The sci-fi-looking Audi e-bike Wörthersee uses technology developed by the German car manufacturer to allow the lightweight e-bike to reach 50km/h. There are several modes ranging from conventional cycling to complete electric motor but that's not all - owners can do wheelies too! There are three wheelie modes, one of them is the “Balancing Wheelie” which employs Segway technology to allow amateurs a chance at gaining street cred. No word on price, but we assume this e-bike might be able to convince wealthy types to convert. For a comprehensive gallery check out Asphalt and Rubber. 

Harvard Business School is reinventing itself, again. HBS is developing a new breed of MBA graduates, who during their first year will experience the new FIELD (Field Immersion Experiences for Leadership Development) curriculum. The big idea is to help students grow through leadership, global immersion projects and entrepreneurship. With students working in collaborative workspaces and seed money to start enterprises, HBS hopes that more tech start-ups will emerge, keeping young entrepreneurs on the east coast. 

Having experience in designing medical equipment, we know that the next innovative idea often comes from unexpected places. Wired.co.uk has a great article highlighting Six amazing examples of medical 'reverse innovation'. Reverse innovation means innovation that is adopted in the developing world and trickles up to the developed world. Reverse innovation does not just apply to medical equipment, there is a whole array of services and products that could become the worldwide norm. Above image is Winsega, a handheld pre-natal scanner developed by second year students at Makerere University College. 

This has got to be one of the coolest ‘make a better hammer’ designs yet. Neo is a simple hammer that has a magnet at its base for keeping your nails attached. Excellent for when you're up a ladder.

Fast Company has an excellent article online: Dieter Rams On Good Design As A Key Business Advantage. The article is a transcript of Rams’ 1976 New York speech. The key take-aways of the speech are: emphasis on functionality, understanding the objectives of the company and designing for people. He also talks about order and proportion. Rams' work is indeed timeless, as is evident in the 606 Universal Shelving System for Vitsoe, which is still being produced 52 years after he designed it. Even though the speech was delivered 36 years ago, Rams warned of consumerism and its effect on natural resources, he states: “The times of thoughtless design, which can only flourish in times of thoughtless production for thoughtless consumption, are over. We cannot afford any more thoughtlessness.” 

If you have a startup, and are considering using design, have a look at Startups, this is how design works. The guide for non-designers was made by Wells Riley, a  graphic, UX and interactive designer living in San Francisco. The site uses a lot of Dieter Rams’ Ten Principles of Good Design philosophy. The underlying message is that successful companies need business people, engineers and designers. While the site is aimed primarily at web startups, the information can apply to all types of businesses.

Think Quarterly’s current issue is all about creativity. One of the articles focuses on Sir Ken Robinson, famous for his views on revolutionizing education. In the article Robinson discusses the importance of creativity in today's world with references to his book Out of our Minds. The article is very insightful and if you think your organization or even your personal life could use more creativity, buy the book. 

Last week, Tasos delivered a full day workshop for IoDSA, an NPO aimed at improving governance in the public and private sectors of South Africa. The course, “Innovation for Directors” is designed to help executives understand the importance of innovation in developing their businesses. From the IoDSA site: Innovation has emerged as the number one imperative for businesses around the world and South Africa is no exception. Globalization has brought both increased competition, and also the knock on effects of dramatic global events into the South African business landscape. Businesses need new approaches to efficiency, growth and competitiveness and these new approaches are clustered into the term “innovation”. This entertaining and practical day-long session unpacks the concepts behind the most effective innovation strategies and practices used by the world’s most successful organizations to create new products, services, processes and experiences.”  Bookings are currently open for the same course on 11th of June.

Massoud Hassani is a young designer whose was born in Afghanistan, a country, like many others that is still filled with landmines that continue to kill and injure civilians. He left his home country as a teenager to study at the Design Academy in Eindhoven, where he developed a low cost landmine clearance device. Mine Kafon is quite beautiful and could easily be mistaken for a sculpture, the design consists of bamboo sticks which have a foot at one end and are connected to a hub in the center. The design is lightweight and moves when the wind blows. When one of the feet triggers a mine, the location is captured via GPS. While the design does not completely solve all the challenges facing mine clearance, it does present a viable approach to saving peoples lives. We recommend Hassani speaks to Theo Jansen for advice on wind power. 

