Student innovation competition tackles the challenges of ageing

Budding designers in Mechanical Engineering pitch their ideas to Dragon's Den style judging panel. - <em>News</em>

Monday 14 December 2009
By John-Paul Jones

A competition to help Imperial engineering students stretch their entrepreneurial muscles concluded with a Dragon’s Den style competition at the end of last week.

Students opting for the Design, Art and Creativity module of the Mechanical Engineering degree course were challenged to develop designs to assist the elderly with buying, preparing and eating food in a brief from the Disabled Living Foundation. They considered a range of food-related problems the elderly might face from finding and transporting shopping to lifting heavy cooking implements.

Working in teams, with the support of mentors from innovation and design consultancy PDD, students spent 10 weeks researching and developing their ideas before pitching them to a panel of design professionals to choose the best design.

The challenge was won by a team which developed the ‘Egg’ concept, a cooking pot designed to help the elderly in the kitchen. The pot’s shape is inspired by an egg, with a curved base to make it easier to tip and drain water as well as an adjustable handle, making it easier to lift. The team’s members were Kiat Goh, Terence Leong and Lok Mak. Lok said “I was very glad that we could present our idea in front of professional engineers and designers and it didn't feel like I was presenting a student project at all. It was quite daunting but I was very happy that we received some very positive feedback from the judges.”

The judges also highly commended another team for their “Twist-A-Lid” design. Vassil Botev, William Hunt, Omar Mustufvi and Douglas Weber-Steinhaus developed a low cost ratchet devise to help twist off bottle tops. Omar said: “From this experience, I’ve learnt how the product designing process runs in the real world and overall the exercise has been very enjoyable.”

Now in its third year, the Innovation Challenge is designed to help students discover how their knowledge can translate into practical applications. The Challenge was developed by Annick Collins, the Design, Art and Creativity course leader. She said: “This course has taken our students out of their comfort zone to work with industry partners and clients. The insight they have gained into their own learning and practice has been worth all the incredible hard work that everyone has brought to the challenge.”

Explaining the choice of brief Ms Collins added: “The Innovation Challenge focuses on contemporary global and social issues. We were mindful that we do have an ageing population and there are challenges around maintaining an appropriate quality of life and dignity in later life that we wanted the students to consider.”

Congratulating the winners Dave Clark, Head of IT, Data Services and Helpline at the Disabled Living Foundation, said: “It was a really high quality of entries. I was impressed by the way the students put a focus on the needs of the product’s future users. It’s really positive to see how the students went about working with the DLF to fully research their brief.”

He was joined on the bench by colleagues including Simon Colbeck, Head of Technology at Marks and Spencer’s Home and Menswear Division, Barry Lillis, Senior Consultant at PDD and Rama Gheerawo, Innovation Manager at the Royal College of Art, Helen Hamlyn Centre.

-ends-