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tangents

Exploring In All Directions
‍Down One Path, Up Another

Tangents

We start going down one path, and then take it in a completely different direction. This is where we explore ideas around insights, design, brand, and business development and how these topics affect our daily lives.

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The Trig Team
4.1.2015

International Home & Housewares Show: Our First Adventure

The team at Trig is always on the lookout for new and emerging trends in products across many industry sectors. We enjoy going to trade shows as a way to stay up on the hottest inspirations from our fellow industrial designers.

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The Trig Team
5.1.2014

Innovate Carolina 2014 Brings Together Area Product Development Community

On Friday, April 25, Trig Innovation participated in the Product Development and Management Association’s fifth annual Innovate Carolina conference in support of the Research Triangle’s product development community.

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Patrick Murphy
2.27.2014

Design Intent and Engineering Integrity in Short Order?

The product development process is a multi-stage endeavor. Informed by customer research and marketing analysis, strong opportunities drive the first legs of the race to get a product onto shelves. When the project is handed off to development, it is in these stages that opportunities become designs, and designs become products.

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Guest Contributor
2.20.2014

Marketing Balance: Long-term Payoffs versus Short-term Needs

When you lead a middle-market company’s marketing efforts, you know that there are lists of must-dos in the areas that provide for your company’s short-term needs for revenue, as well as long-term needs for brand-building.  Your never-ending task is to balance these respective needs within a finite set of resources, both internal and external, maximizing cash outlay with the smartest leveraging of human capital and technology.

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The Trig Team
1.6.2014

How to Import and Export Between Two Squarespace 7 Sites

The Trig team first started in website design with Squarespace 5 in 2011. With the release of Squarespace 7, we've been promoting the platform to not only start-up and small company clients, but mid-sized companies have been able to get a flexible marketing tool as well.

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The Trig Team
8.20.2013

Patrick Murphy Named Senior Industrial Designer at Trig Innovation

In a not-so-controversial move, Trig is pleased to announce the promotion of Patrick Murphy to the role of Senior Industrial Designer.

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The Trig Team
6.6.2013

Left to My Own Devices: Thoughts on the Do Lectures

I recently traveled to Wales for the Do Lectures Startup event, a global gathering of bright minds from across the spectrum of business, arts, sports, and more. It’s an event that is difficult to categorize, from the people, to the presenters, to the overall experience.

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The Trig Team
5.29.2013

Industrial Design: Digital Sketching with Patrick Murphy

Check out Trig Innovation's newest YouTube video, featuring lead designer Patrick Murphy showing off his digital sketching skills. With its huge ambition of improving the human condition, the field of industrial design has always been challenging and fascinating.

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The Trig Team
4.30.2013

NC State College of Management Features Trig Innovation Story

We’re honored that Sam Harris and the communications team at North Carolina State’s Poole College of Management recognized Trig Innovation and its founder, Ty Hagler (Jenkins MBA class of 2011), with a recent feature story on the college website.

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The Trig Team
4.17.2013

Lilly Ferrick—the Tangents Interview

Lilly Ferrick has taken business development at Trig by storm since joining the company just a couple of months ago, bringing a wealth of expertise and experience in selling industrial design solutions to her new role.

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The Trig Team
4.11.2013

Trig Innovation Sponsors PDMA’s Innovate Carolina 2013

Trig Innovation, a Durham, North Carolina-based innovation management firm, is pleased to announce its sponsorship of the 2013 Innovate Carolina conference</a>. Innovate Carolina, held annually at rotating sites in North Carolina and South Carolina, is in its fourth year as the signature event of the Carolinas chapter of the Product Development and Management Association.

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The Trig Team
4.3.2013

eDrawings App for iPad Review with Patrick Murphy

Patrick Murphy is the lead industrial designer at Trig Innovation, shaping products in multiple market sectors, including hardware, tools, medical devices, furniture, and products for the home. In his work at Trig, Patrick utilizes a variety of software platforms to bring new products to life in sketches, renderings, 3D CAD models, and animations.

