Jackson Square, San Francisco where architecture office and design agencies sit shoulder to shoulder. Among the crowd is the Samsung Design America (SDA).

SDA was started with the mind of creating innovation at Samsung Electronics ‘at just the right time with the right people’.

Creating the future with today’s reality

Here at SDA we oversee the entire gamut of the product development stage from end-to-end,  strategy, user experience, design, prototyping, and engineering to create a new product or even a new product line. Also, working with experts in a diverse range of fields to read and forecast the latest trends and create new business opportunities. One of the prime objectives of the SDA office is to open new opportunities for Samsung products. Bringing in exquisite hardware and software to service and lifestyle to create an ecosystem for new products to be introduced and thrive.

SDA focuses on ‘big changes’ with real impact

This is why we chose the location as San Francisco to be at the epicenter of innovation and change. The Bay Area is known for its culture of innovation. It’s a culture that embraces trial and error, that experiments and accepts failure. We want to tap into this culture to open new doors for tomorrow.

SDA TEAM

Product strategy

The product strategy team takes new categories and defines concepts, develops business, collaboration and marketing research & support.

Industrial design team

The design and development of new products within new categories are the role of the industrial design team. They also produce mockups of newly developed products and maintain new SDA product design specs.

UX team

The UX team handle early concept stages to final software versions of the user experience, prototyping and UI system architecture. The primary role of the team is establishing a guideline for the user journey as well as the final design.

SDA WORKS

Gear Fit

Gear Fit was SDA’s first wearable and Samsung’s first fitness device as well. It won the ‘Best Mobile Device’ award at Mobile World Congress in 2014, and its modular design, beautiful color display, and curved screen are still iconic today.  SDA design members pushed Samsung’s hardware expertise and had to balance information density in creating a “glanceable” experience.

Level Headphones Over

SDA created Samsung’s first effort in the premium headphone sector. The industrial design team built a sleek and minimalist design for comfort and an intuitive and simple touch experience on the side of the headphone for a truly user focused headphone set.

Galaxy View

Working closely with the Seoul office, the SDA office oversaw the entire project from original identification and incubation, through to manufacturing all the way through to the go-to-market process. The result was a new category in the entertainment market with using the Galaxy View.

Gear S

SDA worked closely with the Seoul office Product team on the final design, materials and straps. The product strategy team was involved in helping build the service partner ecosystem, explaining how partners could adapt their services to the new world of wearables and even going to New York Fashion Week to present the device with designers like Diesel and Swarovski.

Gear Fit2

The Gear Fit2 was a multi-department collaborative effort. The product strategy team worked with local sales and retail teams to develop the GearFit2, incorporating user and retail feedback into the design from it’s inception for music and sensor accuracy as a key features. As the project neared launch we helped support the local sales team with the positioning and go-to-market activities.

Gear Circle Headphones

Our designers wanted to be more fashion oriented with these headphones, designing a necklace that you would be comfortable leaving on and not have to worry about taking them out and untangling them.

Gear IconX

The SDA teams worked together to build Samsung’s first truly wireless buds, Gear IconX. Our design team did deep ergonomics testing to ensure that the buds would stay in and solved the difficult challenge of putting 4GB of memory in them so that you can load your MP3s directly to the headphone and leave your phone in the locker room at the gym.

Senior Designer Seounghyun Son (left) and Engineer Sunghan Park

Q. How did you approach the Gear IconX’s design?

Seounghyun Son: For the Gear IconX, we needed a design that would be iconic as both a wearable and an audio product, and would reflect the company’s innovative identity.

When it comes to crafting wearables, too much focus solely on design can be a detriment, and can even cause a product to be uncomfortable to wear. For the Gear IconX, we focused on achieving a balance, so it wouldn’t become too complex, nor too simple. The smooth triangular shape of the earbud is modern and intense, and we shaped it just right in order to evoke the sophisticated aesthetic that Samsung pursues.

