Strategic design for sustainability: towards a new mix of products and services

The transition toward sustainability will require a deep change in the industrial culture. In particular a re-orientation of business ideas will be needed, moving from the traditional product-oriented kind of business to a new, product-service-oriented one. In this framework, the same meaning of the term “design” has to be enlarged and the concept of “strategic design for sustainability” has to be introduced. With the expression “strategic design for sustainability” is meant the development of an integrated system of products, services and communication that is coherent with the medium-long term perspective of sustainability being at the same time economically feasible and socially appreciable today. This paper links the concept of strategic design for sustainability to the one of “leapfrog strategy” (i.e. a direct shift from one mix of producers and services to another) introducing some examples and discussing their implications in the context of the emerging information and services society