What is the Gala? Since September 15 PDP teams have been working hard on their unique projects. At the Product Design Gala 2023 it is time to reveal the results to the world. For the whole day Design Factory has it’s doors open to everyone who is interested in coming to see the innovations that the future product developers have created. The projects are on display around Design Factory and visitors can interact with the students, try the prototype and get inspired by the atmosphere of the event. There are visitors from all walks of life and great connections can be formed.

PDP core principles: The PDP course brings together students from all schools of Aalto University to work on real world challenges presented by an industry partner. All teams have a budget of 10 000 euros that can be used for the realisation of their project. The challenge is provided by an industry partner and the collaboration between the company and the student team is active throughout the year. PDP is an environment that is as close as you can get to real world working conditions with the additions of the freedom to experiment and fail plus the interdisciplinary composition of the teams that in many places is just a buzz word but in PDP it’s true.

History: The PDP course has been running for 26 Years and over 300 projects have been completed today. The total number of students who have taken the course is over 3000. These numbers speaks to the impact that the course has had and continuous to have in the Finnish and global industry. Many graduates of Aalto lists PDP as their most valuable experience going into working life. PDP has also led to the formation of startups, patents, employment by the sponsoring company and master thesis positions.

More information about the event and a sneak peek of this years projects can be found on https://pdp.fi/gala23/