Char.gy and Unboxed project

In term 2, 2019, students worked in partnership with EV charging point provider Char.gy and digital agency Unboxed and on a live brief exploring user experience and servitisation of Char.gy . Char.gy is an electric car charging point, mounted on lamp-posts, which targets EV car owners which do not have off street parking.

Lawrence Richards, ex student of the course and Service Design at Unboxed, feeding back to the studentsin a workshop

The students collaborated with Unboxed and Char.gy with regular reviews over 8 weekly sprints and apply service design methods to undertake field research, interviews, auto-ethnography and observations, to explore current challenges, and generated iterative prototypes to improve user journeys and the end-to-end experience for users and stakeholders. Through this process teams envisioned and re-purposed Char.gy from a series of interactions into a more holistic end-to-end service.
Some teams also developed partnerships with other stakeholders including councils, schools and electric vehicle leasing companies. Char.gy and Unboxed are now considering ways to implement key aspects of the solutions proposed.

In the wider context, the module responded to the Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan’s, initiative to help increase infrastructure for electric vehicles (EVs) in London, and London becoming a zero carbon city with its entire transport system zero emission by 2050 (London.gov.uk). Hence, this collaborative project provided the students with an opportunity to research and develop innovative solutions that were not only product innovation but also human centered; responsive to human and environmental need.