In this class, Undergraduate students from all disciplines in Georgia Institute of Technology work on Design Challenges that have real world applications. Their efforts are showcased at an end-of-semester “Capstone Design Expo” with awards and cash prizes distributed. Further the students are also given theoretical background in topics related to design, manufacturing and business/entrepreneurial topics from experts in Industry and Academia.
Course Objectives
- Solve Real-World Problems: Students are given real-world, open-ended, interdisciplinary challenges proposed by industrial and research project sponsors. They learn and apply the engineering design process: defining functional requirements, conceptualization, analysis, identifying risks and countermeasures, selection, and validation.
- Teamwork: Students work in teams encountering leadership needs and group dynamics; dealing with scheduling conflicts, meeting weekly deliverables and deadlines; and communication among team members, project sponsors, and course instructors.
- Gain & Apply Knowledge: Students attend lectures given by experts from Industry and Academia on topics including patenting, industrial design, manufacturing, market research and marketing, business funding, structure, governances, and ethics.
- “Capstone Design Expo”: At the end of the semester, student teams display and pitch their inventions and marketability to a panel of judges, competing for cash prizes.
Benefits to Sponsor
- Branding/visibility within the Invention Studio labs & electronic advertisements on course website and materials.
- Semester-long recruitment – your design/engineering team will get to work closely with a team of 5 graduating seniors for a semester.
- Low-cost skunkworks R&D – Student teams mentored by a faculty, work on open-ended design challenges offered by the sponsor. They also build and test prototypes to see their design ideas in action! Students typically send the final project report and the prototype to the sponsor at the end of the semester.
- Special Invitation to judge the Capstone Design Expo. An amazing opportunity to directly interact with current & graduating students for recruitment purposes
Request to Sponsor
- Project description
- Technical point-of-contact
- Donation (depends on School) that helps to cover course expenses which may include:
- Subvention fee, course infrastructure support, team presentations and reports, cash prizes, and hosting of the Capstone Design Expo (advertising, refreshments, and audio/visual rental)
- Materials and services costs for prototype fabrication for each student project
Intellectual Property
Undergraduate students (Students) who are not employees of the Institute, are not performing research under a sponsored program, or are not using significant resources of the Institute (as defined in the Institute policies) do not have an obligation to assign their intellectual property rights to Georgia Tech Research Corporation (GTRC). GT IP Policy document here (refer to section 5.4.4).
In those instances, students participating in a Capstone Design Course may commercialize, license, or otherwise assign their intellectual property to a third party (Conveyance of Rights), including to the company mentoring the student group on a project based on that company’s information (Mentoring Company) without seeking a license or release from GTRC. At the sole discretion of the Student(s), any Conveyance of Rights may or may not be for monetary consideration.
Confidentiality
A Company may request students to enter into a confidentiality agreement in order for the Company to participate and provide a project to the Students. In certain circumstances, this may be a reasonable request by the Company. However, please be aware that the Capstone Design Expo is open to the public and that project information must be shared with other students and professors in the Course to meet the Course requirement.
In rare circumstances, a Company’s proprietary information must be shared with Georgia Tech, such as with the faculty coordinators and/or Project Team’s faculty mentor. In such cases, a confidentiality agreement with the Georgia Institute of Technology (GIT) may also be required. Companies needing to execute a confidentiality agreement with GIT should budget at least two weeks prior to the start of the semester to have the form routed through Georgia Tech’s Office of Legal Affairs.
If you would like to submit a design project idea, please reach out to us via email.