My name is Leandro Agro' and I am an awarded IxD/UX Director, IoT Guru, patents contributor, with 15+ years of design and team leadership. I work as: Digital Product Director @Design Group Italia. Customers list includes: PepsiCo, 3M, ABB, Unilever… “Design isn't just about shapes or pixels anymore. Design is the process that shapes product behaviors, communities, companies and -in the end- builds new worlds” Side activities: FrontiersX | SrLabs | JoinPad | TOK.tv

My co-founder Matteo Penzo, introduced the brand new edition of the Frontiers Health conference that will be curated by Roberto Ascione (in the picture). FRONTIERS HEALTH  will take place on November 15-16 at FUNKHAUS BERLIN. Healthcare is being transformed and to a good extent will be…

Road to Berlin: Frontiers Health is back!

Talking on the very same day, stage and event of Reid Hoffman? #Done. :) My interest for autonomous drive and the novel design perspective of this specific kind of connected objects, is giving great results. The location was stunning and my speech was very welcomed…

Autonomous Drive: Talk @ConnectedCity

I do not speak about our business projects usually.  However, there are moments and situations that allow us to unveil something related to our everyday job. This is the case of the innovation center recently opened by ABB. I well remember my first day in…

4y! from zero to everything connected

Listening Roberto Bonzio‘s stories it is like to travel to California, or -perhaps- better. In fact is very well know that California is a “state of mind”, and Roberto -supported by a fabulous live soundtrack- brought the whole Californian feeling into the BlueNote night.  …

IdF LIVE @BlueNote Milano

“If, as Ellul has it, technology is the state religion, Singularitarianism must be seen as its most extreme and fanatical sect. It is the Opus Dei of the postwar church of gadget worship. Ray Kurzweil may be the best-known prophet of this order, but he…

Vernor Vinge’s “Religion”

Some shots from my quick trip to Venice, where I was speaker @EICS conference. The title of the speech was:”Augmented Minds”.   “Augmented Reality does not serve machines, but us, humans. With it, we are attempting to overcome our own nature and to extend our…

European Summit Immersive Computing

Thanks to our friends from WARNER BROS we achieved a small but precious dream: to see READY PLAYER ONE in a private premiere. Joining the forces between FRONTIERS CONFERENCE, JOINPAD, TAG and DGI, it was possible to get a dedicated movie theatre :D and involve a…

READY PLAYER ONE (Premiere)

According Wikipedia, “David Rose (born February 19, 1967) is an award-winning product designer, entrepreneur, and lecturer at the MIT Media Lab. David is on a mission to make technology subtle and polite; to dissolve into the fabric of the everyday”. That’s is fantastic description, but…

David Rose

Few days ago, I had the pleasure and honour to talk about UX -> Digital Transformation and Design Thinking with the Italian Compagnia delle Opere. The webinar, recorder live in Milan, reached about 150 small software houses. note: This one hour seminar (about 120slides) will…

UX Webinar with 150 small software houses

I can’t say nothing, but we are super-satisfied by the opportunities emerged during this Californian trip.  Here are all the non-business related highlights from the (some of the) places where I went: Apple (best in-store AR/VR and venue), Logitech (best Art exposition), Cyngn (best meeting…

Stealth mode ON

I had great time in Rome, together with SARA’s core people. My role was to inspire them with a speech crafted around digital transformation, design thinking and the role of “identity” into the trust economy. SARA is THE insurance company that was conceived -in 1946-…

ConvAction SARA (Rome)

After weeks spent in the Bay Area, heavily involved in Autonomous driving vehicles, AI, Robotics, Digital transformation projects, make sense just to stop for a while an meet this old irony friend.

The Golden

For a couple of years I lead the Talent Garden Innovation School UX Master. It was a good experience for me, and -as Design Group Italia- we were so lucky to meet the talents that emerged in these classes (and hire some of them). During…

TAG MasterUX | Caminetto Night

I was a speaker in this very cool ING DIRECT event dedicated to Fintech’s startups. Special Guest Martin Wezowski, Chief Designer at SAP.   AI, bots and blockchain technologies will be essential in the future of banking. Here are a few images from the event. Also,…

ING Direct CHALLENGE

We hosted @DGI the whole smartdesign Master Course: about 60 students lead by Venanzio Arquilla, from Politecnico di Milano. “A nice evening discovering the real design life“.

