BACK Special interview of Aumster Lee, CEO of TOOUT Design
Author: Vincent Origin: Vision Union Time: 4 June 2007
Aumster Lee, CEO of TOOUT Design
Aumster Lee, born in the late1970s, now living in Hangzhou, is a senior industrial designer, industrial explorer and professional design manager proficient in analyzing the key-points in design from research on users’ feedbacks. Aumster Lee, CEO & CDO of TOOUT, has devoted his latest 8 years in design for industrial products in terms of furniture, consumer products and user experience, etc.
Vision Union: First, I’d like to thank you for accepting our interview with you. Would you please introduce the situation when you founded TOOUT and the development since then? What kinds of things leave you unforgettable memories and how many troubles you ran into?
Aumster Lee: TOOUT is just a studio set up from the year 2000 to 2002. Most of the industrial design organizations were fighting to survive then. All the things were in chaos. What design companies did was just do is improve the outlook of products for enterprises. Most of the time, they were playing as an “artificer”. We wish we could break the deadlock and do a real “design” with our full enthusiasm and our belief in seeking different innovation factors while reserving the common. In order to achieve the goal, we need to work out perfect methods to make every detail of the design original until it gets to our clients. Under this circumstance, we established TOOUT. All the things are ever developing and linked with one another, the original intention including our spirit to upset the status quo and our insistence to create the future.
The original idea of TOOUT determines that TOOUT will keep improving itself. We earned appreciation from our first customer –HUAWEI with our active design ideology and rigorous designing attitude. For 5 years, TOOUT become a designer for lots of brands such as PANASONIC、NEC、INTEL、LENOVO、HUAWEI、UTSTARCOM、DTT、SIMCOM、SNDA and so on because of its unique design ideology. Now, we are striving to be the think tank of the design industry.
There are all kinds of troubles all the way along the road of our development. However, the biggest trouble not only comes from design itself, but comes from the society. Firstly, we cannot fully figure out what is in need in the market technically in our first times. Thus, the cost of our design is too high to be carried out. Now, we have a department doing researches on the market and customers everyday, making it possible for us to create infinite value with limited resources. Secondly, lots of troubles occurred during our designing, for example, the way our customers examined and appraised our designs, the way they paid us, etc. Though there were so many obstacles, we accumulated lots of experience for future use.
We have a lot of unforgettable memories for these years. The most unforgettable one is our first cooperation with HUAWEI because it is a milestone of the development history of TOOUT. That cooperation made us have a deeper understanding of why the design industry exists. The way they handle issues and communicate with us laid the foundation of our cooperation with brand companies.
TOOUT’s designing environment
Vision Union: Would you please sum up your experience in running a business of your own?
Aumster Lee:
Experience I: It is very important to insist on your original ideology and choose which way to go.
Experience II: Make sure to create a good brand image. Make sure to be professional, honest, steadfast, persevering and rigorous. Make sure that you fully know what your customers need before you give out your design ideas.
Experience III: Be innovative. Be brave to search for new potential customers and new ways. Bear in mind that the spirit of design is innovation rather than pure design.
Vision Union: Would you please describe the goal of TOOUT in the future?
Aumster Lee: We hope we could play as the think tank within the design industry successfully, design products which could make people’s life better from our customers’ aspect. This is the way we are aiming at.
Vision Union: What kind of qualities do you think good designer need to have?
Aumster Lee: Firstly, a designer should possess professional skills, aesthetic view and communication skills. Secondly, he should be strict with himself. Try his best to be perfect. Meanwhile, he should be modest, a man of character. But, he must have a heart of mercy. The way of thinking of a designer urges his mind to design. However, it is not necessary for you to be an obstinate and unruly artist.
Vision Union: Lots of graduates, majored in industrial design nowadays are facing the great pressure from finding a suitable job after graduation. Do you have any advices for them? And what’s the premise to be a designer of TOOUT?
Aumster Lee: I’d like to just give them a few suggestions. I hope graduates could be more realistic, better recognize their own capability and appetite. And then do what they can do best in front of their eyes.
The standard for us to recruit a designer is very simple. First of all, the applicant should be a man of good character. Secondly, be a progressive man.
Vision Union: What’s your opinion on the education of industrial design in China?
Aumster Lee: In my opinion, the education of industrial design is a little bit out of date. I think the courses should be updated to improve students’ actual skills instead of pure theories. And schools should employ some teachers who have practical experience. This will make students get a deeper understanding of the design industry and have a determination to explore their own future.
Vision Union: What do you think of the industrial design industry in China?
Aumster Lee: The industrial design industry in China is now developing from the confusion to health in multi directions. Those designs in Beijing are of cultural flavor, tactful in Shanghai and much market oriented in Shenzhen. I think the industrial design industry in China Mainland, different from that in Taiwan, Korea and Japan, is still in the beginning stage. What we need is to find our own ways – the way applicable in China. Thank you!
Some cases of TOOUT:
3G- Video Telephone
This is a video telephone definitely designed for DTT who is specialized in 3G-TDSCDMA. Aiming at those businessmen and officers, this product has successfully solved the problems of privacy due to the fact that it is a video phone.
Game Set Handles
This is a very professional field with fighting flavor. It is developed from F 117, American-style invisible fighter so as to make those fighting games more like themselves. “Harshness” and “softness”, and black and white have been applied very well in it.
E-Home
This design wins the Concept Award of China Industrial Innovative Design Forum. The core of this case is eastern language act in concert with entertainment details to express the will to feel the trend of future life. It transmits the best part of the entertainment center.
