Katja Holtta-Otto

Associate Professor

Research Areas:
Design Science

Biography

I believe designers can design anything if they are given the right tools to do so. I am especially interested in enabling the designers to make the world better by design whether is was designing a device that eliminated human error during use, a device that can be used easier by all from an old man with arthritis trying to do his daily routines, or a product that will bring clean water to a rural village in a developing country.

My approach is to develop these tools to equip the designer to answer any problem. I have developed the foundation for empathic experience based design theory to increase the innovativenss and improve the user interaction characteristics of products. I work closely with psychologist and sociologists to better understand the human as a user of products. My approach to design research is rigorous data based, human centered and interdisciplinary.

In addition, I also work in Systems Engineering. Specifically in the areas of modularity, system decomposition and design for system integration.

Education

PhD Mechanical Engineering, Product Development, Helsinki University of Technology, 2005
MS Mechanical Engineering, Helsinki University of Technology, 2000

Research Interests

- Innovation and creativity
- Universal design

- Empathic Experience Design

Design for distracted use
Innovation and Risk in product development
Differences in product development methods for New Ventures and more mature and larger companies
User centered design
Systems Engineering and system architecture

Research Projects (previous & on-going

Investigating the Innovation Capabilities of Undergraduate Students
Empathic Experience Design for Universal Design
- Leveraged Freedom Chair re-development (a survey for current mobility users)
Measuring Innovation and Risk in Engineering Design
User Centered approach to future smart homes and products

Awards and Achievements

NSF CAREER Award 2012
Best Paper Award: ASEE Annual Conference and Exposition (Design in Engineering Education Division) “An Experimental Investigation of the Innovation Capabilities of Engineering Students”, 2010
Best Paper Award: ASEE Annual Conference and Exposition (Mechanical Engineering Division) “Extreme Experience Interviews for Innovative Designs: Classroom Assessment of a New Needs-Gathering Method”, 2010
Best Paper Award: ASME 21st International Conference on Design Theory and Methodology (DTM), “The Characteristics of Innovative, Mechanical Products”, 2009
Best Paper Award: ASME 18th International Conference on Design Theory and Methodology (DTM), “Identifying Customer Needs – Disabled Persons as Lead Users”, 2006
UMass Dartmouth Outstanding Women Award 2012

Selected Publications

Peer Reviewed Journal Articles

Hölttä-Otto, K. Chiriac N., Suh, E.S. and Lysy, D., 2012, Comparative analysis of coupling modularity metrics. Journal of Engineering Design Vol 23, Issue 10-11, 2012
Genco, N., Hölttä-Otto, K., and Seepersad, C.C., 2012 “An Experimental Investigation of the Innovation Capabilities of Undergraduate Engineering Students” Journal of Engineering Education, January 2012
Ranawat, A., Tuteja, S., Hölttä-Otto, K., 2012 “Contribution of visual design elements to the perceived product family look”Journal of Design Research, Vol. 10, No. 3
Chiriac, N., Hölttä-Otto, K., Suh, E. Lysy, D. 2011, Level of Modularity and different levels of system granularity, ASME Journal of Mechanical Design, Vol 133, October 2011, 101007. [pdf]
Saunders, M. N., Seepersad, C. C. and Hölttä-Otto, K., 2011, The Characteristics of Innovative, Mechanical Products, ASME Journal of Mechanical Design, Vol 133, Issue 2, 021009. [pdf]
Hölttä-Otto, K. Tang, V., & Otto, K., 2008, Analyzing module commonality for platform design using dendrograms. Research in Engineering Design, Vol. 19, No. 2, pp. 127-141. [pdf]
Salonen, M. Hölttä-Otto, K. Otto, K., 2008, Affecting product reliability and lifecycle costs with early design phase product architecture decisions. International Journal of Product Development. 5:1-2, pp. 109-124.
Hölttä-Otto, K. & de Weck, O., 2007, Degree of modularity in engineering systems and products with technical and business constraints. Concurrent Engineering: Research and Application. June, Volume 15, No. 2.
Otto, K. & Hölttä-Otto, K., 2007, A multi-criteria assessment tool for screening preliminary product platform concepts.Journal of Intelligent Manufacturing. Volume 18, Number 1 February.
Hölttä-Otto, K. & Magee, C., 2006, Estimating factors affecting project task size in product development – an empirical study. IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management, Vol 53, No 1. February.
Hölttä, K. & Otto, K., 2005, Incorporating design effort complexity measures in product architectural Design and Assessment. Design Studies. Vol 26, Issue 5, Pp. 445-564. September. [pdf]

