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| Speakers & moderators
(listed alphabetically) |
|
| Ann,
Elaine |
- Kaizor
Innovation |
| Böninger,
Christoph |
- designafairs
GmbH |
| Cicala,
Bob |
- Dura
Automotive Systems Inc. |
| Claxton,
Bruce |
- Motorola
Inc. |
| Grace,
Robert |
- Plastics
News |
| Jager,
Gregory |
- Dura
Automotive Systems Inc. |
| Kwon,
EunSook |
- University
of Houston |
| Nightingale,
Gary |
- Global
Diligence (HK) Ltd. |
| Roderman,
Brian |
- PDS
Development |
| Sawhney,
Ravi |
- RKS
Design |
| Wenning,
Bob |
- TBM
Consulting Group Inc. |
|
| Speaker biographies
(listed alphabetically) |
Elaine Ann
Founder/Director
Kaizor Innovation
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Ann |
Elaine Ann started Kaizor Innovation, a Hong Kong-based strategic
innovation consulting company in 2002. Kaizor helps foreign firms
conduct design/user research and develop appropriate innovation strategies
for the emerging China market.
Born and raised in Hong Kong and having lived in the United States
for 12 years, her bi-cultural and bilingual background helps clients
obtain insights and bridge behavioral, cultural, social and political
differences between markets. She is well versed and can write in both
Chinese (PuTongHua and Cantonese) and English. Ann brings to Asia
processes of new product innovation and user-centered design methodologies.
Prior to moving back to Hong Kong, she lived in the United States
from 1990-2002. While in the U.S., she worked at Razorfish and at
Henry Dreyfuss Associates in New York, and as a director in the Fitch
Interaction group in San Francisco. Her past clients include Hewlett-Packard,
Philips, Kodak, Federal Reserve, AT&T, Intuit, Nissan and Fujitsu.
Ann has a U.S.-patent-pending design for the Ford F150 Vehicle Storage
System and is published in the book "Creating Breakthrough Products,
Innovation from Product Planning to Program Approval." She graduated
from Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, where she earned her
master's degree in interaction design and a bachelor of fine arts
degree in visual communications design.
Ann also is a visiting lecturer at the School of Design at the Hong
Kong Polytechnic University. She has presented extensively about designing
for China, including at: the First Joint U.S.-China Industrial Designers
Society of America conference in Beijing in 2002; IDSA's 2003 national
educational conference in New York; Industrial Designers Society of
Hong Kong seminars; Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts in China; and the
Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, British Columbia.
Christoph Böninger
President
designafairs GmbH
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Böninger |
After studying industrial design in Munich, Germany, and Pasadena,
Calif., Christoph Böninger began his career in Munich in 1983
with Schlagheck & Shultes Design, before becoming industrial design
manager four years later for Siemens Corp. in the New York. In 1990
he returned to Germany to assume the design director’s post
for parent company Siemens AG, overseeing capital-goods design. In
1997 he was promoted to executive vice president of newly created
Siemens Design Inc. In 2000, Siemens repositioned that unit as designafairs
GmbH and named Böninger as its president. While still part of
the German parent, designafairs operates as an independent firm and
is free to work any clients.
The 100-person, Munich-based shop claims now to be Europe’s
largest creative agency. It also boasts studios in Seattle and California’s
Silicon Valley, as well as in Erlangen, Germany, and Shanghai, China.
Last fall designafairs opened a 4,000-square-foot, public color and
materials lab in Munich in conjunction with several partners, including
GE Plastics, 3M Co., and European firms that produce lacquers, liquid
crystal polymers and in-mold decorating technologies. The lab aims
to boost collaboration between designers and manufacturers in the
areas of new materials, colors and processes while helping customers
scale up such projects for mass production.
Bob Cicala
Engineering Director – N.A. Body & Glass Division
Dura Automotive Systems Inc
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Cicala |
Bob Cicala is director of engineering for North American Body &
Glass, a business unit of Dura Automotive Systems in Rochester Hills,
Mich. Cicala joined Dura Automotive in 1997 through its acquisition
of Excel Industries. At the time, he was an engineering manager working
with encapsulated glass products. He was named to his current position
in 2001 and now is responsible for the design, engineering and implementation
of door system components and other body-related products to the automotive
industry.
Cicala received his bachelor of science degree in mechanical engineering
from Lawrence Technological University in 1985. Following graduation
he spent five years working for General Motors Corp. with responsibilities
for the engineering of exterior trim components. Prior to joining
Excel Industries, he and partners formed a Michigan-based company
that focused on extruded products for automotive applications.
