How can we use design to positively impact society?

That’s the question we’ll answer at Catapult Labs this Saturday, May 19th in San Francisco.  Over the years we’ve assembled a compelling network of designers, technologists, and entrepreneurs using design tools and methods to drive positive social change.  We’ve selected NINE of them to lead 90-minute hands-on labs covering topics such as:

• Game mechanics and behavioral change
• Creating and sustaining a movement
• Integrating impact evaluation into the design process
• Visualizing data to communicate your message

Our esteemed Lab Leaders are joining us from Google, Autodesk, Stamen Design, See Change, MooreDesign, Gargani + Co., and Designers Accord and includes:

• Valerie Casey, founder of the Designers Accord movement and TIME Magazine’s “Hero of the Environment”
• Nadya Direkova, Senior UX Designer at Google and prominent speaker on game mechanics for web applications
• Dawn Danby, Senior Sustainable Design Program Manager at Autodesk and one of Fast Company’s “100 Most Creative People in Business”

In addition to learning, Catapult Labs will allow you to engage with other professionals and students interested in social impact as well as three amazing social ventures in search of design assistance who will be pitching the audience on their missions.

We have only 125 seats at Catapult Labs — buy your ticket today and reserve your spot!

Thank You to our event sponsors:
Autodesk, California College of the Arts, American Society of Mechanical Engineers, Bay Area Green Printing, Speck Design, and TechShop

In the past two years we’ve worked with some amazing organizations worldwide — Villgro Innovations, The Unreasonable Institute, StepOne Ventures, Nuru International, Peace Corps, and more — to develop training and learning material centered around design and how it impacts development.

Based on the success of these sessions, we’re announcing a new line up of Learning Labs for 2012 that tackle common challenges organizations face in each phase of development.  We’ve grouped Labs into the Learn/Explore, Play/Experiment, Implement/Evolve phases and incorporated hands-on activity that support both product and service design methodology.  Each Lab runs 90-min in length and is facilitated by a design team member.

We looked to twitter, Open Studios, and individual emails to single out topics that are relevant to designers interested in social impact as well as companies implementing designed solutions in marginalized communities.

‘Empathy + Immersion’ allows you to spend 60-min in the shoes of another…

‘Participatory Design Intro’  showcases successful case studies in participatory design around the world…

‘Designing a Customer Experience’ is an exercise in viewing your business from the viewpoint of new customers…

For a full description of each lab, download our Learning Lab Guide (415kb, PDF).

Ready to try a Lab?  Visit our Learning Labs page and submit a request.  We look forward to hearing from you!

We’re excited to announce that Catapult’s design team will assist INOTEK as they initially select target communities for the pilot program and issue a “call for challenges” to local organizations and individuals in order to find unique clean energy opportunities. Catapult will then work with partners on-the-ground to conduct field research exploring user needs and opportunities and to define and generate potential solutions. Selected concepts will be prototyped with market partners with at least two designs further refined into viable market solutions.

“We are going into the pilot completely technology agnostic and allowing the development process to focus on the needs of the people who will use the final solutions. That’s the benefit of a multi-partner project with increased capacity,“ says Heather Fleming, CEO of Catapult Design.

Catapult will provide counsel to the project partners throughout the 2012-13 pilot and incorporate design methodology and consideration into the program.

Click here to download the official press release. [PDF]

In September we kicked off our 2011 fundraising campaign to raise $50,000 towards 2012′s new projects and initiatives.  Historically, 50% of Catapult’s annual budget is funded by donors.  Meaning our donors are equal contributors to our partners’ stories and endeavors to develop innovative tools and services to combat poverty.

This week the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) committed a $10K contribution to our 2011 campaign.  Help us match the ASME grant!  By doing so we can continue to deliver considerate professional design services to projects that effect the lives of the many people living in underserved communities, both at home and abroad.

All contributors to our 2011 fundraising goal receive a Catapult gift or a complimentary ticket to our Spring design event. Want to know what you’re contributing to? Check out this 90-second video of how Catapult is impacting lives through design.

