Design:
- Design research that is truly representative is made difficult by the fact that much of human behavior remains hidden, even in deep research projects.
- Apple is notorious for their painstaking design process that sweats the details-now they're making anyone who wants to sell in their stores follow specific guidelines.
- Desktop fabrication tools are branching out to more obscure manufacturing methods as low cost CNC and 3D printers become fairly saturated markets. The latest: Hydrographic Printing.
Making Technology Work for Us:
- People are modifying the one-button-ordering Amazon Dash for other tasksaround the home.
- A bit one of our founders wrote about having higher standards for the devices we use.
Building things:
- Warren Buffet's Berkshire Hathaway spends a big $32 billion to acquire... a manufacturer. Those familiar with the (real) state of U.S. manufacturing are probably less surprised than most- while the business of widget building employs fewer people domestically than before, the value creation is still significant and many segments are growing at a healthy pace.
- A rare non-bullshit article about 3D printing. Worth the time if you want to get a look at the real world complications and opportunities in the current state of additive manufacturing- particularly interesting to think about when you consider the Berkshire / Precision Castparts deal. Solving the boring, hard problems of precision fabrication through 3D printing (particularly for metal parts) will make some people very rich, we just don't know who they will be yet.
- Foxconn, one of the few contract manufacturers with a household name, continues to make big moves to expand it's operations outside of China, this time in India. As wages in China keep climbing, more companies are looking to India as alternative, especially for less complex products.
More next week.