Weblog Consulting Register Login Subscribe to Free Influx Emails Join our Facebook Group Branding Street Cred Technology Lifestyle Style Entertainment Interviews Art InfluxTV Map Widgets RSS — All Subjects RSS — More Feeds

Search

Advanced Search

Contact Privacy Policy

Nokia demonstrates how it's leveraging insights gleaned from the developing world into products. The mobile phone is made to work a lot hard in developing countries; it becomes the mobile office and primary computer for many of its users. In response, Nokia is launching Life Tools; software included in its phones that can help those involved in agriculture better understand market and weather conditions.


Posted by Ed Cotton I was fortunate enough to attend Jan Chipchase's Street Hacks (avail for download from his site) presentation at Adaptive Path the other night.

He's Nokia's resident field researcher/ethnographer.

His function is to help Nokia better understand how people use mobile phone and identify potential opportunities.

In his presentation he shared some great examples of how people in the developing world are adapting/hacking and playing with limited resources to deliver experiences they want and need.

Here are some of his examples;

1. Not An Official Product: Two SIM cards on the space of a single SIM so users can switch between providers



2. Stealing Electricity, but with a Meter- from Brazil- It costs to add the meter, but having the meter gives you an address and the "rights" from having an address.



3. A system for airtime transfer gets turned by its users into a banking system- Africa- people can send airtime quicker than money and in towns and villages, individuals exchange that airtime for cash.


Posted by Ed Cotton Here at Influx, we are big fans of the “Sense and Simplicity” brand initiative that Philips has deployed in various guises over the past couple of years.

Its been part of an advertising campaign, but it’s more substantive, its become a set of guiding principles that define the company’s direction.

“Sense and Simplicity” seems appropriate in the developed world, where people are looking to strip the complexity out of their lives.

How about the developing world?

Philips is also applying the same principles to these markets and is creating special products to meet their very different needs.

One example is a woodstove that consumes less electricity and reduces the toxic indoor pollution that accompanies most traditional cooking sources.


Source:Philips

In addition to the stove, Philips has some innovative lighting solutions that it’s been testing in India: a rechargeable, weatherproof, portable lamp and a hand-held, hand-cranked LED flashlight that provides 30 minutes light for every minute of cranking. (shown below)




Source: Philips


It's interesting to see how this brand  platform is gaining more potency as it expands its global footprint and finding new applications over time.