While planning for the year ahead, sometimes it’s a good idea to look back. Now that we’re well into 2017 (it’s already mid-February?), the Navigate the Future team looked back at our best-of-the-best from 2016. If you’re new to our blog and want a quick introduction to some of the topics we care about the most, this is a great place to start.
In 2017, you’ll see plenty more about topics like delivering excellent customer experiences, the Internet of Things, Digital Manufacturing, Additive Manufacturing, Driver-less Cars, the Experience Economy, and more. So stay tuned!
The Future of Mobility: A Revolution in the Making
Chris Force, our contributor focused on the intersection of design and culture, highlights some organizations that are making tangible progress into the future of transportation. Self-driving cars is the vision, but plenty of new technology and industry partnerships will be needed to pave the way first.
10 Strategies Manufacturers Can Use for Delivering and Excellent Customer Experience, Part 1 & Part 2
This excellent write-up on “Industry 4.0” from Louis Columbus was too good to be confined to a single article. As Louis eloquently puts it: “Customers’ experiences and their active voice in product development are the much-needed oxygen manufacturers need to fuel new product generations and stay relevant.”
Digital Manufacturing in the Industrial Internet of Things
The prolific Dave Turbide has industrial expertise to spare, and drills into the need for manufacturers to fully digitize their design, production, and product lifecycle strategies. Dave notes how new technologies – like the sensors that power the Internet of Things, as well as augmented reality – are playing a role in the manufacturing renaissance.
Is 3D Printing the Future of Manufacturing?
In this article, Dave Turbide focuses on the role that 3D printing, or additive manufacturing as it’s more formally known, will play in the massive production scale that most manufacturers require. While 3D printing is still seen as the domain of hobbyists, Dave notes the technology’s vital role in prototyping, and highlights how large companies are making major investments in production-level 3D printing equipment, which suggests the role of 3D printing is still on a growth trajectory despite some current technical limitations.
Customer Experiences Can Be Designed, Too
We spent a lot of time talking about designing with the user experience in mind, and B2B marketing guru Paul Gillin shared several examples of how customer-facing service providers are changing the way they interact with their customers. From banks being redesigned as coffee shops, to push-button pizza orders with Dominos, the overall customer experience has become just as important to any brand as the products they produce.
