DESIGN CORPS FOR AFRICA

The Design Corps

The Design Corps for Africa is modeled after John Kennedy’s Peace Corps. It is a network of local Design Studios organized and led by the 3% to 5% “gifted and talented” teens that
exist in every community to create high paying jobs.

The network of Design Studios will

1.Identify inventors and technology

2.Complete a proof of concept process

3.Develop a business plan for investors

4.Incorporate “reproductive” headquarters (HDQ) led by professional managers that create higher
paying jobs for towns as well as a sustainable economic engine. Most designers/inventors do not want to be
entrepreneurs…they love to design and invent.

Our Vision The recent global financial crisis and its ripple effects have set the stage for rapid and radical opportunities for new organizations and structures.
Startup costs and barriers to entry
diminish; opportunities for creating new value increase; transactions are not
bound by time, distance, or size; and something intangible - a better idea -
can massively increase global welfare. This pattern is not merely about incremental
improvements. It's about a revolution in how we create, share, and refine anything. It's RippleEffects 6.0

Secondly, the Internet operates in a manner fundamentally unlike anything that has ever preceded it. In particular, it promotes "democratization" of
information, tools, and resources that combine to empower ordinary people with
increasing capabilities. Therefore, it can be used to collaborate in an “open
source” environment across long distances and encouraging networking among
youth.

Charter & Mission In line with our charter, the Design Corps of Africa’s near-term goal is to bootstrap a positive cycle as a community-based proof of concept project:

· Create a process and place where towns can create a new innovative
future.

· Identify and empower young professionals to serve for two years in towns in a support and encouragement role.

· Create “reproductive” headquarters in African towns with 10 to 100 million plus in annual sales and 15+% net after tax profits.

· Foster a collaborative community of people and projects which will inspire other towns to join us in vision for Africa.

The long-term mission of The Design Corps is far more ambitious, may take decades to realize, and necessitates that we extensively partner outside of The Design Corps. We wish to generalize the inventive and
innovation cycle around principles that can be applied to the design process by

· Empowering towns to become cultures of innovation and design,

· Facilitating the exchange of ideas among inventors, towns and investors, and

· Creating high paying jobs and reproductive headquarters as an economic engine.

Philosophy & Strategy The charter of The Design Corps suggests a dilemma: How can we simultaneously be small and agile but also influential enough to
have a meaningful impact? Indeed, this is a dilemma that all organizations face
as they grow and mature. Our answer is embarrassingly simple: We see ourselves
as a perpetual startup.

First, The Design Corps will deliberately not do many things that are already well-established. Instead we will seek to fill existing voids. Our bias will be to focus at BRIDGES: between theory & practice, the strategic & tactics, but above all - between inventions & commercial products. Each studio is a community-based “PROOF OF CONCEPT” center. We are the “missing link.”

Second, all of our local Design Corps teams in a Design Studio will be small, but with sufficient resources to achieve a modest level of success.

Third, when appropriate, we will opportunistically partner with other groups to amplify their efforts as well as the Design Studio Network. www.rugged-engagement.com

We can be agents of change between towns, helping to break down barriers, and expediting innovations - but on a scale that can only be realized by
multiple teams working in concert.

Structure & Function The Design Corps will be confederation made up of many Design Studios loosely coupled, but united by a single cause - to enable rapid design and redesign of
inventions to create locally owned headquarters with high value added products
and profits.

The Design Corps focuses on:

· Sandbox Design - networks that allow for rapid data gathering, redesign and deployment without great risk—proof of concept
processes.

· Neutral Platforms – creative application of existing inventions and materials that reduce the incremental costs for
performing more ambitious development.

· Rapid Prototyping - small teams/networks that produce functional and conceptual prototypes that are potentially DISRUPTIVE.

· Creative Application - self-directed “open source” teams with a mandate to connect ideas to users and businesses in many, varied and creative ways.

A Call to Action

If Africa through The Design Corps helps shape the design society of 2030, it will thrive. www.fastcompany.ning.com With the initial $10,000,000 investment, we will create ten pilot Design Studios. If our vision for The Design Corps and its impact on Africa resonates with you, then please join us in what we believe is a historic time for our world…

Design Corps for Africa

Harrison, Michigan, USA

© 2009 William Wilkie 989.539.1928

Adapted from Gary Flake’s “The Live Labs Manifesto”

Africa Design Corps Manifesto.doc

www.design-corps.org

www.rugged-engagement.com