ChiQ smart appliance
service design
The service design putting people back at the center of kitchen. - the design makes a difference in users' lifestyle.
This project redesigned ChiQ's smart kitchen appliance by conducting a competitive analysis, mapping the customer journey, developing concepts, prototyping, and conducting user testing to create a human-centered experience that integrates refrigerators and projector display with kitchen counters as a peninsula-like central platform.
The design process involved research sprints, ergonomic mockup studies, and prototype validation to develop connected devices that work together on cloud service platforms. The result is an open platform that enables third-party services, such as grocery delivery, to integrate seamlessly with users' kitchen activities, forming the foundation of ChiQ's broader smart home ecosystem strategy.
Situation
With shifts in lifestyle, technology, and new home-bound services, it’s time to reexamine the central role of cooking/food preservation/dining inside the kitchen.
Tactics
Competitive Analysis: I researched and analyzed best practices of user experience and design in products and services related to the smart kitchen.
Customer Journey: to understand how customers find and interact with the service we created a Customer Journey Map that includes the service ecosystem.
Actions
Scenario Development: I converged the research into insights for creating user scenarios, concepts and product definition in design sprint workshop with teams.
Ergonomic Study in Mockup: lo-fi mockups were produced for reviews and iteration design and development.
Prototype and User Testing: The refined designs were made into working prototype for testing with users, validation, demonstration and presentation.
Results
The innovations in this smart home appliance represent the first stage of ChiQ’s grand product strategy, which aims to continuously design a human-centered home internet ecosystem featuring connected devices with collaboration capabilities on cloud service platforms.
Based on the home application environment and centered on the human element, I redefined the functions of core terminals, such as fusing refrigerators with counters to create a central kitchen platform. This open product platform will allow more in-home service providers, such as grocery delivery, to integrate with users’ inhome activities.
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