Copyright © Photo by Mimi Thian on Unsplash
The SUGAR Global Innovation (SGI) program, a collaboration between Linköping University (LiU) in Sweden and Aalto University in Finland, utilizes design thinking to address technological challenges. Emphasizing problem space exploration over quick solutions, SGI guides student teams through an empathetic understanding of user needs. Its approach between courses ensures seamless knowledge transfer and collaborative progression.
Through weekly lectures, mentoring, and tools for ideation, students gain independence while receiving essential support. The program’s emphasis on an entrepreneurial mindset prepares students to navigate uncertainties and transform ideas into tangible concepts. In essence, SGI tries to equip to the next generation of innovators with the skills and mindset to drive meaningful change in technology and beyond.
Discover more about the SGI program through this interview featuring a teacher and a student who participated in this program.
Juan Felipe Ruiz Muñoz
Lecturer at Linköping University
Which university and courses are part of your consortium and what brings you all together?
The Sugar Global Innovation Program is comprised of Aalto University in Finland and Linköping University in Sweden, and we work around design thinking and product development projects that are part of the Sugar Global Network, but we also have projects in design and engineering as well as master’s theses. For us, it is really important that the projects also have a social component that benefits society at large. So, the projects also include not only mapping what the technologies can do in which areas they can be put, but also which ones would have a larger impact.
How do you think society will benefit from this project?
I think society can benefit from this type of program because, on the one hand, it allows the students to learn design methodologies and product-developed methodologies that they can then apply in their future careers. Still, also the type of projects that we selected have a component of something larger that we can help society with. So, for example, how do we protect bees and how do we bring beekeeping to the digital era as well as how do we keep food production and urban garden in more sustainable.
How do you envision participating in this project will contribute to your personal and professional development?
I think these projects have benefited me as I have had the opportunity to come into contact with people from different backgrounds and different expertise, for example, from the technologies where you get exposed to a different way of seeing things to a different background, to a different type of knowledge and research in areas that otherwise I wouldn’t have seen myself. So, it is really interesting to get to talk to these people and to make connections with them as well.
Juan Gil Escribano
Mechanical engineer at Aalto University
How do you find working with the R&D&I projects?
Our project was given the META-HILIGHT technology from ATTRACT, and it pushed us to imagine how the future will look like and which steps should we take today to reach that future. So, it shaped our solution to reach and to make a better future.
How do you think society will benefit from this project?
Our challenge was to redesign beekeeping for the digital era. Beekeeping actually affects many aspects of our daily lives for example, food production depends on a lot of bees and ecosystems and nature heavily relies on pollinators as well. But the truth is that many bees are dying due to climate change. And so, we wanted to help beekeepers to keep their colonies alive so that society can have a better sustainable future.
How do you envision participating in this project will contribute to your personal and professional development?
I believe that this kind of project in which you have the opportunity to try new things in different ways and to think outside the box, really reshapes the way you think and see the world as a professional and also as a person. And of course, it teaches you how to work with people from different backgrounds because all of them have a lot to give to the project and to bring to the project.
For more information
Visit the SGI program site.
