Sponsoring the Interaction Design Foundation (IDF)

Here at the Interaction Design Foundation we are very proud that the world’s leading technology designers, professors, and bestselling authors are willing to join forces with us to provide free online access to top-grade educational materials. For everyone, everywhere. From New York to New Delhi. Rich and poor. In academia and in industry.

However, creating and providing top-grade educational materials on this scale is a cost-intensive mission. And since we insist that our millions of readers get free access—we need sponsors.

SAP’s sponsorship

We are delighted to announce that our mission has gained sponsorship from SAP—the world’s leader in business software (NYSE: SAP).

SAP believes that our top-grade educational materials can be of great value to designers of IT systems in both industry and academia and wishes to help us make these materials freely available and accessible to everyone around the world.

SAP, with their focus on business software,  are particularly interested in helping to educate technology designers so that they can design products that are more efficient, productive, and pleasurable to use. SAP’s sponsorship is an expression of their genuine wish to improve the design, function, and usability of technology on a global scale. Put simply: businesses run better through better designed technology.

The role of sponsors—Academic freedom and rights in an open and independent organization

Our search for sponsorship is inspired by and based on the way in which companies sponsor academic conferences and professional associations: it’s all about involving industry while maintaining academic freedom.

This philosophy is exemplified by our first main sponsor, SAP, which supports academic freedom and rights with regard to Interaction Design Foundation's publications. SAP does not wish to exert any editorial influence over any content produced and published by The Interaction Design Foundation. The Interaction Design Foundation maintains an open organization, independent of industry and competition.

SAP actively encourages support for The Interaction Design Foundation from all interested companies and universities.

SAP and IDF - concrete initiatives

As part of the sponsorship, IDF will collaborate closely with the SAP User Experience Community on educational initiatives — both for SAP employees and for the whole world. IDF will also team with the SAP University Alliances program to help its members create learning material that promotes simpler, more innovative and efficient product design. Working with more than 1,300 universities worldwide using SAP solutions in the classroom, SAP University Alliances plans to bring IDF content to these institutions. The initiative includes a bicycle tour to major metropolitan areas in Europe, North America, Africa, Asia and the Middle East, where IDF and SAP University Alliances representatives will raise awareness by delivering IDF's free materials to universities and software design companies.

More on the tour at: SAP University Alliances and the Interaction Design Foundation

Examples of what the Interaction Design Foundation offers its sponsors

 

• A seat on the executive board: Long-term strategic decisions are made by the Executive Board and main sponsors (see sponsorship levels below) have a representative on this board.  Sponsors do not, however, have any editorial control over the materials produced.
• Publicity: We help make publicity for our main sponsors. For example, our founders, Mads and Rikke, will be speaking at several SAP conferences.
• Display of sponsor’s logo: We display the logo of our main sponsors on all the app. 150,000 pages of the site as well as in our printed books.
• Open job positions: Our main sponsors may use our communication channels such as mailing lists and social media to post job positions—thus reaching the world’s technology elite directly. This is limited to one posting every three weeks in order not to overload our readers.
• Networking among employees: We help our main sponsors’ employees build long-term relations with our network of elite authors.
• Educational initiatives: We tailor some of our educational materials to fit into the sponsor’s internal educational needs.
• Fulfillment: And, of course, all our sponsors and contributors have the satisfaction of supporting the spread of first-rate education worldwide, and of being seen to do so!

Sponsorship Level

There are three sponsorship levels for companies who wish to sponsor the Interaction Design Foundation, based on the level of annual sponsorship:

1. Main Sponsor;
2. Supporting Sponsor;
3. Other Contributor.

Main sponsors have more prominent exposure than other sponsors, reflecting their greater investment.

The Interaction Design Foundation will consult main sponsors concerning proposals for sponsorship from direct competitors and will refrain from any agreement with a sponsor if the main sponsor considers such sponsorship inappropriate. This is a privilege given only to the main sponsors.

Want to know more?

Please get in touch with us if you are a potential sponsor, for example:

1. A philanthropist who is interested in supporting free and open educational initiatives.
2. A senior executive from a major software or design company.

Knowledge wants to be free!

People from around the world show their support for our mission to make world-class educational materials available for free. It's all about the Democratization of Knowledge

The Interaction Design Foundation's Mission