Turian Tales 2020 | A year in review

If we have to capture the year 2020 through an analogy, then a high-speed roller coaster ride fits the bill. Just like the adrenaline rush we experience while going through a series of ups and downs, this year reflected a similar experience. The world went topsy turvy with the pandemic hitting globally. A telling quote from an MIT article:

"In an age of artificial intelligence, genomic medicine, and self-driving cars, our most effective response to the outbreak has been mass quarantines, a public health technique borrowed from the Middle Ages."

We worked on more than 100 assignments across fintech, edutech, consumer tech and conglomerate business envisioning using Design Thinking & Futures Thinking in 2020. Our special focus remained Next Billion Users.

Here is a summary of actions, reflections, learnings, innovations and future foresights from Turian Labs. Hope the next year brings a renewed vigour for moving through this wonderful world we live in.

Warm wishes for 2021 to all our employees, interns, clients, partners, associates, alumni, academia and well-wishers at large. May our elders from whom we learnt this art & science of innovation, stay healthy. May the young who are on this course despite all odds, thrive.

Hope you enjoy this edition of Turian Tales.

Manoj Kothari

Five Tenets of Design for an Inclusive World 2021

Our team has been working extensively with NBUs or Next Billion Users, who are first time internet users, across several countries in the world. We asked our team if they can recall an important facet of an inclusive design for tech they experienced in 2020. Here is what they had to say:

1 | Latency, a virtue

First time internet users are not really matching up to Moore's law. Their equipment lags the elites by several notches. While India is aiming for 90% of the population to be on the internet by 2030, internet speed is likely to play truant here and in several other parts of the world. This requires products and services that use the internet, to be designed with a few seconds latencies in mind to allow buffering and provide feedback during the buffer. As a user in explained:

 “Sometimes the app does not tell me it has stopped working because of the net (internet) issues, I need to check whether my data is on or not in the top bar (notification bar)...this happens so much that even when my phone hangs I feel like because of the internet this app is not working”

2 | Complex but aspirational

Contrary to the popular belief that users from lower economic or educational backgrounds prefer a simplified way of using their devices, we found such users embracing complicated challenging workflows. This ‘complexity’ made their task completion journey gratifying. 

“I like to discover new English words on my apps...when I see words that I didn’t know before I google their meanings I feel like my English improves because of it” - A user talking about how despite having low English proficiency, he prefers to use his device in English since it’s a challenge he enjoys.

Another user mentioned (a homemaker we met who is an active day-trader on Zerodha, though investing tiny amounts), “I think of the future. With stocks I get excitement… getting returns in 15 days. With gold it needs 4 years...hence investing in stocks is satisfying...”

3 | Design for cognitive continuum

Users that have recently shifted from a feature phone to a smartphone, have a library of icons and diction in their memory to guide them through the new technology. Interfaces that assist onboarding users onto the smartphone universe, tend to be better accepted.

“I don’t know what is ‘Contacts’....my (feature) phone had ‘Phonebook’ that had all the numbers is this the same thing?”

4 | Big & bold

Oftentimes lower-end smartphones have a relatively poorer resolution and low contrast. Users also tend to use screens that are broken, designing CTAs (click-through-actions) and affordances that are large, farther-apart and clearer can prevent accidental taps caused by bad and broken screens even in high contrast environment

“My phone that I use to get rides, lasts 10 to 12 months only. Because it is always in the heat; always charging; always on and I keep the brightness on maximum or else I can’t see during the daylight” - Uber driver speaking about his secondary phone that he uses to get rides.

5 | Multi-usership of personal products

Next Billion Users often have to share their devices within family/friends/community and a constant fear of losing important personal files or critical app data looms on their minds. Need for privacy in the publicly shared devices are in demand in the digital space, as much they are in physical realm.

“I don’t add items in the cart that I want to really buy...I have a different account, I save my favourite items there.... Otherwise my mom can see what all I am interested in purchasing before I get a chance to discuss with her” - A user speaking about her challenges of using the same online shopping app account.

Preparing for the Future with Megatrends

One of the strong knowledge practices within Turian Labs is Megatrends and Futures Studies. As the world struggles understanding the black-swan events this year, futures study and strategic foresights is becoming an important tool in the corporate arsenal. This year saw us conducting large format vision-setting ideation workshops with selected CXOs of a large Indian conglomerate.  These workshops were based on synthesis of our own India megatrends and a set of close to 30 global reports on different sectors, our client brought in.

How megatrends are affected by the pandemic and how they would shift the course of things now on, have been articulated by Manoj Kothari in an article here.

The advent of Virtual Research

Travel has been an integral part of our User Research studies. But with all our travel options closed, we learnt and practiced the whole new art of conducting ethnography/empathic research remotely. This year, through the lockdown, our team completed around 100 projects using remote-research methodology. We even ran a co-creation workshop for strategy sessions with global clients as part of consulting engagements with Google, German Accelerator, and a global mobile phone brand. You can read more about our learnings on how to do them efficiently here. 

