment & fun, a social community and a feeling of being valuable and recognized. With a personalised experience citizenM is willing to invest in becoming an even more customer-centric organization. citizenM will differentiate themselves from their competitors and with the help of the citizen board citizenM will maintain a steady loyal customer base.

During the validation phase the citizen board proposition was presented to twenty five citizenM guests and hotel ambassadors. The qualitative research method resulted in a validation moment of the design criteria. The thesis is concluded with recommendations for further developing the citizen board proposition.

This thesis report represents the result of a graduation project for the master programme Strategic Product Design at the Delft University of Technology carried out in collaboration with KLM Royal Dutch Airlines. This project aims to find out how to create the desired experience for KLM passengers during undesired disruptions. This problem has been tackled with the use of the Double Diamond approach enriched with the ViP approach. KLM Royal Dutch Airlines is the flag carrier airline of the Netherlands with the ambition to become Europe’s most customer-centric, innovative and efficient network carrier. To achieve this ambition, they have to make significant steps forward. KLM decided to do this by striving for operational excellence, creating a long term sustainable growth with products that both stimulate efficiency and provide customer intimacy. At their new department, Operation Decision Support, they embraced this by becoming more data-driven by creating tools to optimize the operation of KLM.
While the airline industry is progressively optimizing and KLM is facing strong competition, there is one area that remains relatively uncharted. What happens to the passengers when disruptions occur? There are many types of disruptions, varying from individual level to operational level. Unexpected mass disruptions, often caused by bad weather, are challenging to solve and result in disastrous customer experience results. During these unexpected disruptions, the Net Promoter Score, which measures the passengers’ satisfaction and thus the loyalty for the firm drops drastically. To increase passenger satisfaction, KLM should improve their service recovery when operational disruptions occur. This can be done by giving the passenger their ‘perceived justice’ which depends on the offer they get, the procedure and the interaction. Pinpointing the needs of the passenger is unfortunately very difficult since every passenger is different: they have different mindsets and travel for different occasions. With the use of a qualitative research method; adaptive storytelling, the passenger needs are found and translated to the perceived justice framework. The presented solution offering the perceived justice to the passenger is called ’Emma’, an automated, digital, ground attendant integrated into the KLM application. She enables passengers to solve their disrupted journey by pro-actively sharing information, offering solutions and giving recommendations. This application is equipped with cognitive abilities; natural language processing, machine learning and intelligent automation to create a personal and tailor-made experience via a mobile device. The application ‘Emma’ shows the potential to increase the NPS score and therefore, the passengers’ satisfaction during operational disruptions. ‘Emma’ includes many features that enable the passenger to be in control, gives them the feeling of being taken care of and shows the responsibility of KLM by giving detailed and transparent information, giving personalised rebooking options and showing tips to spend their waiting time better. Creating an application requires the involvement and resources of third parties. This takes time, and therefore, the implementation plan is separated in two years. The first year is focussed on aligning the different teams within KLM and building the features with the available internal resources. The second year, the application will be extended and further optimised with the use of third-party resources. This will enable KLM to launch a service that will be relevant in the future and give the passengers a satisfying service recovery during unexpected operational disruptions.

This thesis studies the strategic motivations for large firms to engage in partnerships with young ventures, and aims to design a service model for an intermediary that puts the needs of the large firm at the core. This project was commissioned by, and executed in collaboration with Venture IQ, an innovation scouting company founded in August 2015. Venture IQ develops a software platform (named Catalist) to collect data on companies and share the results of their search efforts with their corporate clients. For every search project Venture IQ carries out the same approach, that spans three phases: Kick-off, Search, and Deep Dive. This approach does not embed client needs or provide structure to its team of analysts. 

With the goal of this assignment to redesign Venture IQ’s service model with a focus on client needs, the assignment was formulated as follows:

To develop a service proposition for an open innovation intermediary to aid large firms in the early stages of their search for strategic partnerships with young ventures.

Through phase of discovery including review of literature, explorative interviews with industry experts, analysis of the context and Venture IQ itself, two main research questions are formulated.

1. How can Venture IQ’s service model be designed to better serve individual projects?
2. What role can Catalist fulfill in the future of Venture IQ’s services?

The discovery phase provided insights into a variety of strategic motives that large firms have for searching for an innovation partner. To better understand the differences between individual projects and find answers to the research questions a conceptual typology of three search project types is constructed:

Market search projects - The large firm intends to gain access to new or adjacent markets to leverage their current technologies, products or services
Technology search projects - The large firm intends to gain access to novel technologies that can increase value of the firm’s current market
Explorative search projects - The large firm intends to gain access to, or knowledge about unfamiliar markets and the technologies, products or services that are shaping them

The research questions and the conceptual typology form the foundation for the next phase of in-depth research, during which nine search projects carried out by Venture IQ are investigated through case studies. The data for the case studies was collected through observations of client meetings and discussions, and analysis of correspondence and presentation documents. The nine case study projects were augmented with a survey among the analysts working on those projects to document their experiences.  Follow-up interviews were held with analysts to clarify responses where needed. 

In addition to the goal of obtaining insights into Venture IQ’s process and client needs, the case studies form a method to learn about how the software platform is currently being used and how it can add more value to the search process. As a result from the case studies three platform user types were defined: Analysts: Venture IQ analysts that execute searches provide clients with results, Client lead users: people at the client firm who lead search projects and have experience in the field of corporate venture capital, and Project-based users: employees at client firms that are involved in specific searches because of their expertise in the field. 

The insights derived from the qualitative data are summarized into five clusters, that each form opportunities for design. The design opportunities are collected in the design brief that states the vision for the future of  the software platform:

The vision is for Catalist to become the go-to platform for initiating and organizing corporate venture capital searches, and accelerate these with Venture IQ’s data-driven services.

The insight clusters are formulated into design challenges that, together with the design vision, parameters and requirements form the design brief, the foundation for the ideation phase. 

Three concepts were composed from ideas that arose during team brainstorms. After detailing these concepts were tested along the requirements stated in the design brief and one concept was selected.  The selected concept describes a procedure where clients can initiate new search projects within Catalist whenever they desire to do so. This intake procedure consists of a series of questions that cover all the information that analysts need to start a search. Additionally, project information is captured in a format that allows collaborators (client lead users, project-based users and analysts) to review the project characteristics at all times and make alterations when necessary. 

Two iterations of prototype testing with clients have  illustrated the value of a structured intake procedure. Despite the low fidelity of the prototypes valuable information was uncovered by asking for specific types of project attributes and motivations. Test users, who were client lead users, acknowledged the value of the procedure. Not only to improve the effectiveness of the search process but also to individually assess the underlying reasons for a new project. 

A challenge for the future arose during the prototype tests of the intake questions, as some questions and definitions can still be misinterpreted. It is therefor recommended that the intake procedure is thoroughly tested to smoothen out the ambiguity that some elements might cause. 

The most important design features are two elements that are strongly connected: a new experience for the client to start their search for a strategic partner, and a service model that is a guide for the intermediary performing the appropriate search actions. 

The final design illustrates an innovative process for client users to interact with each other and with analysts, via Catalist. Aside from the intake procedure, a series of features is designed to make Catalist a central place to collaboratively search for potential partners and share ideas about future projects. 

Although Catalist must undergo changes before the final design is realized, the new service model can be put into operation immediately. A simple online survey or intake document can be sent to clients that want to start a new project. From this intake survey analysts can select the appropriate actions and start the search process.