Leap: SCAD StartUp 2022
week-long design competition
About the project
Leap was a submission for the SCAD Startup 2022 competition. Startup is a week-long design competition open to all majors. Our team, Fab5, consisted of five students from three different majors: UX design, Interior design, and Advertising & Branding. In our initial phase, we came up with a topic and carried out research to determine the problem space and narrow down on our target audience. After that, we conducted ideation processes, such as crazy 8's for concept direction. With the concept finalized, we moved onto prototyping and finally creating our vision video. Throughout the week, we checked in with our mentor twice and went to a midpoint checkup to get feedback and make changes as needed.
Time Frame
10 weeks
Awards
My role
Fan Favorite Awards
Project Manager
Interaction Lead
Research Lead
Summary
We will spend cumulative weeks of our lives looking down at our phones. While smartphones have developed and evolved, our capacity to learn healthy usage habits has not.
Leap integrates with existing screen time technology to promote healthier relationships with your phone by allowing you to set achievable goals for downtime and influence your behavior. The messaging from Leap is encouraging, always focusing on the positives and your successes. We saw an epidemic of young people who are frustrated at their lack of ability to stay off their phones. It feels like such a simple task, but its execution feels monumental. Leap is here to help you; so, you can leap to more in life.
Research
The average user spends around six hours on their phone a day, which accumulates to almost seven days of the month. What would you do if you could reclaim a whole week stolen by your phone?
96.3% of surveyed millennials and Gen-Z users said they cannot imagine a world without technology. What about you? Can you picture it?
Our phones are encouraging mindless addictions which are affecting our mental health and physical control. Technology has become essential to daily life, and we can't get rid of it. But, we can evolve our interactions and connection with technology.
Leap
Leap is not an app, it’s a product. Leap integrates directly into the existing screen time software on IOS and android phones, because new apps are not the solution
The Leap module operates with a hydraulic base, rising with the press of a button for easy phone input and removal. The user presses the center button, inserts their phone, and selects their screenless time goal.Smart cover technology keeps the screen dark when the phone is in the module. This ensures that no pesky notifications disrupt the user’s flow.
The timer loop will then illuminate, indicating the screen less session has begun. The timer loop encourages the users by counting up rather than down, motivating them to reach their goal.
Business Model
Our product will be fabricated by Loop Industries, a company versed in recycled, sustainable, plastic production. By utilizing inexpensive materials we are able to keep fabrication costs low. The product will have a percent markup for profit.
We will sell both through a website, and alongside the companies we integrate with. But, our preferred method of sale will be through in-person interactions. We stand by our message and want to meet our customers to hear their stories, face to face. We will reach out to various companies to produce pop-up stores to generate a strong relationship between consumer and business.
We’re looking to partner with various influencers to normalize signing off, while launching an advertising campaign focused on helping our users to leap off the screen.
We see serious opportunities for expansion, specifically to users looking to teach their children about healthy technology consumption at an early age.