Q. How did you select the three colors?

Seounghyun Son: The Gear IconX was designed for fitness as well as everyday wear, meaning it had to be wearable not only when exercising, but in daily life, too. That’s why we selected an understated black, white and blue.

To be clear, the variations are black and lime, white and silver, and blue and cyan. The main body of the earbud was given a muted color treatment and accented with aluminum highlights. When decorating the Gear IconX, we deliberated on which combination of colors would yield distinct character. The combination of black and lime, for instance, is sporty, trendy and enduring.

Q. What efforts were made to achieve an optimal fit?

Seounghyun Son: We measured the ears of numerous people, and they all differed in size and shape. So we focused on setting a range and finding a secure balance with the eartips and wingtips. There was no other way to test their fit but to try them out, one by one.

We adjusted the angle of the tip that goes inside the ear by 0.5-degree increments until we found the optimal slant. When it was decided, we altered the sizes of the eartips and wingtips and calculated an adequate range. In order to improve the fit, we conducted various internal tests, as well as satisfaction surveys with approximately 200 people who used the product during exercise.

Sunghan Park: There were a lot of factors to consider, as the Gear IconX is a small wearable device. For the wingtips, it was difficult to choose the three standard sizes, and we also put a lot of effort into honing the shape and choosing an ideal material.

The rubber wingtips wrap around the main body of the earbud, but they are thin and have holes, and can tear easily after being taken off several times. While a soft material would fit nicely, it would also tear easily. A harder material would be durable, but might hurt when worn.

In order to satisfy fit and durability requirements, the wingtips were given different intensities so that the part that directly touched the ear would feel soft and secure. It was also important to develop the product in a way that would allow it to remain pristine during use.

Q. What were some of the challenges in developing such a small product?

Seounghyun Son: It was nice to be in a position to set new rules—designing a new and completely cord-free product. But it was also challenging, as a lot of functions needed to be packaged in such a small frame.

Normally, sound quality improves with bigger drivers. However, we developed a new, smaller driver that could be loaded into the Gear IconX in order to facilitate both premium sound quality and a small frame. We also had to create enough room for an adequate touch area, and needed to consider how best to apply the aluminum detailing in order to achieve the premium-design aesthetic we were after.

Sunghan Park: The challenge was to create a structure that could fulfill various functions while maintaining a small profile. Structurally, the earbuds are divided into upper and lower parts, but these can become separated when subjected to external shocks, because secure connections are generally harder to achieve in small products. Also, if a user drops the Gear IconX, it will fall from a greater height than other earbuds. We therefore put a lot of effort into ensuring that the product would be stable and able to withstand falls.

Q. How did you incorporate the Gear IconX’s heart rate sensor?

Sunghan Park: The Gear IconX’s heart rate sensor slightly protrudes, because the function works better the closer it is to the skin. Finding the optimal angle and degree of that protrusion required several attempts.

We also carefully considered the design of the window covering the sensor. This process was more difficult than expected, because a change in the window’s shape would require modification of the left and right wingtips and the case design as well.

Q. Which factors did you focus on when making the charging case?

Sunghan Park: We were able to create a slim charging case by modeling its design after glasses cases, with a lid that could be closed after placing the earbuds inside. The lid’s design also required detailed consideration. The case needed to be able to be closed firmly for charging, but if it were too tight, the opening “click” would not feel right. So we found a nice balance.

The case matches the earbuds’ color, and we use a machine called a jig to hold and paint it. However, it was difficult to hold the case with the jig because it has a curved design and its inside also has curves corresponding to the shape of the earbuds. So finding a method to paint it evenly took some deliberation.

The Samsung Design America team collaborated to create the Gear IconX. From left to right: Adam Smith-Kipnis, Sameer Bhalla, James Lee, Alejandro Vallejo, Dennis Miloseski, Seounghyun Son, Rhys Bonahoom and Howard Nuk.