New Product Development: How Library Research Can Help: Selected Websites

"PDMA is the premier advocate and comprehensive resource for the profession of product development and innovation." Their website is certainly worth a browse but there is next to no "free" content there. We do own several of their books and we also have access to their important bi-monthly, the Journal of Product Innovation Management, through Wiley Online Library. Members have access to more online material, so if you'd like to consider a student membership, click here.

The Industrial Designers Society of America "is the world's oldest, largest, member-driven society for product design, industrial design, interaction design, human factors, ergonomics, design research, design management, universal design and related design fields." The website has limited useful content about significant designers and innovations. This includes What is Industrial Design? A Primer for Beginners

The International Council of Societies of Industrial Design is a non-profit organization "that protects and promotes the interests of the profession of industrial design." There are some links to additional resources like design blogs.

“Since 1995 Core77.com has served a devoted global audience of industrial designers ranging from students through seasoned professionals. Core77 publishes articles, discussion forums, an extensive event calendar, hosts portfolios, job listings, a database of design firms, schools, vendors and services."

Although the profits may not always be there, one of the noblest areas of product development is in finding ways that new products, technologies and simple solutions can help the poor in the developing world. IDDS is about that effort. It "brings together people from all over the world...to create technologies and enterprises that improve the lives of people living in poverty. Unlike most academic conferences, we emphasize the development of prototypes, not paper and proceedings."

Entrepreneurs are doing a great deal to develop new products and ideas in the New Green Economy. This is the webpage that the Small Business Administration has created to foster those efforts. Note that one (in the left frame) is specifically on Green Product Development.

This snazzy blog seeks "to bridge the fuzzy border between design and business. We started this site with a few simple premises in mind. First, design is a window onto the world at large, and the culture we live in." The related magazine, Fast Company is in many of our databases.

Daily Grommet, a fun, attractive (and local) commercial site, "is an online marketplace and the birthplace of Citizen Commerce, a movement that gives people the information and tools to support products that align with their own values. It's a powerful new way to discover, share, and sell consumer products."

Not the most attractive website (and perhaps that is a bad sign), Product Development Forum is a corporate site sponsored by DRM Associates and PD-Trak Solutions. It does have some basic information "on new product development (NPD), concurrent engineering (CE)" and related topics. Start with their Body of Knowledge page as an index of content.

If you are interested in looking through the "Generic Process for Developing New Products," this webpage might be worth visiting. Mr. Riley is founder of his own product design and consulting firm, and this page of his website offers a step-by-step overview. He also maintains an extensive set of links, especially relating to vehicles.

Kickstarter is a commercial microfinance website: "the largest funding platform for creative projects in the world," it claims. Projects include music, film, art, food and publishing. More importantly, they include Design and Technology. The site also links to "Curated Pages" of "some of the world’s foremost creative communities."