USB drives are still an essential part of most peoples computing equipment, while the cost of these useful drives plummets, there has been many redesigns of this common design. We like this safety pin idea from Artemy Lebedev Studio. The Bulavkus USB flash drive looks pretty neat and the concept sketches are great, whether or not this design will ever be made is questionable, but it could be a cool Kickstarter project.

Design that Matters, a non-profit design company, started by graduate students at the MIT Media Lab in 2001, is the winner of the Corporate and Institutional Achievement category in this years Cooper-Hewitt National Design Awards. Design that Matters “has built a collaborative design process through which hundreds of volunteers in academia and industry donate their skills and expertise to the creation of breakthrough products for communities in need. Our goal is to deliver a better quality of service, and a better quality of life, to millions of beneficiaries through products designed for our clients.” One of their designs that uses the concept of appropriate technology is the NeoNuture, a low cost incubator made from car parts. The design is ingenious because it allows regular car mechanics to repair and maintain the product. 

What It Takes To Innovate Wrong-Thinking, Tinkering & Intuiting is a great article that explores what it takes to be a great innovator. 99% has identified the following core traits of serial inventors,  which can also apply to entrepreneurs or designers. The traits are:

1. Produce and test more ideas.
2. Employ "wrong-thinking."
3. Embrace failure.
4. Sketch out their ideas.
5. Trust their intuition.
6. Love tinkering.
7. Possess a boundless curiosity.

While most of these traits are what typical designers do everyday, “wrong-thinking” is essential for any designer to embrace. James Dyson  believes in it and Kathryn Schulz believes that it is crucial in challenging the status quo. 

We mentioned Pebble when they had raised over $3 million through Kickstarter, but with 16 days left to go, they have almost $8 million pledged. Eric Migicovsky, the force behind the e-ink Bluetooth enabled watch, is part of the Kickstarter Revolution, which is transforming the design industry. Migicovsky gives advice over at Fast Company. The three tips he shares are: watch what people love, highlight the uses not the features and make friends. Worth taking to heart if you have an idea that needs funding. 

While Facebook is becoming a design driven company, Google is also being creative, this time with Google Campus, a converted building in London that the search giant hopes will attract start-ups. The creative space is a 7 story building in Silicon Roundabout and has a loft/recycled feel to it. Interior designers Jump Studio used a combination of fruit crates and up-cycled shipping containers to create a hot desk workspace with event spaces and meeting rooms. 

Ikea is exploring opportunties beyond inexpensive flatpack furniture. Uppleva is a 40 inch TV with Blu-Ray player that comes in a variety of sizes and has the added Ikea-ness of having a customizable cabinet that houses everything. The simple interface design and customizable furniture could change the way you buy your next TV. 

Tim Brown, IDEO CEO and President has written an interesting article for the spring edition of Rotman Magazine tilted From Blueprint to Genetic Code: The Merits of an Evolutionary Approach to Design. Brown argues that design has to evolve to keep up with the world and be more Darwinian and less Newtonian. Sounds to us like he's mixing his scientific metaphors but read the article and see what you think. 

Look; everyone in Copenhagen rides bicycles so it's no wonder that a couple of Danish designers have developed really cool looking bike head and tail lights. The big idea is that the lights are magnetic, so you just click them onto the metal frame. The lights switch on when they're stuck onto the bike and they switch off when removed. Sadly there are no images of the lights at the manufacturer's site, Copenhagen Parts, but you can see them at David Report. 

If you haven’t entered this year's Core77 Design Awards yet, you can still do it today. The extended deadline means all you have to do is register and start the process. Based on the quality an innovation from last years competitions we are expecting great entries this year. 

The PowerPot is one of those designs that could be useful to people who have irregular access to electricity. The pot is a thermoelectric power generator, transforming the heat from cooking into electricity, so you can charge small electronic devices such as phones or hook it up to LEDs while boiling water. The PowerPot currently has over 150% funding on Kickstarter. Supporters can preorder the product for $125, donate one to Africa for $99 or both for $199. In our experience, that's a pretty expensive pot/light/power socket thingie and we can't help wonder if this is the best way to get the job done. Nonetheless it's a novel idea and we applaud the option to donate so we wish the team the best of luck with the project. 

The lead story in this month’s Harvard Business Review is Managing Your Innovation Portfolio, written by Bansi Nagji and Geoff Tuff of our favourite consultant group - Doblin. The article explores Doblin’s Total Innovation model - a useful tool for executives to plan long and short term goals by developing core, adjacent and transformational innovation.