Visit to Mindray, IBR, and Huawei: Exploring Opportunities for Collaboration

SUSTech School of Design (hereinafter referred to as “the School of Design”) is dedicated to building close ties and developing collaboration with industries to educate students in a pioneering and enterprising spirit and cultivate their entrepreneurship and creativity, providing better design outcomes for China and the rest of the world. Since its founding, the School of Design has frequented major enterprises and organizations in Shenzhen to understand the industrial needs and explore opportunities for collaboration.

From October 9^th-16^th, the School of Design visited three well-known local enterprises including Shenzhen Mindray Bio-Medical Electronics Co., Ltd., Shenzhen Institute of Building Research Co., Ltd., and Huawei.

·Mindray·

In the afternoon of October 9^th, Prof. Thomas KVAN, the dean of the School of Design, Prof. HE Renke, the deputy dean of the School of Design, and other school personnel visited Shenzhen Mindray Bio-Medical Electronics Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as Mindray). Mindray is a leading high-tech medical equipment manufacturer in China as well as a global innovative leader in medical equipment.

Group Photo

Exhibition Hall Visit

Exhibition Hall Visit

At the beginning of the trip, the delegation was escorted to the exhibition hall of Mindray, which provided an overview of the history and main products of the enterprise. A discussion was followed between the two sides, during which Mr. ZHOU Xiang, the director of the industrial design center of Mindray, firstly introduced Mindray from the aspects of history, milestones, products, and business scope of the enterprise and illustrated how important industrial design is for the enterprise’s business and development, continued by Dean Kvan’s introduction on the positioning, development, discipline development, faculty of the school. Both sides subsequently exchanged ideas revolving around social design and talent cultivation and explored the possibilities for the establishment of an internship base and future collaboration.

·Shenzhen Institute of Building Research Co., Ltd.·

On the morning of October 14^th, Prof. Thomas KVAN, the dean of the School of Design, led a delegation to Shenzhen Institute of Building Research Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as IBR) located in Jianke Building. IBR is a recipient of lots of recognition and awards including a national high-tech enterprise, a national post-doc research base, a national leading unit of green building and southern China base of national green building and is dedicated to exploring the new-type urbanization with Chinese characteristics and constructing green buildings, communities, and cities.

Group Photo

Ms. YE Qing, the Chairperson of IBR, and Mr. LIU Zongyuan, the Director of Audit Center, extended a warm welcome to and showed the school delegation around the artificial wetland garden, hanging garden, shared library, office space, and underground space in Jianke Building, during which Ms. Ye and Mr. Liu introduced the building logic, planning, layout, and green building technologies of the building, constituting a vivid experience of learning a “breathing” building by “walking”.

Building Tour

After the tour, an overview of IBR was offered by Ms. Ye and then Dean Kvan briefed on the positioning, discipline development, and faculty of the school and further shared the construction of a new design school building in Melbourne University, elaborating the design philosophy, planning, layout, and characteristics of the new building. The conversation was carried on between two sides centered around the important issues of present times including the care of the design, the cultivation of design talents, and the future of design, and both agreed that design should care about human beings, society, and nature. In the conversation, Prof. Christiane M. HERR of the School of Design also expressed her strong interest in how the landscaping is arranged and used in the building and shared her research on the improvement of the human living environment and enhancement of human health through the façade design with microbes or other materials, which was welcomed by Ms. Ye. She suggested that both sides can have further collaborative research in this field and looked forward to more exchanges and opportunities for collaboration with the School of Design.

In the Meeting 

·Huawei·

On the afternoon of October 16^th, Prof. Thomas KVAN, the dean of the School of Design, Prof. HE Renke, the deputy dean of the School of Design, and other school personnel visited the Industrial Design Department of Huawei Consumer Business Group at Bantian, Longgang District. Huawei is a leading global provider of information and communications technology (ICT) infrastructure and smart devices, committed to bringing digital to every person, home, and organization for a fully connected, intelligent world.

Exhibition Hall Visit

The visit started from the office space and product exhibition hall of Huawei R&D Center, providing the delegation with a first-hand experience of the latest phones, home appliances, and other products of Huawei. During the subsequent discussion, Mr. WAN Yang, the head of the Design Management Department of the Industrial Design Department, introduced the development pathway of Huawei since 2011, “Huawei personalities”, and the adaptability and universality design of Harmony OS in UX. Correspondingly, Dean Kvan also gave an introduction to the milestones, positioning, missions, and other aspects of the school and indicated that the “Humble & Ambitious” “Huawei personalities” coincide with the principles of SIDI. The brief introduction session was followed by the exchange of ideas about university-enterprise collaboration and the cultivation of design talents. Both sides expressed the willingness to continuous communication and exploration of collaborative models.

In the Meeting