In the framework of Digital service design course 3 SDSI students took a challenge to improve digital solutions of innovation movement VEFRESH. Located in the industrial quarter of former electronics giant “VEF '' and its surrounding territories, VEFRESH aims to develop the “VEF '' district in Riga as a smart city solution sandbox. For students this was a work-with-real-client experience but for VEFRESH – first meeting with the service design.

In the research phase students found out that one of the most important audiences of VEFRESH are smart city start-ups. Company offers various services free of charge starting from hackathons with awards for best teams to business incubators with guidance of field professionals for serious new business idea developers. However, interviews with different start-ups showed that there is no clear understanding of what VEFRESH does, offer, how to apply for the programs and how it could help startups.

Students developed the solution – a new section in VEFRESH already existing web page, called “For startups''. In this section startups could find clear information about what Vefresh does, what it offers and how it’s possible to apply to the programs. The information is easy to consume – it involves information architecture, color coding, navigation and other user experience-oriented aspects.

Idea was tested in the Figma prototype. After user tests and following improvements, the final result was provided for the client. It turned out that service design could be helpful even for well-trained innovators.

Students: Paula Grasmane-Laše, Līga Lindenbauma and Laura Volkonovska

Tutor: Kristaps Banga