Think Design – Designing a path to success
Think Design, a young design startup, has been founded by three ex-NID students who saw the need for proper industrial design, UI design and mobile app design standards in the Indian market. The young company already has major clients like Microsoft, Whirlpool and Godrej under its belt, along with international clients from around the world.
India might have a long and storied tradition of design which blends form and function, but actual industrial design of most Indian products comes from other countries. The auto-rickshaw, for example, might be the most iconic symbol of modern India, but it was actually designed in Italy!
As the notions behind design change and the creativity of Indian designers is not defined by our 5,000 years of history but rather by practical considerations like whether a design will sell, whether it will be affordable to make and whether it will be acceptable globally, more and more Indian design firms are coming up. And at the forefront is the startup Think Design (found at www.thinkdesign.in/).
The company has in its short history set down roots in Delhi and Hyderabad, and found collaborators around the globe, which has led to its netting well known clients like Microsoft, GMR, Godrej and Whirlpool.
The company offers research solutions, innovation consulting, industrial design and user experience design for web and desktop applications along with mobile and handheld applications. In the words of one of the company’s founders, Deepali Saini, “We work across a broad spectrum of industries, including appliances, telecommunications, automobiles, education, retail, software products, enterprise and web application, mobile interfaces and embedded applications.”
Think Design was formed by a team of three ex-NID designers. The team is small and often works with clients online, allowing foreign clients from Japan, the US, the UK and Australia to work with Think Design. The entire communication as well as deliverables are delivered via the Internet. This includes emails for initial proposals, web conferences for briefings and feedbacks, and data upload to deliver design solutions.
Co-founder Hari Krishnan Nallan C said, “The nascent availability of technical solutions is the key barrier to design innovation. Creating proactive IP cells to protect copyrights, and collaborative and innovative projects between developers and designers is the key to overcoming this problem.”
Advertising in social sites was unheard of till recently, and another new development is in the field of contextual design – a small change in a feature can make a user prefer one design over the other, and this is related to their socio-cultural environment, which Think Design says it can help companies plan for.
Saini added, “At Think Design, we constantly work towards evolving into a highly respected design entity. Each of our personnel is rigorously trained to deliver the best in the given circumstances. We claim to be at the helm of product development, and each person working here is put there and asked to drive the process.”