Peer Reviewed Conference Articles

Otto, K., Hölttä-Otto, K. & Simpson, T., 2013, Linking 10 years or modular design research: Alternative methods and tool chain sequences to support platform design, ASME IDETC Design Automation Conference, Portland OR, 2013. [pdf]
Hölttä-Otto, K., Otto, K., & Luo, J., 2013, Innovation differences between new venture startups and incumbent firms,International Conference on Engineering Design ICED’13. Seoul, S. Korea.
Kuhr, R., Otto, K., Sosa, R., Raghunath, N., Hölttä-Otto, K., & Wood, K., 2013, Design with the Developing World: A Model of Interactions, International Conference on Engineering Design ICED’13. Seoul, S. Korea.
Borjesson, F. and Hölttä-Otto, K., 2012, Improved clustering Algorithm for Design Structure Matrix. ASME IDETC Design Automation Conference, Chicago, 2012. [pdf]
Holtta-Otto, K., Tang, V. & Otto, K., 2012, Module Definition for Product-Service Systems. ASME IDETC Design for Manufacturing and the Life Cycle Conference (DFMLC), Chicago, 2012. [pdf]
Blair, B. and Hölttä-Otto, K., 2012, Contribution of a group to the initial idea in progressive idea generation, ASME IDETC Design Theory and Methodology Conference, Chicago. [pdf]
Chiriac, N., Hölttä-Otto, K., Suh, E. & Lysy, D., 2011, Three approaches to complex system decomposition, Proceedings of the 13th International Dependency and Structure Modelling Conference, DSM’11, Cambridge, MA, September 14 – 15, 2011. [pdf]
Genco, N., Johnson, D., Hölttä-Otto, K., & Seepersad, C.C., 2011, Study of effectiveness of Empathic Experience Design creativity technique, Proceedings of the ASME Design Engineering Technical Conference, Washington, DC, August 27-31, 2011. [pdf]
Chiriac, N., Hölttä-Otto, K., Suh, E. & Lysy, D., 2011 Level of modularity at different levels of system granularity, Proceedings of the ASME Design Engineering Technical Conference, Washington, DC, August 27-31, 2011.
Kershaw, T. C., Hölttä-Otto, K., & Lee, Y. S. 2011 The Effect of Prototyping and Critical Feedback on Fixation in Engineering Design. Cog Sci Conference, Boston, MA.
Genco, N., Hölttä-Otto, K., and Seepersad, C.C., 2011, Factors that influence the creativity of engineering students. ASEE 2011, Vancouver, BC.
Otto, K. and Hölttä-Otto, K., 2010, “Incorporating field effects in modular architecture methods”, ASME IDETC Design Theory and Methodology Conference, Montreal, Canada. [pdf]
Srivathsavai, R. Genco, N., Hölttä-Otto, K., and Seepersad, C.C., 2010, “Study of Existing Metrics Used in Measurement of Ideation Effectiveness”, ASME IDETC Design Theory and Methodology Conference, Montreal, Canada. [pdf]
Genco, N., Hölttä-Otto, K., and Seepersad, C.C., 2010, “An Experimental Investigation of the Innovation Capabilities of Engineering Students” ASEE 2010, Louisville, KY. BEST PAPER AWARD
Green, M., Seepersad, C.C. and Hölttä-Otto, K. 2010, “Extreme Experience Interviews for Innovative Designs: Classroom Assessment of a New Needs-Gathering Method,” ASEE Annual Conference and Exposition, Louisville, KY. BEST PAPER AWARD
Hölttä-Otto, K. Saunders, M. and Seepersad C. C., 2010, “The Characteristics of Innovative, Medical Products,” ASME Design of Medical Devices Conference DMD, Minneapolis, MN. [pdf]
Saunders, M. N., Seepersad, C. C. and Hölttä-Otto, K. 2009, “The Characteristics of Innovative, Mechanical Products,”ASME IDETC Design Theory and Methodology Conference, San Diego, CA, BEST PAPER AWARD.