Next week join us at Net Impact 2011 National Conference in Portland!  Heather Fleming and Noel Wilson will be leading a 2hr prototyping workshop on “Prototyping Innovative Solutions for the BoP” on Saturday.  Space is limited t0 30 participants so reserve your spot soon!

Our badge for this year’s event (and the theme of the evening) is GROWTH.  We’ll share what this means during a break at 8pm with some photos and video!  Plus, we’ve got some big ideas for the rotating DJ booth, state-of-the-art sound system and wall of monitors.  And we’ll also have our brand new Cata-Tees available for purchase in the Catapult Store.

So bring a friend or two who’ve never heard of us (the more the merrier!) and help us strengthen the design for social change community!  

Pre-order your tickets here ($15) and we’ll see you there!

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Schedule:
6pm:  doors open!
8pm:  slide show of our latest design work in India, Tanzania, and the Philippines
10pm:  private venue becomes public
Donations accepted throughout the night via Square.

A CES entrepreneur tries a pair of VisionSpring eye glasses on a customer in Guatemala

Catapult announces a new distribution partnership with Community Enterprise Solutions (CES) in Guatemala, Ecuador and Nicaragua!  CES has a  unique and innovative microconsignment distribution model to create access to essential products and services in rural villages through sustainable entrepreneurship.  Their entrepreneurs deliver essential products, services, and information at affordable prices that have a positive economic and health impact.

Last year we announced our first distribution partnership with Great Lakes Energy in Rwanda with the intention of adding more partnerships in 2011.  We’ve recognized that one of the primary struggles in getting products and technology into impoverished regions is the lack of distribution and marketing infrastructure.  So we’ve spent the past few months searching for and vetting rural distributors to help our clients get their products into the hands of the end-user.  Our distribution partners also offer our clients pre-production services such as field testing of prototypes, market input, and user feedback, all essential to developing quality products.  Check our Picasa feed to see the latest photos from our visit with CES entrepreneurs.

Stay tuned as our list of distributors grows!

The IDSA San Francisco Professional Chapter, SJSU Student Chapter, Project H and Catapult Design invite you to join us for happy hour in downtown San Jose at the conclusion of conference day 1. This is an opportunity to expand our creative community here in the Bay Area, meet the speakers, make new friends who are visiting for the conference, and get inspired by designers outside your expertise. Dont miss it.

Friday, May 6th @ 6pm (drink specials til 7pm)

Loft Bar And Bistro
90 South 2nd Street
San Jose, California 95113

Prototyping Workshop at the Unreasonable Institute

Over the past two years we’ve had the pleasure of working with a variety of outstanding organizations through workshops and design sessions.  Last summer we workshop’d with the Unreasonable Institute Fellows in Boulder, CO as well as Villgro’s staff in Chennai, India.  These sessions are our way of bringing hands-on coaching to groups, companies, and teams exploring the intersection of international development and design.

This year we’re offering a line-up of workshops based on our own training and project experiences and built around the topics expressed by you — our twitter followers, newsletter readers, blog commenters, and Open Studio attendees.  Each workshop is structured to run approximately 90 minutes and can accomodate groups of 30.

Here’s a glimpse of the 2011 Workshop Series topics:

- Exploring Values
- Cross Cultural Communication
- Developing Observational Skills
- Prototyping
- Product Design 101
- Quantifying Community Power
- Technological Environment

To organize a workshop for your group, download the pricing sheet or visit our Workshops page for details on requesting a workshops.  As always, we invite your suggestions for custom and/or future workshop topics!

Join Catapult CEO Heather Fleming to explore new collaborative design methods leveraging physical and digital communities, collaboration sites, and social capital.  The presenters roster includes:

Robert Fabricant, Frog Design
David Benjamin, The Living
Jason Bruges, Jason Bruges Studio
Douglas Coupland
Matthias Hollwich, HWKN, Architizer
Dan Rockhill, Rockhill + Associates, Studio 804
Roo Rogers, RedScout Ventures
Hunter Tura, Bruce Mau Design Inc
Helen Walters