The winners of the 2018 Valtra Design Challenge were announced at the EIMA Show in Bologna, Italy. The competition which started in April and ended on September 23rd was targeted globally to designers, academic design students, design studios and automotive suppliers. This year’s challenge was to design the multi-purpose vehicle of the future: a machine that can handle multiple tasks to meet future needs and that is more efficient than today’s highly specialized machines. 

The first place of the competition was awarded to the work “VERTICAL” by Austrian design team Benjamin Miller, Jack Morris, and Alireza Saeedi. The jury praised the concept as being a very creative interpretation of the challenge theme. “At first glance it looks very specialized, but if you judge the complete system instead of only the tractor, a versatile and holistic concept for the future emerges. The concept takes care of everything from seeding to distribution of food”, comments member of the jury Hans Philip Zachau.

“Valtra has been widely recognized for ground-breaking and visionary industrial design. We started the Design Challenge in order to raise awareness of future challenges in the agricultural community and society at large. It is also a platform for designers to showcase their innovations.” comments head of the jury and industrial design & user experience manager at Valtra, Kimmo Wihinen. “The Valtra Design Challenge is the world´s largest design contest in agricultural machinery and one of the biggest in the off-road vehicle industry. The high number of innovative and high-class entries shows us that there is a demand for this type of competition, and we are already working on the theme for the next edition”, he adds.

The Valtra Design Challenge 2018 Jury members were Kimmo Wihinen from Valtra, Brandon Montgomery and Sam Freesmeyer from AGCO, Hans Philip Zachau from Lighthouse Industrial Design and Paolo Grazioli Frozen Design Tokyo.

The Valtra Design Challenge was organised for the second time in 2018. This year the competition has received 107 entries from 32 different countries and six continents. The first prize of the Valtra Design Challenge is a €10,000 cheque.

For more information:
www.valtra.com/designchallenge