On 9 December, GAIN and Enterprise Ireland celebrated an online buddy meeting in order to discuss results and experiences related to their pilot design projects, as the User-Factor partners continue to exploit the value of their partnerships by meeting and exchanging ideas

Due to the current travel restrictions, the buddy meeting was organized online and focused on the GAIN Design Project and other Galician Design actions, as well as Entreprise Ireland’s Thinking Ahead Through Design initiative. Finally, the two partners discussed how to expand the impact of their projects beyond their duration, by discussing GAIN and Enterprise Ireland’s Capitalisation plans.

USER-FACTOR is a three-year project (2018-2021) funded by the Interreg Atlantic Area Programme, coordinated by PDR, aiming to strengthen innovation in small and medium enterprises (SMEs) by supporting them to use design as a tool for user-driven innovation. In total, 8 design support pilots were developed under User-Factor in different regions (Portugal, Spain, France, Ireland, Northern Ireland, Scotland, Wales).  Each partner supported a minimum of 25 SMEs in the implementation of design methodologies and the involvement of users in the development of products/services and prototype testing.