Smart Design @DGI

I spoke about the connection between artificial intelligence and design at Swiss Center, in a conference organized by Casaleggio.  Connection -> Data -> Intelligence -> Empathy.

Artificial Intelligence meets DESIGN

I saw this band for the first time in Boston, more than 10y ago. Later I meet them again in Houston, where they were in tour. Lat year I saw them in Berlin, as Frontiers Health party and now Milan. Art, science, music mixed together…

Blu Man Group

Joinpad, the augmented reality firm for the IIoT, was on stage @FutureLand. #business_milestone Program of the day |VRARA Meetup

Joinpad @FutureLand

H-International School is an IB World School, authorized by the International Baccalaureate up to the Middle Year Programme. Today I remotely spent one hour with the students, talking about “what it means to be a designer”. I hope all the best for those young guys. They are…

Back to school / They were young

NEXUS is a local Science Event that is organised in Sesto San Giovanni. Inspired by “Internet of Humans“, my Publisher EGEA, invited me to give a speech about DESIGN and Superpowers: Here is my deck.   The Fondazione Bassetti, supported by my friend Fabio Besti,…

NEXUS: Design & Superpoteri

Friday was a very special day. I spent the whole afternoon @MMN in Trezzo, close to Milan. For many people around, this place is “just” the best Apple dealer in Italy. To me, this place, is the reign of tech toys. I started this Friday session, fixing…

This is MMN: Realm of inspiration, Apple tech and Museum

Last week, I spoke at EXPLORE talks:”Innovation and Design Trends”. Two days with top class international speakers to explore everything you need to know about innovation and design thinking. During the event you will enjoy plenary sessions and four thematic tracks with keynote speeches and…

Design e/è Trasformazione / EXPLORE

With the exclusion of Warner Bros and Symantec, I do no partecipate often to other companies’ internal meeting. This time I have made an exception for Sas. In fact, those guys involved me in a really innovative way. Sas organised a sort of internal talent,…

Sas goes X-factor style (and I was in the Jury)

Stranger Things is on Air (and it is absolutely great) while very a strange sky is over our heads. / Those pict weren’t photo edited

Inusual Sky / High altitude wind

Star Wars Movie Night – Private Screening of ‘Consign To Oblivion’ at Design Group Italia At this first-ever DGI movie night, we will screen ‘Consign to Oblivion’, a non-profit feature film inspired by the famous Star Wars saga.Directed by Francesco Dell’Oro, Silvio Bergamaschi, and Alessandro…

Star Wars night @DGI

  From the original event’s website // 20 Ottobre 2017 | #UxTalk: #UX Big #Players. Alcuni dei migliori #professionisti del mondo #digitale si confrontano sulle implicazioni #professionali della disciplina e sul suo impatto tra gli addetti ai lavori sia a livello #organizzativo che #progettuale. Ospiti…

UX Talk: UX Big Players

Being the organiser of an event like that, is an honour. NASA | SAP | Amazon | SAS | GE | Eurotech | Generali | Vodafone | Fjord | Jibo | Arduino |  IGP Decaux | Design Group Italia | Digital Magics | Logotel | Corlina |…

Frontiers CONF: Spare Picts 1/2

For those that needs more SPACE.

NASA @MI

“Smart products should be empathetic to connect with people that will use them.” Leandro Agro @SMART DESIGN Politecnico di Milano – Facoltà del Design course, exploring product and digital design (aka Internet of Things). SaveSave

IoT Lecture @SMART DESIGN

During last months I co-designed a “Innovation Pipeline” that brings both consultancy and design competence, mixed in a very pragmatical way. This methodology, conceived together with Alessandro Braga (Ambrosetti) and GianAndrea Giacoma (Design Group Italia), is called MA.DE. MADE is a collaboration between DGI and…

MA.DE. (when Consultancy meet Design)

The “Monday Breakfast” is a new great tradition running since early 2017 @DGI Milan Headquarter. This specific meeting was held my the Digital Team, showcasing trends and recent projects.

