Jury Alumni

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  Jaime Moreno

  Founder and Creative Director, Mormedi

  2016 Commercial Equipment Jury Member

  Born and raised in Madrid, Jaime started Architecture at the Polytechnic University of Madrid but shortly after moved to Switzerland where he achieved a Degree in Industrial Design at the Art Center College of Design. He has upgraded his studies taking seminars at Harvard, IESE, IE and St. Louis University Business School.
  
  After graduating he worked as a design consultant for Philips at the Domestic Appliances department in The Netherlands.
  
  From this experience, he decided to found in 1998 his own company, Mormedi, a design consultancy that innovates through customer experience, with a strategic approach, delivering service design, industrial design and digital experiences.
  
  The company now includes a multidisciplinary and a highly skilled team of designers, strategists, engineers, business development consultants and marketing specialists. Mormedi covers many sectors in a wide variety of typologies, ranging from banking, airlines, telecommunications, consumer electronics, energy, etc. The 70% of its turnover comes from abroad, working for 12 companies that belong to the "Fortune 500” list.
  
  Jaime combines his dedication to Mormedi, as CEO and Creative Director, with a passion for design which has led him to take part as a member of the jury in several competitions and to give conferences in Spain, UK, Denmark, Japan and Hong Kong. He is also a member of the Design Management Institute (DMI), the Industrial Designers Society of America (IDSA), and the International Forum Design (IF).
  
  Jaime has been awarded with the “2015 National Design Award” in the Professional’s Category, given by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness.

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  Rhys Newman

  Global Head of Design & User Experience, ABB E-Mobility

  2024 Commercial Equipment Jury Member

  Rhys is the Global Head of Design & User Experience at ABB E_Mobility. He previously worked as a consultant and led multi-disciplinary Design teams at Google X's Everyday Robots, Casper Sleep, NOKIA, and Lego. He co-founded his entrepreneurial venture, OMATA in 2015.
  As a Design Leader, he has a reputation for building happy and motivated studios where designers want to work, creativity is the priority, and innovation happens. He is obsessed with nurturing cultures of creativity, optimism, and the value of Design and Designing as a perspective and a practice.
  Rhys has a Master’s Degree in Product Design from the Royal College of Art in London, and a First Class Bachelor of Arts Degree from the University of Wales, Cardiff, UK. He has been a part-time lecturer at Art Centre, Pasadena; Goldsmiths University, London; Denmark Design School, Copenhagen; and the Royal College of Art, London. He has also served on the jury of numerous competitions, was Chair of the IDSA IDEA Awards, and has multiple patents.

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  Helen Maria Nugent

  Dean of Design, California College of the Arts (CCA)

  2023 Commercial Equipment Jury Member

  Helen Maria Nugent has been leading progressive innovation in art and design education for over 25 years. Currently, she is the Dean of Design at California College of the Arts (CCA) in San Francisco where she oversees 9 graduate and undergraduate design programs including an MBA in Design Strategy. She envisions the Design Division at CCA as a sanctuary for those with radical curiosity, where wonder and imagination are amplified through rigor and craft.
  Previously she was a professor at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago where she founded the Designed Objects programs that cultivate a reciprocal relationship between products and humanity. In the way-back machine, she was the co-director of the transformative and aptly named, Workshop for Art Research and Practice (WARP), a radical foundation program for artists and designers at the University of Florida.
  
  Helen Maria is also the co-founder of Haelo Design, an interdisciplinary research-oriented design studio that is undertaking the transition from object design to strategic futuring.
  

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  Tom O'Connor

  Industrial Designer, PDT

  2017 Commercial Equipment Jury Captain

  Thomas O'Connor is an awarded Industrial Design consultant who thrives at the intersection of business, technology and user-centered design. He began consulting for PDT in 2010 where he's led multi-disciplinary teams ranging from start-ups to Fortune 500 companies. PDT is a Chicago based product development consultancy specializing in fast moving, regulated and complex industries ranging from medical devices, aerospace, consumer electronics, laboratory equipment and tactical communication devices.
  
  Thomas has consulted for clients including AbbVie, Hospira, Smiths Medical, Harris, Thermofisher, Siemens, Bosch, 3M, Weber, McDonalds and Intel.
  
  Most recently Thomas spent 4 months working in Shanghai as a consultant for Sinowell. Thomas led research and product development to help bring innovation to the commercial horticulture and hydroponics industry. Sinowell is a manufacturer and wholesaler of horticulture and hydroponics equipment.
  
  Thomas is active in the Chicago start-up community, serves as a judge in Chicago's Tech Week Launch Competition and is an Industrial Design mentor at University of Illinois at Chicago.
  
  Thomas grew up in the Motor City and received his BFA in Industrial Design from the College for Creative Studies in Detroit.

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  Anthony Prats

  Product Lead, Robotics & Automation, Stealth Startup

  2024 Commercial Equipment Jury Member

  From creating lovable robot sidekicks to defining the future of food, Anthony Prats is a product and design leader with a decade of experience building category-defining hardware and software products. He got his start at Anki, helping to bring their Cozmo robot to life, built a molecular beverage printer at Cana, and explored the future of human-robot interaction at Google. He currently leads robotics and automation efforts at a stealth startup in the food space.

