Why ITE?

Stroller

ITE works with companies ranging from the Fortune 500 to entrepreneurs and single inventors. Compass Baby Products was a startup company consisting of four people out of the Car Seat and Stroller industry. There was a CEO who was responsible for Product Definition, a Sales person, a Finance person, and a Manufacturing person. ITE was responsible for managing all of the engineering and product development activities for the stroller.

ITE started with a basic definition of the features that Compass provided based on their experience in the industry. ITE began the project in the early definition phase; we first assessed the competitive landscape by purchasing and benchmarking competitive units. We understood the market and were able to provide concepts that would fill the market gaps while incorporating some of the industry's best practices. ITE generated industrial design concepts as well as engineered the mechanisms to facilitate many of the stroller's unique feature set such as:

• Light weight
• One handed operation
• One-and fold and unfold...no bending over
• Full recline so baby can lay nearly flat
• "Sedan Ride" four-wheel independent suspension wheel system with metal posts will last for years, push wonderfully and ride smoothly for your baby
• 5-point safety harness and thick padding provides a comfortable, safe ride for baby
• Stands when folded to protect the cleanliness of the fabric and avoid scratching plastic parts
• Rotating handle for comfortable pushing--for taller caregivers too
• As you rotate the handle down, the person pushing the stroller can move further away from the stroller, helping taller people maintain a comfortable stride length
• Accepts the state-of-the-art Compass infant car seat
• Adjustable handle, tray for baby and parent tray
• Metal steering posts deliver high-quality tracking and a smooth push with no "shimmy and shake"

Using ITE's development process we were able to develop a highly successful product that achieved the product requirements while mitigating the risks along the way. We used best practices such as integrating analysis to ensure that the stroller was reliable and structurally sound while reducing the weight, and developed prototypes to test and validate various mechanisms and ergonomic features.

With the success of the stroller the four investors were able to grow and sell the company. Many of the strollers design features can still be found on company's new products today.

"The designers really thought through the design of this product as evidenced by some design features, such as the flap on the back that can be raised revealing a mesh window so that the person pushing the stroller can see the status of the baby while still behind it."
– A.D. Neal via Amazon.com Apr. 2013