Based in Ottawa, Canada, Design 1st is a team of specialists in Physical Product Design and Engineering, helping clients bring innovation to their markets.
Founded by Kevin Bailey (ex-Nortel) Design 1st provides innovative design services to inventors, entrepreneurs, start-up ventures and multinationals in a wide range of markets. Their expert team works alongside clients, turning a napkin sketch idea into an engaging and useful product solution that meets market, business and manufacturing requirements. With 25 years’ experience, the team excels at more technically challenging products for both indoor product and extreme outdoor environments, taking into account; heat, stress, motion, safety and materials. Their technical engineering skills configures a product and combines with the designers’ artistic talents to help clients select and refine the product form with colors, textures and finishes that get users engaged and excited about using the new product.
Like many processes, the product’s design starts with an idea! The engineers and artists set objectives, develop concepts, design the details, make prototypes and evaluate the solution to see how well it meets the target requirements. New products are developed using the latest 3D CAD Pro-Engineer and SolidWorks software platforms. Components are selected starting with keys, displays, LED’s, connectors, hinges and other external functions. The design team provides a definition of the high level user interface requirements for how the product will operate and creates product images of the potential solutions. On the engineering side the design team defines electronic circuitry board requirements, designs the physical housing structure and engineers the details for each of the many physical parts required in a new product. Bottom line, people react positively to products that are straightforward and easy to use and great design also considers ease of installation, maintenance, assembly and fabrication.
Design 1st has a strong track record of success across a wide spectrum of product industries including medical, commercial, outdoor, wireless and retail markets. Their services range from the development of custom product enclosures and structures including custom mechanisms and unique product packaging. The team also supports pre-sales creating marketing images, renders and animations that quickly convey the product features and benefits. Client requests range from time-critical one-off demonstration prototypes to mass produced products that require revision control and design transfer into global manufacturing teams. Design 1st also advises clients on Intellectual Property protection and how to brand, market and package the new product to differentiate it from the competition.
Call Us toll free at 1.877.235.1004 and let us introduce you to our team.
Design 1st Product Innovation Process