Bruce Claxton
Senior Design Director
Motorola Inc.
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Claxton |
Based in Plantation, Fla., Bruce Claxton has more than 27 years of
industrial design experience, including more than two decades with
Motorola. He also currently serves as elected president of the 3,300-member,
Dulles, Va.-based Industrial Designers Society of America. At Motorola,
Claxton directs a team – including an office in Penang, Malaysia
– that has developed various communication devices, among them
the award-winning Talkabout two-way radios.
A graduate of the Cleveland Institute of Art and an alumni of the
Creative Problem Solving Institute at SUNY University in Buffalo,
N.Y., Claxton recently earned his master's degree in design at Georgia
Tech University. In 1998 he participated in a four-person United Nations
delegation that briefed senior Chinese government leaders about industrial
design, and he has been active with design schools in Mexico.
Robert Grace
Editor & Associate Publisher
Plastics News
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Grace |
Robert Grace has been editor of Plastics News since its launch
in March 1989. He graduated with a bachelor's degree in journalism
from Ohio University in 1979 and began his career with Crain Communications
Inc. in Akron, Ohio, in 1980 as an associate editor on Rubber &
Plastics News. The following year, Crain posted him to London,
where he directed the editorial relaunch of the monthly European
Rubber Journal and helped start Urethanes Technology magazine.
He returned to Akron in fall 1988 to help launch Plastics News.
He was named associate publisher in October 1999 and conference director
in July 2000.
Gregory Jager
Sales Director – N.A. Body & Glass Division
Dura Automotive Systems Inc.
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Jager |
Greg Jager has been director of sales for Dura Automotive's North
American Body & Glass business unit since December 2001. He previously
was director of operations for Dura's body components group, where
Dura developed the RackLift window regulator from a concept created
by inventor Dr. Paul Fenelon.
During the late 1970s Jager attended Oakland Community College in
Oakland, Mich., and Detroit College of Business while serving a four-year
designer apprenticeship. His career has taken him through positions
in design, engineering, operations and sales at companies such as
Firestone's industrial products division, Ford Motor Co.'s glass division,
and Dura Automotive (formerly Excel Industries Inc.).
While working at Ford's glass division, Jager was instrumental in
developing reaction injection molding techniques for glass encapsulation.
After leaving Ford, he led the introduction of RIM-encapsulated glass
to Mazda for its CT20 program and was engineering manager for customers
in Excel's non-North American Operations. He later was promoted to
director of sales for Excel Industries and plant manager for the firm's
Fulton, Ky., PVC encapsulation facility.
After Dura acquired Elkhart, Ind.-based Excel in 1999, he served as
operations director for Dura's body components group, before returning
to the sales director's post. He currently works out of Dura's corporate
office in Rochester Hills, Mich.
EunSook Kwon
Associate Professor – Industrial Design
University of Houston
EunSook Kwon in August 2003 moved to Texas from Seoul, South Korea,
to serve as an associate professor in the fledgling industrial design
program within the University of Houston’s College of Architecture.
For the previous 13 years, she had taught design in Seoul, at the
Korea Advanced Institute of Science & Technology, while also consulting
for some of Korea’s leading industrial companies, including
LG and Samsung.
Still, Kwon is no stranger to the United States, having earned her
master of arts degree at Ohio State University in 1990. She currently
is a Ph.D. candidate at OSU. She earlier earned a pair of industrial
design degrees from Seoul National University – a bachelor of
fine arts degree in 1984 and a master’s degree two years later.
Among many activities, she has published several papers, lectured
in Korea, Singapore, Malaysia, Japan and Germany, and served as a
juror for design award competitions in Singapore and the United States.
She also has been busy with various key design events. Last year she
was part of the program committee for the 6th Asian Pacific Design
Conference, in Tsukuba, Japan, and worked as a member of the international
advisory committee for the Association of International Color’s
2003 midterm meeting in Bangkok, Thailand. Kwon also was a member
of the organizing committee for the 2001 congress of the International
Council of Societies of Industrial Design (ICSID) that took place
in Seoul.