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  Robert Sachon

  Head of Design, BSH

  2016 Commercial Equipment Jury Member

  Robert Sachon has studied free arts, product design and is a graduate of the Harvard Business School´s General Management Program (GMP). He can look back on a long design career in the household appliance sector. Among other things, he worked as a designer for the Siemens brand and was responsible for the design of the regional brands in Southern Europe and South America belonging to the BSH Group portfolio. Since 2005 he has shaped the Bosch brand as Global Design Director. His holistic design approach has been acknowledged with numerous international design awards. Only recently, Sachon and the Bosch Home Appliances Design Team were awarded the honorary title of “Red Dot: Designteam of the Year 2015“.

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  Bruno Saint-Jalmes

  Head of Creative Design and Concepts, Airbus

  2016 Commercial Equipment Jury Member

  In October 2013 Bruno was appointed Chief Designer of Airbus Group. Airbus Group management charged Bruno with giving the Airbus Group range a more emotional design language. On this basis, Bruno set up future vehicle products, new ideas, future initiatives and technology strategy as a guideline for future Airbus Group innovations – some examples of the major innovations he delivered are the A350XWB cabin, cockpit design and the Concept Plane Vision 2050, both resulting in a new passenger comfort & service experience as well as a higher airline efficiency.
  
  He oversees the Airbus Industrial Design Group and also provides leadership and direction for industrial designer teams across the company, as well as to foster a design excellence culture within Airbus Group. He is based in Munich, Germany.
  
  Previously Bruno was the Head of Design and Advanced Design at the Airbus Commercial Design Centre in Toulouse, France, from 1994 to 2013. His mission was to develop all the aircraft products, differentiating their individuality, and creating a seductive interior of cabins and cockpits.
  
  Prior to that he was in charge of car and product design at Renault-Matra's design studios from 1988 to 1993.
  
  Bruno began his career at French automaker Peugeot, where he was responsible for driving the style of small and mid-size cars.
  
  Bruno graduated from the École Nationale Supérieure de Création Industrielle with an MA in Industrial Design/Product Design

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  Stephanie Szarwark

  Senior Visual Designer, Enlisted Design

  2021 Commercial Equipment Jury Member

  Stephanie is a Senior Visual Designer at Enlisted Design, a visual and industrial design agency based in Oakland, CA where she brings brands to life through tangible visual design. Previously, she was a freelance brand designer, working with small Bay Area startups and large companies such as: Clif Bar, Nestlé, Ancestry, and Waymo (Alphabet). These projects ranged from packaging design to digital product illustrations to copywriting and art direction. Her diverse experience led her to specialize in helping clients hone their brand stories to better resonate with customers. Stephanie is particularly passionate about bridging the gaps between design and business strategy, and helping more people engage their own creative thinking.

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  Joshua Taylor

  CEO, Product EVO

  2023 Commercial Equipment Jury Member

  Josh Taylor is the CEO of Product EVO, a surfer dude, and a secret weapon for overwhelmed founders and product managers. He believes passion without good strategy is wasted energy. So he's on a mission to make successful products predictable and repeatable. His approach is to align the product development process with first principles for demand generation.
  
  Through Product EVO, Josh has helped develop hundreds of products and solved countless product development challenges along the way. He's created a curriculum for lean market research and product strategy for high-growth companies with limited time and resources.
  
  Outside of Product EVO, Josh is a landlocked surfer. He moves abroad with his family in the summers to chase waves during the big wave season in Central America. He is always looking for ways to expand his thinking about what is possible for his life and take massive action to live that way.
  

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  Mesve Vardar

  Director of Industrial Design, Humanscale

  2017 Commercial Equipment Jury Member

  Mesve Vardar is the Director of Industrial Design at Humanscale. With a decade of Humanscale experience behind her, Mesve Vardar has been a key contributor to a number of celebrated Humanscale products, including the Red Dot award-winning T7 Mobile Technology Cart. She joined the company in 2006 as a designer after earning a Master of Arts in Industrial Design from Pratt Institute. Before accepting the role of Design Director, Vardar worked as a Senior Industrial Designer and Researcher. In this capacity she worked on product development and research across categories, including seating, monitor arms, healthcare and lighting. Having conducted dedicated research into the future workplace, she is motivated by front-end thinking and the broad impact Humanscale can have on the changing office.

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  Spencer Wright

  Proprietor, ThePrepared.org

  2018 Commercial Equipment Jury Member

  Spencer Wright is a writer, operator, and mechanical designer living in New York City. At theprepared.org he runs a weekly newsletter on manufacturing, logistics, and the business of hardware product development. By day he works on industrial 3D printing software at nTopology.
  
  With a formal education in English syntax, Spencer built his project management experience in construction, learned to machine and weld building custom bicycle frames, and cut his engineering teeth designing structural and actuator assemblies for robotic sliding doors.