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The Trig Team
3.28.2013

Brisley Joins Trig Innovation Design Team

Trig Innovation, an innovation management firm based in Durham, North Carolina, announces the addition of Drew Brisley to its industrial design team. Brisley is a 2012 graduate of North Carolina State University’s industrial design program, graduating with honors (summa cum laude).

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The Trig Team
3.20.2013

Digital Industrial Design Sketching with Patrick Murphy

In the above video, our lead industrial designer, Patrick Murphy, demonstrates his techniques for concept sketching on an iPad. Using the Wacom Bamboo Paper app, Patrick creates a drool-worthy sketch of a bicycle flashlight, intended to be mounted on the handlebars.

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The Trig Team
3.14.2013

Ferrick Joins Trig Innovation

Trig Innovation, an innovation management firm based in Durham, North Carolina, announces the addition of Lilly Ferrick to its business development team. A graduate of Florida International University, Ferrick arrives at Trig with a wealth of experience in consulting on behalf of industrial design and communications companies.

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Patrick Murphy
2.7.2013

Evolution in Design at Sling

During the 2002 Major League Baseball season, brothers and die-hard San Francisco Giants fans Blake and Jason Krikorian missed seeing some of the best games of the year due to their travels across the country. Finding this an unacceptable way to live, they devised a solution. Two years later, the Krikorian brothers founded SlingMedia.

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Tyler Hagler
12.18.2012

Too Many Windows: The Medical Device Tax

This brings us to the coming 2.3 percent medical device tax is going into effect on January 1, 2013, as part of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA). There has been a lot of very real upheaval, and not just rhetoric, in the device industry over the excise tax, as it is 2.3% of gross sales, as opposed to net sales.

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Patrick Murphy
12.13.2012

Evolution in Design

Design is constantly evolving. Design is the answer to problems that reside different environments, and environments are always in flux. Along with the development of new technology, new markets, new styles, and the ever-changing tastes of the human mind, design adapts to embody and satiate all of these factors.

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Patrick Murphy
11.15.2012

Thoughts on the Passing of Bill Moggridge

Bill Moggridge passed away on this past September, leaving many of us in the global design community saddened at the loss of not only a great designer, but a great person. He also leaves us with his monumental legacy achieved on two continents, in multiple areas of design—doing it, teaching it, and serving as one of its principal champions over the course of four decades. His influence will live on for at least as many to come.

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Tyler Hagler
10.4.2012

Back to School—Playing Out Effective Ideation at NC State

Earlier this month, I had an opportunity to go back to school—no, not like Rodney Dangerfield in the 80s, but back at the invitation of one of my favorite professors, N.C. State’s Dr. Jon Bohlmann, as he brings a fresh perspective to the Creativity in Management course by anchoring it in the principles of Design Thinking.

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The Trig Team
9.7.2012

SimpliciKey wins industrial design award

We are proud to announce that one of Trig’s signature clients, SimpliciKey®, has recently earned more recognition for outstanding industrial design in home products. A remote control electronic wireless deadbolt, SimpliciKey is a former winner of the designSPARK Award in industrial design.

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The Trig Team
8.16.2012

Defining Innovation

What is innovation? Perhaps just as importantly, what isn’t innovation? As an innovation consultant, I’ve heard several limiting definitions, particularly in the product development space. But for me, it’s a pretty expansive term.

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Guest Contributor
8.7.2012

Perception Is Reality—A Lesson in Human Factors

Guest blogger Rob Packard is a quality and regulatory expert with over 20 years of experience in managing product development for the medical device, biotechnology, pharmaceutical industries.

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Tyler Hagler
7.31.2012

A Way Forward for Medical Device Innovation

In a Q+A session, Stuart Karten, a California-based industrial designer and juror for the Medical Design Excellence Awards, talks about the intersection of consumer products and medical design.&nbsp; Karten correctly documents the power of the first impression, since consumers often inform their buying choices with that powerful first interaction with a product.

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The Trig Team
7.10.2012

Kvalheim’s World of Animated Characters

As we’ve written about in previous Tangents Trig Innovation added animation services to its product design and marketing repertoire last year. Our team of industrial designers has quickly picked up strong skills in creating animated videos that tell the story of a product's beauty and benefits to the customer.

