James Dyson Design Awards

James Dyson Design Awards

An ultrasound tool set designed to quickly measure the commercial worth of forests, has scooped the coveted ninth annual James Dyson Design Award at an award ceremony held in Auckland last night.

Tim Cox, a 22 old industrial designer from Christchurch, says his winning product design could revolutionise New Zealand’s forestry sector, which exports $3.2 billion of products annually.

“New Zealand’s forest industry relies on old technology to measure forest woodlots prior to felling. Current products are expensive and require multiple tools for a single job. My product, Tretech has been developed to eliminate double handling of data to reduce time, costs and human error.”

“It consists of three tools – the handheld hammer anchors into a tree, an ultrasound transponder measures diameter, quality, density of the wood, and this transmits to a handheld receiver, which measures the height of the tree. The system incorporates other technology like GPS and a camera to record the tree’s location,” says the designer.

Not only is it an innovative piece of technology it is also beautifully crafted object, the various component pieces being well integrated and ergonomically satisfying.

Tim, who designs rock crushing equipment for a job, says he drew on his family’s 25 year history of working in the forestry industry.

The Massey University industrial design graduate says while he has researched the marketplace and produced a prototype, the product is at concept stage only, and he would welcome an opportunity to commercialise his design.

Open to design and engineering students and recent graduates, the James Dyson Award recognises emerging designers whose work demonstrates the ability to think differently and create products that solve problems and work better than existing products.

The judges, headed by designer David Lovegrove, product representative for the Designer’s Institute of New Zealand, said that Tim’s design reflected the Award criteria and the Dyson philosophy, which is simply, about making products work better.

“In the three years I’ve been judging this Award, I have never seen a product that is so well resolved, thoroughly researched and so well thought-through. From a design and manufacturing perspective, this resonates well with Dyson’s design philosophy.”

David said the award winning product stood out for its commercial appeal and also it’s far reaching benefits.

“Tim’s design really advances its field. From a sustainability perspective, it incorporates materials that will withstand years of use.

“Tretech is a complete system. It’s not one product, it’s actually three. Though if he had presented us one tool, it may still have won,” he said.

The other two finalists were both Massey University design graduates – Hamilton’s Jamaine Fraser designed a hydration blanket to aid stranded whales, and Aucklander Dan McLaughlin, created Airaid, which can help people living with respiratory disease. It is a nebuliser which functions by using a foot pump that fills a chamber with air, the air is compressed and used to control the correct dose of medicine administered to a patient through an oxygen mask.

Tim was also named a British Council New Zealand Design Ambassador, and will travel to the UK with $3,000 traveling expenses and accommodation, have the opportunity to tour Dyson’s world class Research, Design and Development facility, and meet with other key members of the UK design community.

Plus, he can select an official fee prize package from the Intellectual Property Office of New Zealand (IPONZ) tailored to their design’s intellectual property needs, $3,000 worth of legal advice provided by Farry.Co Law, they’ll receive a Dyson handheld cleaner and a year’s membership to the Designer’s Institute of New Zealand.

The runner up, industrial design graduate, Jamaine Fraser, will attend the Creative Catalyst meeting for East Asian emerging creative entrepreneurs in Bangkok this year, as a guest of British Council New Zealand.

Eleven New Zealand entries, including the three national finalists, will progress to online judging in the international James Dyson Award competition. The global James Dyson Award winner will be announced in September 2009 and together with their university, they will win a total prize fund of £20,000 or local currency equivalent.

The Dyson Award was set up in 2001 by Avery Robinson, the distributors of Dyson in New Zealand. It is hosted in association with the British Council New Zealand, DINZ, Farry.Co Law and IPONZ to recognise and reward up and coming Kiwi designers with product design ideas that best demonstrate innovative and inspiring solutions to everyday problems.

James Dyson, engineer and inventor of the Dyson vacuum cleaner: says “Design surrounds us. It inspires us. It makes more things possible. As our need for good design and technology increases so does the need for innovative and adventurous designers, engineers and scientists.

“If you think you have a way of making something better, don’t be afraid to be different, and don’t give up if people reject your ideas, trust your instincts. We want to encourage future generations of design engineers.”

All entries can be viewed on www.jamesdysonaward.org