Innovation
In today’s world of artificial intelligence, Blockchain and the Internet of Things, ongoing technological progress is the key to success. We help industry players all along the coffee supply chain to develop innovative new products and processes, enabling them to remain agile and evolve to meet the industry’s ever-changing requirements. We stay abreast of the latest developments and evaluate the possible market value of emerging trends.
Strategy
Staying at the cutting edge of technology is no easy task. The Swiss Coffee Alliance carefully reviews your markets, products, technologies and resources to produce a coherent strategic roadmap, which is continually updated in line with market trends and your new ideas. Our wealth of experience and professional partnerships enable us to offer you services and tools that will help you define your budgets and meet your innovation targets.
Ideation
Businesses are fuelled by ideas and expertise. But finding a way to make the most of your company’s creative potential can seem like a Herculean task. We will propose a structured idea management system to capture, collect, enrich and evaluate interesting opportunities. We’ll also monitor market news, the intellectual property of similar companies, and any new market players to ensure that you always stay on top of the competition.
Concept
To turn a great idea into a great product, you first need to develop a detailed concept. The Swiss Coffee Alliance has extensive knowledge of existing technologies and the components that are currently available, enabling us to quickly validate the basic functionalities of your proposed concept. This is key for ensuring the viability of your design, as well as the feasibility of incorporating recent innovations into your product or process.
Design
Now it’s time to bring your creative concept to life. Drawing on comparative product research, we help you to evaluate product characteristics such as colour, texture, form, usability and ergonomics, and select materials and processes that reduce your production costs. Finally, a cosmetic prototype is built, so you can get an initial idea of the size and handling of your product. Throughout the process, we keep financial considerations in mind and ensure that we never lose sight of your product’s marketability.
Engineering
Our professional network understands the needs of the coffee industry. Your approved concept and list of requirements are sent off to our engineering partners, who build components that deliver the desired functionality and are suitable for mass production. After checking all the technical data, your cosmetic design choices are combined with basic software to produce a functional prototype that closely resembles the finished article.
Manufacturing
Once the functional prototype is given the green light, a tooling order is issued and the necessary industrial testing carried out. This includes life cycle tests and certification assessments performed in laboratory conditions in accordance with international standards. An interdisciplinary production process and quality assurance measures are then established, and the final product is only approved once any issues are entirely resolved.
After Sales
Excellent customer care and after sales can turn a market player into a market leader. In addition to customer relationship management, it’s essential to establish a reliable process for providing detailed product information, indicating availability of spare parts, training maintenance technicians, and more. Returned goods with technical faults must be compiled in a knowledge database to support troubleshooting efforts and ensure a process of continuous improvement.