Ranawat, A. and K. Hölttä-Otto, 2009, “Four Dimensions of Design Similarity,” ASME IDETC Design Theory and Methodology Conference, San Diego, CA.
Hölttä-Otto, K. & de Weck, O., 2007, Metrics for Assessing Coupling Density and Modularity in Complex Products and Systems. ASME IDETC Design Theory and Methodology Conference. Design Theory and Methodology (DTM). Las Vegas. [pdf]
Celona, T., Embry-Pelrine, C. & Hölttä-Otto, K., 2007, Are modular products larger than integral products? International conference on engineering design, ICED07. Paris.
Hölttä-Otto, K., Helminen, P., Ekman, K. & Roemer, T., 2007, A pilot program teaching dispersed product development in collaboration with an international university. ASEE’07. Honolulu, HI.
Hannukainen, P. & Hölttä-Otto, K., 2006, Identifying customer needs – disabled persons and lead users. ASME design engineering technical conferences DETC. Design Theory and Methodology (DTM). Philadelphia. BEST PAPER AWARD. [pdf]
Simpson, T.W. Marion, T. de Weck, O. Hölttä-Otto, K. Kokkolaras, M. and Shooter, S. B., 2006,“Platform-Based Design and Development: Current Trends and Needs in Industry” ASME design engineering technical conferences DETC. Philadelphia.
Hölttä-Otto, K., 2005, Analyzing module commonality for platform design in functional and physical domain. ASME design engineering technical conferences DETC. Long Beach. [pdf]
Hölttä, K., Suh, E. S., and de Weck, O., 2005, Tradeoff between modularity and performance for engineered systems and products. International conference on engineering design, ICED05. Melbourne.
Otto, K. & Hölttä, K., 2004, A multi-criteria framework for screening preliminary product platform concepts. ASME design engineering technical conferences DETC. Salt Lake City. [pdf]
Hölttä, K., 2004, Comparative analysis of product modularization methods. NordDesign. Tampere.
Hölttä, K. & Salonen, M., 2003, Comparing three different modularity methods. ASME design engineering technical conferences DETC. Chicago. [pdf]
Hölttä, K. & Otto, K., 2003, Incorporating design complexity measures in architectural assessment. ASME design engineering technical conferences DETC. Chicago.
Hölttä, K., Tang, V., & Seering, W., 2003, Modularizing product architectures using dendrograms. International conference on engineering design, ICED03. Stockholm.

Book Chapters

Hölttä-Otto, K. Otto, K., and Simpson, T. W., 2013, Defining Modules for Platforms: An Overview of the Architecting Process. In: Advances in Product Family and Product Platform Design – Methods & Applications, Simpson, T.W.; Jiao, J.; Siddique, Z.; Hölttä-Otto, K. (Eds.), 2013, XIV, 748 p. Springer.
Hölttä-Otto, K. Chiriac, N., Lysy, D. and Suh, E. S., 2013, Architectural Decomposition – the role of granularity and decomposition viewpoint. In: Advances in Product Family and Product Platform Design – Methods & Applications, Simpson, T.W.; Jiao, J.; Siddique, Z.; Hölttä-Otto, K. (Eds.), 2013, XIV, 748 p. Springer.
Hölttä-Otto K. and Otto, K., 2006, Platform Concept Evaluation. In: Product platform and product family design – Methods and Applications. Simpson, T., Siddique, Z., and Jiao, J. (Eds.). Springer.

Post-doc or researcher positions open in the following projects:

Empathic Experience Design for Universal Design
Measuring Innovation and Risk in Engineering Design
User centered approach to smart home design (Smart Grids)

PhD positions See projects here, or propose in any of the listed research areas!

Alumni Faculty