Gary Nightingale
Managing Partner/Projects Manager
Global Diligence Ltd. (HK)
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Nightingale |
Gary Nightingale splits his time mostly between Texas and China, where
he keeps an apartment in Shenzhen. The mechanical engineering graduate
from Texas A&M University, who is fluent in Mandarin Chinese and
also has a marketing MBA, began his career with several jobs in the
Lone Star state. Between 1994 and 2000, he worked for Motorola Inc.
in Fort Worth, served as a design engineer for Plano-based design
consultant Ignition Inc., was sales and marketing director for thermal-management
company Thermotek Inc. in Carrollton, and a strategic account manager
for Dallas-based telecom enclosure maker Chatham Technologies Inc.
After Singapore-based contract manufacturer Flextronics International
acquired Chatham, Nightingale in September 2000 moved to China. He
served Flextronics as a global program manager there, overseeing all
telecom infrastructure projects in China for customers such as Ericsson,
Nokia, Motorola, Lucent and Huawei, while also implementing plant
layout based on lean principles.
After Flextronics downsized in China, Nightingale and his former supervisor,
Larry Hotaling, in October 2002 formed Global Diligence Ltd. (HK)
in Hong Kong. The firm acts as a bridge between small to medium-sized
U.S. manufacturers and the supply base in Asia, offering such services
as program management, manufacturing outsourcing, corporate due diligence
and strategic consulting.
Nightingale concurrently serves as manager of global sourcing and
international business development for Ignition, As such, he manages
outsourcing projects to help Ignition find qualified Asian tooling
and manufacturing partners to make its U.S.-designed products. He
also is helping the design firm to open an office this year in Asia.
Brian Roderman
Vice President – Design
PDS Development
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Roderman |
Brian Roderman in January joined PDS Development in Dallas as vice
president of design. PDS, which also has an office in Houston, is
a product development firm that provides design, engineering and production
services to clients in involved in consumer products, housewares,
transportation, telecommunications, toys and business-to-business
industries. Roderman oversees the design strategies for the organization,
along with the operations management for the Dallas office.
Previously, he was business development manager at Ignition Inc.,
a product design firm based in Plano, Texas. Roderman has a bachelor
of fine arts degree in industrial design from the University of Kansas.
He is active with the Industrial Designers Society of America, having
held the posts of Southern District vice president and Texas chapter
chair. He currently serves on IDSA's national board of directors as
the chapter vice president.
Ravi Sawhney
President & CEO
RKS Design
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Sawhney |
Ravi K. Sawhney is president and chief executive officer of RKS Design,
which was founded in 1980 and has become a prolific award winner.
The firm, based in Thousand Oaks, Calif., near Los Angeles, last year
alone won five Industrial Design Excellence Awards from the Industrial
Designers Society of America and BusinessWeek magazine.
Sawhney has taught design at various California universities, including
the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena. He has lectured at various
business schools and institutions and is a regular speaker at UCLA’s
Anderson School of Business. He also wrote a book on industrial design
called “Elements,” published last year, has juried many
awards contests, and is chairperson for IDSA’a 2004 IDEA awards
program.
In addition to RKS Design, he has helped to start several other businesses
and is a licensor of numerous products and design innovations, as
well as being named on more than 100 patents worldwide. A founding
investor in various other companies, Sawhney most recently co-founded
RKS Guitars with British rock guitarist Dave Mason and started Keyvision,
a new designer eyeglass company.
Bob Wenning
Senior Management Consultant
TBM Consulting Group Inc.
Before joining TBM Consulting Group in 1995, Bob Wenning worked for
25 years as an operations and manufacturing manager. He now specializes
in new product development and launch, and has been instrumental in
developing TBM’s popular “Design for LeanSigma”
courses. (TBM is the sole licensee of LeanSigma, a registered service
mark of Maytag Corp.) He serves as a teacher and leader of business
process improvement and production preparation, as well as shop-floor
kaizen work.
Wenning previously was manufacturing manager for DuPont Co.’s
Instrument Products Division and before that, was operations manager
for Abbott Laboratories’ Transfusion Diagnostics. That division,
where he was responsible for new product development and launch, provided
screening tests to detect the HIV and hepatitis viruses in blood products
used in transfusions.
Wenning has a master’s degree in mechanical engineering from
Texas Tech University and has advised companies from AlliedSignal
and Maytag to Thikol and First Data Corp.
Durham, N.C.-based TBM Consulting Group, meanwhile, has been teaching
lean business principles to firms in the United States, Europe and
South America for more than a decade. From its Connecticut beginnings,
TBM has branched out to include offices on three continents, while
growing at a rate of about 30 percent annually. The firm notes that
it has been credited with turning around hundreds of companies worldwide
in the manufacturing and service sectors. |
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