HP 3D Multi Jet Fusion

I joined HP 3D back in 2016, as a Senior Interaction Designer, responsible for the Multi Jet Fusion system - back then a new HP’s brand series of products designed to revolutionise additive manufacturing and the 3D printing as we know it.

From 2019 to 2023 as the CE/UX Section Lead I was in charge of the group of multi-disciplinary designers working on Multi Jet Fusion portfolio of hardware assets (42oo and 5200 series); where my role included strategic definition of business roadmap, as well as full-cycle product development - from initial research to final implementation.

You can learn more details of the process by requesting a password for the following case studies:

Automatic Unpacking Station

Research process

Design challenge.

 

Every designer likes a good challenge, yet I wasn’t even remotely aware of the one expecting me, when I joined HP 3D business unit.

Multi Jet Fusion solution is the group of products for industrial manufacturing environment that require very specific approach, where the main design goal is efficiency and effectiveness of the user.

However, this purist, almost militia-like approach to design, is what makes you to appreciate the design process the most: stripping out all the elements, leaving only the interfaces that provide unique value for the users, makes you put your persona in the center as never before.

Designing for the brand new technology also brings its complications, as each day can bring new challenges, that you need quickly to adapt to.

Design process.

HP uses it’s proprietary Product Life Cycle process, that is based on multi-disciplinary collaboration, where design discipline is instrumental through all the steps of the lifecycle - as a design team, we follow the Double Diamond process, accompanying the product development from initial research to the new product introduction.

Exploration and research

Initial research activities team performs can be broken done in 3 main steps:

  1. Customer visits and interviews
    We kick out each project with an ethnographic research, with a goal to understand each customer’s pains & motivations, specific needs of their E2E workflow and facility layout.

  2. Workshops and co-creation sessions
    After gathering initial information, we organize the series of workshops and co-creation sessions to deep-dive on customers needs and priorities.

  3. Insights generation
    Based on those learnings we define product E2E exerience intent and design brief; when as well generate the series of supporting deliverables: customers archetypes, personas, experience scenarios, user journeys, etc.

Prototyping and Validation

When UX requirements are defined, we use Lean UX process for designing a product, where the continuos evaluation of findings is a key. From cardboard models of the machines and paper sketches we progress towards more advanced prototypes with each iteration.


However, the biggest challenge (and personal fulfilment) comes from synchronising digital and physical interfaces into integrated E2E workflow. Both disciplines of ID and UI design have the same level of importance when it comes to designing a complex eco-system, that makes having a hawked-eyed overview of all design activities especially important.

Customers and Expert reviews

The moment the functional prototype is finished, we start expanded validation activities with alpha and beta customers - they are able to run a product in their own facility, when we run our qualitative research: shadowing of operators, interviews of different user roles, surveys, etc.


At the same time we as well perform internal evaluations in form of of usability, human factors and ergonomic reviews.


This allows us to refine the product even in the later stages of the development.

Design results.

MJF Series proved to be a successful products, delighting the industrial customers all over the world as well as a winner of several prestigious design awards. So what helped up to achieve it?

  1. Agility
    Releasing a product in a corporate environment usually equivalents to “slow”, yet we were able to speed up the development process thanks to the possibility of quick iterations.

  2. Collaboration
    One thing that proven to be the key of success in cross-teams collaboration. On one hand working together with Marketing Product owners to refine the value proposition of the solution, and, on the other, with R&D to understand possible technical limitations, put design discipline in the middle: bringing a balance to the product definition.

  3. Customer first
    What makes this balancing exercise possible is always having customer in the center. Partnering with our users through all the process of product development is what generates value of our solution.