The White Space Product Development Challenge is a midwest inter-university competition created to strengthen students’ knowledge of design methodologies in product development and provide opportunities to interact with companies and industry professionals
White Space Product Development Challenge
Student Team Competition
The White Space Product Development Challenge is a cross-university competition presented by the Chicago Chapter of the Product Development Management Association in conjunction with the Northwestern University Segal Professional Bridge group promoting white space research that identifies a real-world problem to solve where there is currently no competition or the competition is falling short.
Teams will then work to develop a product to fit this market need. Each team is encouraged to bring their own problem space they would like to work on. Most teams have an idea from a previous class that they would like to explore further.
The competition is open to undergraduate and graduate students attending a university within 3 hours drive of Evanston, IL. Student team members can be in any school or discipline and must all be currently enrolled at the same university on a full-time basis.
You will gain hands-on learning outside of standard courses, including design research methodologies, advanced patent research process, filing a provisional patent, and design for manufacturability.
Demonstrate your talent by contributing to a team under “real world” constraints. This isn’t a business competition, it’s a product development competition, focused on identifying unclaimed whites space in the market and creating a viable solution to solve customers’ needs.
Sign up to compete here
Team Finalist Presentation
Challenge Deadlines
January 20, 2023 Individual Team Match registration
January 24, 2023 - Team Sign-up Deadline
January 28, 2023 - Kick-off “Design Day” Workshop at Northwestern Evanston, IL
March 5, 2023 - Phase I Written Proposals Due
March 11, 2023 - Finalists Teams Announced / Mentors Assigned
April 8, 2023 - Final Written Submissions Due
April 14, 2023 - Teams Presentations, Awards Ceremony
“The challenge helped me validate my idea before really pursuing it.”
- Chris Datsikas, NU ‘18
“The experience to learn from professionals was worth everything for me.”
- Emmanuella Ben-Eboh, UIC ‘19
Your team is invited to attend a free design-thinking workshop run by professors Dan Brown, and David Gatchell.
Over 50 students have attended in previous challenges and connected with students from Northwestern University, DePaul University, Milwaukee School of Engineering, Purdue University, and the University of Illinois at Chicago.
The workshop teaches the latest design methodologies to identify competitive advantages in product design. With highly interactive activities, students experience hands-on learning and are exposed to new methods outside their standard courses like ethnographic research, advanced patent research, and design for manufacturability.
“The challenge timeline was a perfect compliment to my class deliverables.
I felt it motivated my students who were not just designers or researchers.”
Professor Irem Tekogul (pictured & quoted) in collaboration with Professor Limia Shunia and Professor Brett Balogh, IIT
Finalist student teams will have the opportunity to present their research, concept, and prototypes to our esteemed panel of judges. After deliberation, the judges will assign finishing places. Prize money will be awarded to the top teams.
“This challenge is focused on the research process of creating a competitively advantaged product design, versus the common business plan competition where often the product competitive advantage is missing or yet to be developed.”
Professor Dan Brown, NU
