Volvo Cars Workshop in Gothenburg, Feb 2018

Volvo Cars Workshop in Gothenburg, Feb 2018

Volvo Cars Workshop in Gothenburg

February 2018

Last month, the two winning teams of the Volvo Challenge at Jönköping’s Innovation Days piled into our respective Volvos and headed to the Gothenburg headquarters. There, we were greeted by Volvo’s representative mentor Staffan Davidsson, and the rest of the IT Innovation Team. We began the day by pitching our original ideas and describing the developments we had since made with our prototypes, and the team provided helpful feedback for us to consider in our next steps. After lunch, we were treated to a factory tour, where we got to see the robots at work and Volvo’s famed efficiency in action. We spent the rest of the work day forming tests for our identified riskiest assumptions, researching the development process, and brainstorming potential new revenue streams.

After a delicious dinner with Staffan and a fun night at our AirBnB, we reconvened the next morning to prepare and give a follow up presentation on our progress. During the meeting, we had the pleasure of joining the team for the futurologist’s weekly update on technological advancements from around the world. The Volvo Cars team later provided comments and criticisms where they saw fit. Looking ahead, the teams devised how they could continue the project individually and potentially in tandem with Volvo. We worked together to identify pertinent research questions that would provide helpful insights to our teams and Volvo, resulting in topics like “Gamification in the Mobility Industry,” “Personality and Optimal Level of Entertainment in the Driving Experience,” and “Trust Building Tactics in the Digital Age.”

We greatly enjoyed our time in Gothenburg working with the Volvo team, and hope to continue the partnership and push forward with our projects.

-Kendall Wyckoff