Helping international startups with India-market-entry strategy with German Accelerator

With the extensive body of work in understanding Indian consumers and market dynamics we have been working with global clients and especially with accelerators and startups on their India Entry Strategy. One hallmark of this year was our engagement with German Accelerator, where we partnered with them on the Next Step India program. Although the program was designed to be an in-person one, the pandemic induced lockdown turned it into a remote program. We just wrapped up the 3rd cohort of startups which were from the AI, IoT, logistics, mobility and sustainability domains. 

As part of the program, we help the German startups sharpen their value proposition from an India entry standpoint through a triangulated approach. This encompasses decoding of the changing user behaviour, understanding cultural sensibilities and the essence of doing business in India.

So far, we have engaged with over 20 startups. Our teammate Sajid Khetani, who is leading the engagement writes about two sectors of interest and promising startups from Germany, therein:

1. Electric Vehicles in India | Improving last-mile efficacy 

Electric vehicles may be the future, but at the moment they form a minuscule portion of overall automobile sales India. Demand for micro-mobility is rapidly rising. The bulk of EVs are two-wheelers - (600,000 as of Mar 2019). On further drill down, we discover that the majority of these two wheelers are either being sold in tier 2 or tier 3 markets or are widely seen as part of the shared mobility infrastructure or used for the last-mile deliveries. 

One of the key determinants of success of a thriving EV ecosystem is the availability of a widespread charging infrastructure, as ‘range anxiety’ rides supreme in the purchase of an EV. We came across two startups whose offerings are aligned to this problem:

Swobbee 

Last-mile delivery providers and the shared mobility providers need fully charged batteries with the least possible downtimes. This is where Swobbe comes in with its ‘battery-as-a-service’ solution. The ubiquity is their modular solution. It provides the ability to store multiple battery types under one station, which is a great value add in a differential battery type situation. Do check them out here.

Rytle

Last-mile delivery has its own share of challenges in India. Finding the current location is definitely a problem, but beyond it is the accessibility of the last-meter, considering the density of urban layouts. This is where Rytle with its modular approach with a box-in-a-box solution aims to help in last meter delivery for goods. Their modularity begins from large vehicles which act as a hub, which has electric tricycles built-in along with the delivery boxes. This decreases the vehicle querying at warehouses along with decreasing the touchpoints for delivery. Do check them out here. 

2. Healthcare | AI led diagnostics + decision support

The Indian healthcare system has evolved significantly over the years, with the eradication of polio, reduction of infant mortality rate, and improvement in the overall delivery of medical services. Private sector has led improvements in the diagnostic, preventive and wellness space, along with strengthening the specialised care delivery. This has improved the availability of healthcare across the spectrum of care and delivery, at least in an urban context. Unfortunately, the rural areas or the Tier 3 towns still face a lack of readily accessible healthcare services, which are primarily driven by the public sector. Two startups that stand out here are:

Canostix

Cancer is very prevalent in India, especially in places where early diagnosis is a challenge. Early detection can drastically improve the survival rates of infected people. Canostix aims to deliver on this value proposition by relooking at the way cancer is detected at the present moment. With a simple blood test, they aim to improve the accessibility of early cancer diagnostics to anyone who needs it at an affordable price point. Do check them out here.

RAMP Medical

Wrong treatment to the patients can cause side effects, which may lead to increased medical expense and adverse outcomes. Doctors rely on their experience, other literature like medical journals and the patient’s medical history to come to arrive at a therapeutics direction. RAMP Medical with its AI led decision-making offers significant support in predicting whether the specific combination of therapies is the best and safest for that patient. Do check them out here.

Living the Design Thinking life at Turian Labs

How does a Design Thinking company, preaching the exalted tenets of the art to the world, really implement the basics in it’s own workplace? Here are some reflections from our team-mate, when asked spontaneously - ‘What is that one thing that you can recall, about Design Thinking culture adoption in our work practices?”

It was a part of Manoj’s talk on Making a Better Workplace using Design Thinking. Do check out.

Design Thinking led Innovation - 5 years and counting

Turian Labs completed five years, early April 2020. It has been a phenomenal journey and we have had opportunities to work on some enviable research and strategy mandates across the globe. The factors that played a critical role in making this journey of a fledgeling domain and that of a startup, different & exciting, have been put together in an article by Manoj Kothari.

In the mid of this year, Google confirmed buying a minority stake in Jio Platforms. Working with Google as a preferred global UX research and innovation strategy partner since 2015, we can say that Google puts in some serious effort in delivering the promise through deep empathic enquiry and rapid prototyping, which are the cornerstone of Design Thinking led Innovation. 

One of the immediate impacts from an innovation perspective is an affirmative push towards Design Thinking and rapid UX research sprint methods in the Indian business ecosystem, shifting away from classical market research and inside-out-innovation.

Do write to us what you think about Turian Tales 2020 here.