SDA Bocconi and Messe Frankfurt will Study the House of the Future

STARTING FROM THE FACTORY TO VALUE ITALIAN DESIGN, WITH INDUSTRY 4.0 IN MIND: THIS IS THE THEME OF A RESEARCH PROJECT THAT WILL BE COORDINATED BY CARNEVALE MAFFE' AND LOJACONO

“The ideal house is a factory of sustainable living, run by a network of devices able to communicate with each other, devices that must be smart and beautiful at the same time”. With these words Carlo Alberto Carnevale Maffè, SDA Professor of Stategy and Entrepreunership, resumes the core of the research project that will be realized by SDA Bocconi in collaboration with Messe Frankfurt Italia.

Restarting from factory to value Italian design is the title of the project that will be coordinated, on a scientific level, by Carnevale Maffè and Gabriella Lojacono (Management and Technology Department) and whose results will be presented in December 2016. The research is aimed at rethinking the models of production in the decor sector in order to increase the competitiveness of Italian companies operating in this branch. All this, starting from the demand and focusing attention on the 4.0 industry phenomenon, based on advanced technologies able to understand and predict the consumers’ needs.

“The key-aspects are the strategical use of technology and sustainability: a kitchen is sustainable when it doesn’t waste energy because it starts and stops the cooking in the right moments”, explains Carnevale Maffè, who makes a clear distinction between the sub-system of objects and the system of lifestyle, “The integration of all the objects in a smart system improve the quality of life: the objects of the future are learning devices, collecting information on consumer lifestyle. As a browser learns the users’ tastes and preferences, also a bed can do it, learning when and how long the consumer sleeps and adapting to his habits”. It is therefore important to develop a closer relationship between the consumer and the whole industry, from factories to dealers; the company has to know who buys the products and how and for how long they’re used. “Our objective is to analyze the Italian market as well as all productive realities in this sector on a national level to understand if there are the conditions to make this step forward and if even demand is ready for that”, continues Carnevale Maffè, “It’s an ambitious but possible project”.  

by Benedetta Ciotto