Labor Projekter Industrialdesign

Public funding for design in product development

Alre­a­dy in our artic­le "Eco­no­mic Fac­tor Design" we explai­ned the important role design can play in the deve­lo­p­ment of pro­ducts and their pla­ce­ment on the market.

Part­ners often approach us with plans to deve­lop some­thing becau­se they find in us the part­ner who is able to turn the idea into a real pro­duct. Initia­tors are not only start-ups or estab­lished com­pa­nies, but also rese­arch insti­tu­ti­ons such as uni­ver­si­ties or insti­tu­tes. Howe­ver, ever­yo­ne faces the same pro­blem: pro­duct deve­lo­p­ment is expen­si­ve! The cos­ts for exter­nal sup­port, whe­ther in design con­sul­ting or the design its­elf, are often not fac­to­red into the deve­lo­p­ment cos­ts. Get­ting sta­te sup­port, in the form of public fun­ding, and thus making it easier for new pro­ducts to enter the mar­ket can be of gre­at help.

But not only the cos­ts of the deve­lo­p­ment repre­sent a hurd­le. The search for sui­ta­ble part­ners is also a chall­enge for many teams. Usual­ly, idea pro­vi­ders only cover their own spe­cia­list area and are depen­dent on exter­nal com­pe­ten­ci­es in other are­as. In our opi­ni­on, this is the grea­test and most important task, becau­se com­pe­tent and relia­ble part­ners are a gua­ran­tee of suc­cess for sus­tainable pro­duct developments.

As a design office for deve­lo­p­ment and pro­duct inno­va­ti­on, we not only have many years of expe­ri­ence, but also an excel­lent net­work in the are­as of rese­arch and indus­try. We would be hap­py to sup­port you in fin­ding a part­ner or to assist you our­sel­ves. We tail­or our ran­ge of ser­vices spe­ci­fi­cal­ly and indi­vi­du­al­ly to your requi­re­ments. Our exper­ti­se covers the enti­re deve­lo­p­ment pro­cess from the initi­al idea to pro­duc­tion. We keep an eye on the enti­re pro­ject: in the con­cep­ti­on, the design, the con­s­truc­tion and pro­duc­tion advice and pro­vi­de image mate­ri­al for presentations.

We have been able to demons­tra­b­ly gain many good expe­ri­en­ces with public fun­ding oppor­tu­ni­ties in recent years. Design is in demand and in many cases eligible.

As so often, all begin­nings are dif­fi­cult. The bureau­cra­tic effort invol­ved in sub­mit­ting an appli­ca­ti­on can seem like an insur­moun­ta­ble obs­ta­cle. We say: Don't be put off by the see­mingly com­pli­ca­ted appli­ca­ti­on pro­cess. In recent years, we have been able to sup­port seve­ral of our part­ners in app­ly­ing for public fun­ding. We know the pro­ces­ses, know how to esti­ma­te the effort and can for­mu­la­te appli­ca­ti­ons with you.

ZIM funding

Until the end of 2020, we car­ri­ed out a coope­ra­ti­on pro­ject with the Chair of Tech­ni­cal Che­mis­try at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Duisburg-Essen and the com­pa­ny CryLas GmbH from Ber­lin. This pro­ject was fun­ded by the Cen­tral Inno­va­ti­on Pro­gram for SMEs (ZIM).
The ZIM is a nati­on­wi­de fun­ding pro­gram that is open to all tech­no­lo­gies and indus­tries, with the aim of sus­tain­ab­ly streng­thening the inno­va­ti­ve power and thus the com­pe­ti­ti­ve­ness of medium-sized com­pa­nies. The tech­no­lo­gi­cal inno­va­ti­on con­tent and good mar­ket oppor­tu­ni­ties of the fun­ded R&D pro­jects are essen­ti­al for appr­oval (https://www.zim.de/ZIM/Redaktion/DE/Article/ueber-zim.html).

Con­tra­ry to state­ments to the con­tra­ry, the ZIM is an excel­lent oppor­tu­ni­ty to have pro­jects fun­ded. The high demands on tech­ni­cal inno­va­ti­on and mar­ke­ta­bi­li­ty mean that results have to be docu­men­ted, but at the same time it is to be eva­lua­ted as a qua­li­ty fea­ture. The effort is rather mode­ra­te com­pared to other fun­ding programs.

Kooperationsprojekte Projekter Industrial Design, CryLas, Universität Duisburg Essen

The aim of the three-year coope­ra­ti­on pro­ject was to deve­lop a com­pact and eco­no­mic­al­ly attrac­ti­ve machi­ne for the pro­duc­tion of metal nano­par­tic­les in liquid solu­ti­ons.
A spin-off of the Pro­jekter was dis­cus­sed from the start. In this way, know­ledge trans­fer from the uni­ver­si­ty envi­ron­ment to indus­try could be ensu­red. Thanks to the suc­cessful coope­ra­ti­on and the idea, which was ulti­m­ate­ly appli­ed for a patent, the pro­ject came clo­ser and clo­ser. The goal is the spin-off at the begin­ning of 2022 (https://www.uni-due.de/2020-06-29-nanoparticle-on-button-pressure).  

Collux CAD Konstruktion Büro für Industrial Design Deutschland

The pro­ject lived from the exch­an­ge and the moti­va­ti­on of the coope­ra­ti­on part­ners. All depart­ments bene­fi­ted from each other and sup­port­ed each other accor­ding to their pos­si­bi­li­ties. In addi­ti­on to the design tasks, we were also respon­si­ble for the pro­ject manage­ment in this pro­ject. While each part­ner was main­ly acti­ve in their own area of exper­ti­se, we loo­ked at the over­all con­cept, becau­se our job is to bring all the com­pon­ents tog­e­ther. We were the dri­ving force in many are­as and always had the enti­re­ty of the pro­ject in mind.

Project funding, yes or no?

From this exam­p­le of a suc­cessful fun­ding pro­ject, it can be gene­ral­ly dedu­ced that public fun­ding is a good way.
The pro­blems of expen­si­ve deve­lo­p­ment cos­ts and the search for com­pe­tent part­ners can be sol­ved in this way.
Howe­ver, good rese­arch or advice on the right fun­ding pro­gram is advi­sa­ble at the begin­ning. The­re are many dif­fe­rent pro­grams with dif­fe­rent focu­ses.
Cont­act us, we will be hap­py to advi­se you!

At this point we would also like to point out the new law on tax incen­ti­ves for rese­arch. The law has been in force sin­ce Janu­ary 1, 2020. The new rese­arch allo­wan­ce makes Ger­ma­ny even more attrac­ti­ve as a loca­ti­on for rese­arch and inno­va­ti­on. This is an inde­pen­dent ancil­la­ry law to the Inco­me Tax and Cor­po­ra­ti­on Tax Act, which is inten­ded to bene­fit pri­va­te rese­arch and deve­lo­p­ment.
You can find more infor­ma­ti­on on this topic on the BMWi web­site (https://www.bmwi.de/Redaktion/DE/Schlaglichter-der-Wirtschaftspolitik/2020/02/kapitel-1-10-neue-forschungszulage-in-deutschland.html).

We are at your side to ans­wer the ques­ti­on of whe­ther your idea is eli­gi­ble for fun­ding. Every pro­ject is dif­fe­rent, but in our expe­ri­ence, the oppor­tu­ni­ty to con­sider and enga­ge is always wort­hwhile. Even if no fun­ding is pos­si­ble, we are the right sup­port­ing part­ner for you or at least know the right part­ner for you and will be hap­py to put you in touch.

We look for­ward to exci­ting new projects!

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