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Patrick Murphy
5.29.2012

The Unmistakable Power of Icons

Out of all the artistic expressions I have the privilege to explore in my world of industrial design, there’s nothing that provides the instant gratification of an icon, whether it’s placed on a product or used in marketing applications to sell it. In other words, I love a good icon.

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Tyler Hagler
5.24.2012

Innovation: Being Everything for Somebody

Sometimes you hear a compelling speaker, and you just can’t get it out of your head in the following days and weeks. We had this happen to us at last year’s Carolinas PDMA Innovate Carolina conference with David Burney’s compelling breakout session on community-driven innovation through his work at New Kind and Red Hat. And this year, it’s happened again at the same conference, 2012 edition. Thanks a lot, Greg Hopper.

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Tyler Hagler
5.24.2012

The Importance of Visual Scribes in Ideation

While the product design and development process as a whole can take months, sometimes years, depending on the industry and the product, great ideation sessions can provide the vision and roadmap for the product development portfolio.

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The Trig Team
4.26.2012

PDMA Innovate Carolinas 2012—What We Learned

Year after year, we participate in what has become a must for area innovators to fuel their respective creative fires—the Product Development and Management Association’s Innovate Carolina conference. This year marked another stellar conference, hosted last Friday at Raleigh’s Long View Center, an emerging haven for entrepreneurs in the heart of the downtown business district.

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The Trig Team
4.12.2012

Meet the Trig Crew—Patrick Murphy

Patrick Murphy joined the Trig crew in the spring of 2011 as an industrial designer, upon the recommendation of another Trig designer, Smith Newnam. We owe Smith quite a bit for this great referral, since Patrick has quickly established himself as a formidable design talent within Trig’s innovation management strategic framework.

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The Trig Team
3.22.2012

Trig Innovation Sponsors PDMA’s 2012 Innovate Carolina Conference

Durham, North Carolina’s Trig Innovation is proud to partner with the Product Development and Management Association (PDMA) as a platinum sponsor for the organization’s upcoming Innovate Carolina conference. The Carolinas chapter of the PDMA will host its third annual innovation conference on Friday, April 20, 2012 at the Entrepreneurship Music Arts Collaboration (EMAC) at Raleigh, North Carolina’s historic Long View Center.

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Patrick Murphy
Tyler Hagler
3.1.2012

SolidWorks Poses Competitive Advantage for Industrial Design

Many industrial design firms working in product development rely on surface modeling to express their creative vision for a product in development. Surface modelers such as Rhino, 3D Studio Max, and Alias StudioTools all have a high degree of usefulness in building complex surfaces.

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Patrick Murphy
Tyler Hagler
2.16.2012

Industrial Design: Strategic Context Is Everything

Industrial Design is the bridge between marketing and engineering. The part we play in the process can make or break a product. We know where we stand and we want to provide excellence for you, our client.

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Tyler Hagler
2.2.2012

Fertile Ground - Customer Research at the Launch Phase

This week, Trig is attending the Southern Farm Show at Raleigh’s North Carolina State Fairgrounds from February 1-3. Over 300 exhibiting companies from the world of farm equipment will make the Southern Farm Show the largest exhibition of its kind in the Carolinas/Virginia area of the country.

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Tyler Hagler
1.26.2012

Trig Announces Launch of Mustard Tree Instruments® Animation

Recently, one of our favorite clients, Mustard Tree Instruments®, challenged us to do something new after we had just collaborated with them on a successful design project. The challenge— to create an animated video piece in support of its new product, the Mustard Tree Verifier™ Tri Test 1000.

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The Trig Team
1.5.2012

USPTO Patent Awarded to Atiyeh, Hagler for FizzLoc Soda Clamp

January 5, 2012 (Durham, NC) Trig® Innovation, a Research Triangle, NC-based innovation management firm, announces a patent award for one of its product collaborations, the FizzLoc Soda Clamp. FizzLoc is a compression device developed by Phil Atiyeh of product innovations, LLC of Cheshire, Connecticut in collaboration with Trig® Innovation.