At first the competition was only open to product design students at Coventry, DeMontfort and Sheffield Hallam universities. Word soon spread and by November 2007 there was so much interest that the project was opened up to all students. In total there were nearly 100 submissions from around the world, including India, Canada and the USA.

On Thursday 6 March we held the judging event to whittle down the many submissions to one overall winner. Our judging panel was made up of professional designers and industry leaders, and was chaired by Mark Downs, our Executive Director of Technology and Enterprise. The judging was quite lively and sparked debates such as "what is desirability?" to "how on earth would you take those out?"

After over two hours the judges finally came to a unanimous decision. The winning design was Earcard by Chi Shing Lo of DeMontford University.

Earcard is a flat-pack earplug system the size of a credit card which should be easy to manufacture and cheap to produce. When needed, the earplug can be quickly and easily assembled. The judges particularly liked its convenient shape and potential to be used in a large range of environments. We are already in talks to manufacture it, so hopefully you’ll see it in our shop soon!

The whole project has been an amazing success. A big thank you to the judges for giving up their valuable time and of course the students for the high quality of work they produced.