CRM blogger Paul Greenberg has an interesting recent post which touches on diverse topics, including his experience when ordering a new custom laptop bag from Waterfield Designs. He also discusses the different views on mass customization held by Joseph Pine and Shoshanna Zuboff . He says: Joe’s thinking on mass customization is defined on page [...]

Italian auto news website DueMotori.com carries news about Mazda adding more options to its build to order facility in Japan, called Web Tune Factory . This facility (for Japanese market only) allows customers to order Mazda cars to their own specification. It appears to offer a very high level of customization options, as described in [...]

A newspaper called the Cumberland Times-News tells an interesting story about a family owned company called Roclith Blankets which provided personalized blankets for a new film called “We Are Marshall“, which stars Matthew McConaughey. The actor managed to pull an April fool joke on Clint Hillman of Roclith, by pretending that they had spelt his [...]

A couple of news items caught my eye recently, the first is a piece from the Houston Chronicle, describing how drug company NitroMed is targeting its advertising for BiDil, a heart disease drug developed specifically for African American patients. Separately, the Palm Beach Post reports on the BIO 2006 conference in Chicago, which focused on [...]

A website called Dexigner carries a story on Prior 2 Lever, a company which has launched the world’s first football boot made by selective laser sintering. The new boot is jointly developed by P2L and Loughborough University’s Rapid Manufacturing Research Group . The RM research group has been previously covered on this site, in connection [...]

Global Wireless Entertainment Inc. (GWE), has acquired SkinIt Inc., which provides on-demand physical personalization of mobile electronic devices. SkinIt has merged with GWE’s existing business, Cellfan.com.

Build-A-Bear Workshop, the soft toy retailer where children can make their own stuffed bear, have bought The Bear Factory, a British company which operates a similar concept in the U.K. They have also taken over their U.K. franchisee, Amsbra, Ltd.

Hearing technology company Sound ID has announced the availability of its first system designed for consumers who will benefit from improved sound quality in noisy environments. The Sound ID Personal Sound System combines Bluetooth and noise compensation technologies, sound processing algorithms (which address individual differences in hearing preferences), techniques that improve signal-to-noise ratio and advanced [...]

Third Wave Technologies Inc. and Mitsubishi Corporation have formed a joint venture to accelerate the development and commercialization of clinical molecular diagnostic products and pharmacogenetics in Japan and throughout the Asia-Pacific region.

Writing in iMediaConnection, Steve Johnson (CEO of ChoiceStream) discusses ‘Five Components of Personalization’. Although his article relates mainly to the personalization of marketing rather than end-products, it makes interesting reading.

Geomagic has opened its first branch office in Tokyo. The Geomagic Japan office was established in response to the increasing demand for Geomagic solutions in Japanese design, engineering, inspection and manufacturing organizations, including automotive, industrial and consumer manufacturers. It will provide enhanced service and support to Japanese automotive and electronics customers such as Toyota, Honda, [...]

A number of interesting announcements have been made in recent weeks in the area of personalized television services and technologies. First off, MatrixStream Technologies, Inc., have announced the world’s first H.264 AVC (advance video codec) Video on Demand and IPTV Set Top Box (STB) and PC Player capable of 1080 vertical pixels by 1920 horizontal [...]

Electronics industry website EMSNow has a short interview with Rich Heimsch of Protean Marketing. The interview touches on the idea that the increasing personalization of consumer electronics will benefit Western manufacturers, which are geared more towards short run production than the high-volume factories of Asia. This idea is discussed as a possibility rather than being [...]

British newspaper the Yorkshire Post recently carried an article on plans to develop pre-manufactured housing using components of buildings that can be combined in different ways. A non-profit organisation, Accent Group, plan to work with Canadian architect Avi Friedman (director of the affordable housing programme at Canada’s McGill University).  The article quotes Friedman: “What I [...]

I came across an interesting news item about research being carried out by Rhodes State College on tooling for agile manufacturing . What they are researching is tooling with a shorter development time and lifespan, so that new products can be brought to market more quickly. This is aimed at preventing ‘knock-offs’ (direct copies of [...]