In the latest episode on Lexicon, Interesting Engineering podcast, we speak to Dave Evans, the co-founder and CEO of Fictiv, a platform connecting digital design with physical hardware development.
Dave emphasized Fictiv's mission to accelerate product development through technology and global supply chains while stimulating a necessary shift toward sustainability in the industry.
Named to the Forbes 30 Under 30 list in 2017, Dave advocates for fusion in creativity and innovation.
“We believe in unlocking the creativity and human potential on what we're building and that's what we're driving towards and so over the next 10 years, if I can help more people bring products to market that wouldn’t have existed otherwise, I’d raise the flag and say success.”
Major collaborations accelerating development
Highlighted collaborations with companies like Honeywell International Inc., an American publicly traded, multinational conglomerate corporation, Dave noted designing auxiliary power units (APU) for airplanes in six weeks, typically reducing the timeframe from seven months.
“We were able to reimagine how you go from what we call engineering change orders (ECO) to modify this product that's been around since the Vietnam War the APU. We want to reimagine how you might build a higher quality product that solves your customers' problems and we were able to get that down to just over a month and a half to go from idea all the way through to manufacturing parts being on the test bench validating their engineering changes.”
Over the last 10 years, Fictiv has made significant technological advancements and built global supply chains that helped expedite manufacturing.
Addressing the sustainability challenges in the production process, Dave emphasized that the firm has done eight years of manufacturing reports, which talk about the state of the union and all things manufacturing.
He stated that the company launched its focus on sustainability and manufacturing this year, “kind of a call to arms for people to do better, including simple things that you can pursue to do better.”
Dave highlighted that the company is aiming to improve manufacturing processing. “A lot of parts are made 10,000 miles away, for instance, and then shipped to you. One of the biggest things you can do in manufacturing is to produce it just in time and place it as close to where the products will be consumed or used to reduce the emissions, whether air or the ocean.
As a result, reducing the carbon footprints on the components or products being manufactured, he added.
Adopting sustainable approaches in engineering
The co-founder is also excited about additive manufacturing, particularly the waste in 3D printing. This drives engineers to reimagine how they might design their products for additive, creating numerous benefits from a sustainability perspective.
Cradle-to-cradle is another concept the Fictiv CEO passionately discusses in the podcast interview. While many people may be aware of the cradle-to-grave framework, he questions:
“How do you design a product that goes from the cradle when you're building it to grave? How do you think it’ll actually be the end of life?”
Cradle the Cradle takes one step further and talks about how a product is designed that's meant to be upcycled.
“It's really meant to go from cradle all the way to a new cradle or a new product in the future. You can imagine something as simple as a tomato. I have a can of tomatoes that I use to make tomato sauce, and after I'm done with that, I wash it out. I reuse it as a flowering pot.
He noted that if a company thinks about designing a product to be upcycled from day one, it would make significant environmental changes.
Fictiv is working to incorporate clean technology and help sustainably manufactured products such as electric vehicles, wind farms, or solar-powered battery home systems market faster and function more efficiently. “I'm so excited about all the work we’re doing with clean tech,” said Dave.
Originally published on Interesting Engineering : Original article