Whether a startup or an established corporation, new product innovation is both exciting and daunting. Great ideas abound and opportunities frequently present themselves in new technologies. Yet introducing a new product to market comes with risks despite the excitement of making an unknown experience come to life. Managing this risk is key and is exactly where design can help — by humanizing the audience into known user types, developing and sharing a deep understanding of audience needs and expectations, creating and deploying prototypes — physical and digital, and testing the experience with end users.

Understanding how a new solution will work for users who have adapted to the tools they have today is both a great opportunity and a great challenge. Getting people something new that they will love is a fantastic experience — one made much easier with the help of design.

Developed during the start of COVID, the Logitech Casa Pop-Up Desk was kicked off to help an underserved audience find a better work from home experience. Through user research the team learned many people did not have a fixed desk space at home — sometimes due to space restrictions or sometimes because they wished to keep work and personal life separate.

The need for a way to move about a home easily to work in a more ergonomic manner became the team’s problem to solve and from that idea many prototypes were born, user labs created, and design principles aligned. Users spent time with the design team providing feedback. Design worked closely with Engineering to ensure the textures, components, colors, clasps, hinges, and weight worked to provide an elegant, attractive and meaningful experience to the audience while ensuring cost was maintained.

The team received a 2024 Red Dot award for the product — while also delighting many underserved users (mostly women) who had never expected a product like this from a hardware company.