IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsusta/v13y2021i19p10915-d647731.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

A Case Study of University–Industry Collaboration for Sustainable Furniture Design

Author

Listed:
  • Jo Kuys

    (Centre for Design Innovation, School of Design and Architecture, Swinburne University of Technology, Melbourne 3122, Australia)

  • Abdullah Al Mahmud

    (Centre for Design Innovation, School of Design and Architecture, Swinburne University of Technology, Melbourne 3122, Australia)

  • Blair Kuys

    (Centre for Design Innovation, School of Design and Architecture, Swinburne University of Technology, Melbourne 3122, Australia)

Abstract

This paper describes the importance of including a Human-Centred Design (HCD) approach for successful university–industry collaboration. We detail user surveys and user evaluation techniques to engage end-users for the rejuvenation of manufacturing industries through sustainable product development. There are numerous studies describing the importance of university–industry collaboration; however, very few portray the detailed working relationships necessary to fulfil both the university and the industry agenda. This paper explores a joint project between a prominent Melbourne-based university and a government organisation from Malaysia. The intention was to innovate a range of furniture for Malaysian dormitories to stimulate the local manufacturing sector and provide high-value product applications for Malaysia’s abundant timber sector. By detailing a HCD approach, we reveal how to better direct the design outcomes to accurately reflect the research intent. This is detailed through a case study showing how the research data was translated into final product concepts influenced by end-users and collaboration with the industry stakeholders. The resulting products are a range of sustainable, modular dormitory furniture with a direct route to market. Finally, we provide the lessons learned and suggestions for developing sustainable products through university–industry collaboration.