Monday Breakfast

This is the perfect moment to reaffirm the value of SCIENCE in our society. For this reason I was proud and happy to be part of the GALILEO SCIENCE FESTIVAL event organised in Padua. The academic community has brought science to the streets, counting more than 40K…

Internet of Humans, Sold-out event @Galileo Science Festival

Design Thinking is living a golden age as “new” buzzword. What is OLD for the design industry, recently become the “cutting edge” approach to innovation, for the business consultancy world. Unfortunately WE, the design industry, are not able to re-packadge and sell the already aged Design Thinking…

Design Thinking Observatory: first date.

 

Frontiers Conference is designed to provide a unique experiential platform to learn, exchange and get inspired on the topics of digital disruption and technologies in design, health, AI, robotics, 5G, industries 4.0, software, communication. As with all Frontiers conferences, experience is king, with a variety of hands on workshops, immersive sessions and thought-provoking keynotes. | https://frontiersconf.com

Frontiers Conference | Short Movie

→

Industry 4.0 is bringing disruption to many companies, impacting how customers are engaged, how technologies are employed and how value is created. The design thinking methodology aims to guide companies to discover the key insights and define the correct course of action when developing new…

Fog Computing on Steroids

TOK.tv launched the official Real Madrid app in China (this one, fully managed and monetized by us) with a great event in Beijing. A picture with fabrizio Capobianco (TOK.tv CEO) and the legend Emilio Butragueño (a.k.a. El Buitre). THE OFFICIAL PRESS RELEASE FROM REAL MADRID…

China Wave: TOK.tv & RealMadrid

Design Group Italia NYC moved to Galvanize, co-working & event space. Address: 315 Hudson St, New York, NY 10013, USA

Galvanizing DGI @NYC

I really don’t know if this explanation is true. Douglas, said that is easier of that:”It was a joke”. Btw. I still love the idea that 42 means “anything you want it to be“. btw. For those that are not aware about 42.

About 42

As Design Group Italia, we participated to a fantastic hackathon in Venezia. Our role, was to inspire the participants with our talk and our projects: MEG: Our internal experiment on micro-growing with artificial light. We grow in Space! :) Unicef Kids Power: Fighting the child obesity risk,…

Just an usual day in Venezia

Progettare sulle reali esigenze e i comportamenti di ognuno di noi non è un compito riservato ai designer, ma la sfida che ogni amministratore delegato, imprenditore e manager oggi deve affrontare. Viviamo una rivoluzione inarrestabile che mette ognuno di noi davanti a un futuro che…

Internet of Humans | my first solo book

This presentation was conceived to inspire teams working in a hackathon (in Venezia). The main focus of the speech was about physical objects and their power in building trust, identities, affection, etc. About Objects | Hackathon slide from Leandro Agro'

About the objects…

Together with the mobile guru Giuseppe Taibi, yesterday we saw GITA -the new Piaggio’s robot- live at the premiere in Boston, MA. It was a great pleasure to meet my friend Jeffrey Schnapp (PFF, Ceo) and see what a great team he created around PFF. I think…

Forget Autonomous drive, welcome to… granular mobility! :)

Steve Jobs’s biological father, Abdulfattah “John” Jandali (b. 1931), was born into a Muslim household and grew up in Homs, Syria.  He  pursued a PhD at the University of Wisconsin.Joanne Carole Schieble (SJ biological mother) became pregnant in 1954 when she and Jandali spent the…

Her father was a tyrant

I just finished my first solo book, titled INTERNET of HUMANS. It will be published in Italian by Egea Editore, in collaboration with TAG Innovation School. Stay Tuned. other books where I contributed: – Digital Entrepreneur; Ed. Franco Angeli (2016) – Digital Media and Human…

My first solo book…