Delight – India’s new connected e-toilets
by Shagun Singh
Public toilets have always been a big problem in India. New and innovative solutions are created everyday to solve this problem. The latest in the row of toilet innovation is the E-Toilet by a company called Eram Scientific Solutions which is a part of the Eram Group, a technology research and development company. The company [...]
Designing Education Systems : Butterfly Fields
by Shagun Singh
The Indian education system is not particularly known for its hands on learning methods. The education culture still lauds rote learning and book based learning methods. One social enterprise is thinking about learning methods a bit differently. Hyderabad based Butterfly Fields recently won the case study competition themed “Democratizing Innovation: A Game Changer for Inclusive [...]
Mobile Innovation in India
by Shagun Singh
There are close to 850 million mobile subscribers in India. Mobile penetration in India is increasing every day but that does not come as a surprise. In the past we have looked into successes like Just Dial geared towards the urban Indian and innovations like MKrishi geared towards India’s rural population.
The Design Clinic Scheme – A platform to connect designers and small scale industries in India
by Shagun Singh
I recently stumbled on an initiative called the ‘Design Clinic Scheme’ while doing research on the internet for an entirely different project. The government of India is spending close to Rs 73.58 crores to create design intervention and bring design awareness to the enterprises in the country that need it the most. The initiative that was [...]
CKS – 34 ways to save a life
by Ria Rajan
This post is long overdue. Ive been caught up with the madness that trails behind deadlines, mundane activities like getting my driving license, visas etc. In the midst of all this thankfully, I managed to have a chat with Aditya Dev Sood, Founder and CEO of the Center for Knowledge Societies (CKS). CKS is an [...]
Rethinking indian agriculture using mobile technology
by Shagun Singh
My parents live in a farm house in a town called Ambala in Haryana, India. When I visit them, I go on early morning walks with them, walking through the surrounding farms, villages, temples and gurudwaras. Along the way we run across farmers starting off their day, walking to their farms in dejection. During my [...]
INDIA Future of Change : Panel discussion on Design, Innovation and Entrepreneurship
by Shagun Singh
A Luncheon Panel Discussion on Design, Innovation and Entrepreneurship : Change Drivers for India’s Inclusive Growth was held in Davos, Switzerland by ‘India Future of Change‘ on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum’s Annual Meeting 2011. The panel that featured experts from the field of innovation and design discussed how the synergy between design [...]
Design!publiC conclave – design thinking and governance innovation
by Shagun Singh
As design minds in the US try to figure out whether effective problem solving can still be called design-thinking or needs to be replaced by another buzz word called creative intelligence (refer to Bruce Nussbaums recent article on the subject, and Robert Fabricant’s take on creative intelligence) a conclave in India tries to figure out [...]
Unbox Festival
by Ria Rajan
India seems to be on the brink of exciting new things especially in the realm of art and design. As a young creative practitioner, its inspiring and encouraging for me to see examples of the new work that is emerging from the country.The UnBox festival was once such platform that brought together 200 practitioners, academics, [...]
Gaon Ki Awaaz – bringing hyperlocal news to rural India
by Shagun Singh
A big percentage of indian village population is illiterate. Traditional mode of transmitting news like newspapers are not effective for that demographic. Television as a medium to disseminate news are not effective in villages either because of unreliable electricity as well as the cost behind purchasing a TV unit. Transistor radios have been a cheap [...]
The Dream:IN Project
by Shagun Singh
The practice of design research and design innovation has picked up in the past decade. Design thinking is not the forte of design related businesses alone but is being extensively used to rethink businesses that have nothing to do with design. The idea of thinking outside the box, looking at things upside down and gaining [...]
Digital Green – bettering farmers’ livelihoods via technology
by Ria Rajan
Image – Digital Green website Rikin Gandhi made it to Technology Review’s Young Innovators list 2010. And rightly so – his NGO – Digital Green aims at educating farmers of developing countries using innovative, simple technologies. The seed of Digital Green was sown while Rikin was working at Microsoft Research Labs, India, a few years ago. At Microsoft, the [...]
PROTOVILLAGE – Adequate Village Cluster
by Ria Rajan
A Prototype, by definition, is a typical example of something. That is exactly what PROTOVILLAGE aims to be. An initiative of InteGreater and brainchild of Kalyan Akkipeddi, who, in a trend that is fast becoming popular with those who are opting to BE the change they want, quit his corporate job and went travelling across [...]
Low-cost self-diagnosis tool for rural India
by Ria Rajan
Primary health centers are the cornerstone of the rural health care system. In 1991, India had about 22,400 primary health centers, 11,200 hospitals, and 27,400 clinics. These facilities are part of a tiered health care system that funnels more difficult cases into urban hospitals while attempting to provide routine medical care to the vast majority [...]
“A Grand Idea – Inhabit” Competition Brief
by Shagun Singh
What is this competition about? This competition is focused on design solutions that can change our immediate urban environment into places that we can truly inhabit. The first series of ‘The Grand Idea Initiative’ is called ‘INHABIT‘. The ultimate challenge of which is to create solutions that introduce fun, sustainable, and innovative ways people use [...]
The Indovators – Part 1 | Lina Srivastava
by Shagun Singh
Lina Srivastava is the Principal of Lina Srivastava Consulting, LLC, which focuses on employing strategy, innovation, engagement and the use of cultural assets to create and demonstrate social change. For our new feature ‘The Indovators’, Lina talks about opportunities for indian designers in the fields of service design, information design, systems design, climate change and [...]