Suggested Citation

  • Jo Kuys & Abdullah Al Mahmud & Blair Kuys, 2021. "A Case Study of University–Industry Collaboration for Sustainable Furniture Design," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(19), pages 1-18, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:13:y:2021:i:19:p:10915-:d:647731
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/13/19/10915/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/13/19/10915/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Birgit Hoinle & Ilka Roose & Himanshu Shekhar, 2021. "Creating Transdisciplinary Teaching Spaces. Cooperation of Universities and Non-University Partners to Design Higher Education for Regional Sustainable Transition," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(7), pages 1-21, March.
    2. Marina P. P. Pieroni & Tim C. McAloone & Daniela C. A. Pigosso, 2019. "Configuring New Business Models for Circular Economy through Product–Service Systems," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(13), pages 1-22, July.
    3. Thomas Wastling & Fiona Charnley & Mariale Moreno, 2018. "Design for Circular Behaviour: Considering Users in a Circular Economy," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(6), pages 1-22, May.
    4. N. A. Ankrah & D. A. Langford, 2005. "Architects and contractors: a comparative study of organizational cultures," Construction Management and Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 23(6), pages 595-607.
    5. Garrette Clark & Justin Kosoris & Long Nguyen Hong & Marcel Crul, 2009. "Design for Sustainability: Current Trends in Sustainable Product Design and Development," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 1(3), pages 1-16, August.
    6. Steinmo, Marianne & Rasmussen, Einar, 2018. "The interplay of cognitive and relational social capital dimensions in university-industry collaboration: Overcoming the experience barrier," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 47(10), pages 1964-1974.
    7. Marica Barbaritano & Elisabetta Savelli, 2021. "How Consumer Environmental Responsibility Affects the Purchasing Intention of Design Furniture Products," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(11), pages 1-18, May.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Emilio Rossi & Erminia Attaianese, 2023. "Research Synergies between Sustainability and Human-Centered Design: A Systematic Literature Review," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(17), pages 1-19, August.
    2. Chuloh Jung & Nahla Al Qassimi, 2022. "Investigating the Emission of Hazardous Chemical Substances from Mashrabiya Used for Indoor Air Quality in Hot Desert Climate," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(5), pages 1-16, February.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Marcos Ferasso & Tatiana Beliaeva & Sascha Kraus & Thomas Clauss & Domingo Ribeiro‐Soriano, 2020. "Circular economy business models: The state of research and avenues ahead," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 29(8), pages 3006-3024, December.
    2. Lukas Alexander Benz, 2022. "Critical Success Factors for Circular Business Model Innovation from the Perspective of the Sustainable Development Goals," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(10), pages 1-18, May.
    3. Fabio Neves Puglieri & Rodrigo Salvador & Omar Romero‐Hernandez & Edmundo Escrivão Filho & Cassiano Moro Piekarski & Antonio Carlos de Francisco & Aldo Roberto Ometto, 2022. "Strategic planning oriented to circular business models: A decision framework to promote sustainable development," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 31(7), pages 3254-3273, November.
    4. Maryam Hina & Chetna Chauhan & Rajat Sharma & Amandeep Dhir, 2023. "Circular economy business models as pillars of sustainability: Where are we now, and where are we heading?," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 32(8), pages 6182-6209, December.
    5. Sofie Hagejärd & Anita Ollár & Paula Femenías & Ulrike Rahe, 2020. "Designing for Circularity—Addressing Product Design, Consumption Practices and Resource Flows in Domestic Kitchens," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(3), pages 1-20, January.
    6. Bruno Michel Roman Pais Seles & Janaina Mascarenhas & Ana Beatriz Lopes de Sousa Jabbour & Adriana Hoffman Trevisan, 2022. "Smoothing the circular economy transition: The role of resources and capabilities enablers," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 31(4), pages 1814-1837, May.
    7. Durán-Romero, Gemma & López, Ana M. & Beliaeva, Tatiana & Ferasso, Marcos & Garonne, Christophe & Jones, Paul, 2020. "Bridging the gap between circular economy and climate change mitigation policies through eco-innovations and Quintuple Helix Model," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 160(C).
    8. Margaret Oluseyi Lawal & Ochuko Mary Amori, 2023. "SMEs-Enabled Circular Business Models: A Pathway to Sustainable Development (A Study of Some Selected SMEs in Abeokuta, Ogun State)," International Journal of Latest Technology in Engineering, Management & Applied Science, International Journal of Latest Technology in Engineering, Management & Applied Science (IJLTEMAS), vol. 12(09), pages 94-99, September.
    9. Żaneta Muranko & Catriona Tassell & Anouk Zeeuw van der Laan & Marco Aurisicchio, 2021. "Characterisation and Environmental Value Proposition of Reuse Models for Fast-Moving Consumer Goods: Reusable Packaging and Products," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(5), pages 1-35, March.
    10. Ferran Giones & Kari Kleine & Silke Tegtmeier, 2022. "Students as scientists’ co-pilots at the onset of technology transfer: a two-way learning process," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 47(5), pages 1373-1394, October.
    11. Uttaran Dutta, 2019. "Design Engagements at the Margins of the Global South: De-Centering the “Expert” Within Me," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(20), pages 1-18, October.
    12. Mariale Moreno & Carolina De los Rios & Zoe Rowe & Fiona Charnley, 2016. "A Conceptual Framework for Circular Design," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 8(9), pages 1-15, September.
    13. Yaolin Wang & Chenyang Liu & Xi Zhang & Shaoting Zeng, 2023. "Research on Sustainable Furniture Design Based on Waste Textiles Recycling," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(4), pages 1-18, February.
    14. Stefano Poponi & Andrea Colantoni & Sirio R.S. Cividino & Enrico Maria Mosconi, 2019. "The Stakeholders’ Perspective within the B Corp Certification for a Circular Approach," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(6), pages 1-15, March.
    15. Sophie Hennekam & Steve Mckenna & Julia Richardson & Subramaniam Ananthram, 2019. "Perceptions of Demotion Decisions: A Social Capital Perspective," Post-Print hal-03232774, HAL.
    16. Jyh-Rong Chou, 2021. "A Scoping Review of Ontologies Relevant to Design Strategies in Response to the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(18), pages 1-27, September.
    17. Alao T.O. & Aina O.O., 2020. "Organisational culture of construction companies in Lagos State, Nigeria," Organization, Technology and Management in Construction, Sciendo, vol. 12(1), pages 2158-2169, January.
    18. Knošková Ľubica, 2020. "Circular Design and Consumer Involvement in Circular Economy," Studia Commercialia Bratislavensia, Sciendo, vol. 13(43), pages 25-34, March.
    19. Bas Wouterszoon Jansen & Anne van Stijn & Vincent Gruis & Gerard van Bortel, 2022. "Cooking Up a Circular Kitchen: A Longitudinal Study of Stakeholder Choices in the Development of a Circular Building Component," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(23), pages 1-20, November.
    20. Alessandro Ruggieri & Alessio Maria Braccini & Stefano Poponi & Enrico Maria Mosconi, 2016. "A Meta-Model of Inter-Organisational Cooperation for the Transition to a Circular Economy," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 8(11), pages 1-17, November.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:13:y:2021:i:19:p:10915-:d:647731. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.