It all started with a marketing manager at Lyft reliving a childhood fantasy and asking our design partners at Ammunition to create an iconic symbol inspired by KITT, of Knight Rider fame. We’re often tasked with making dreams come true, so off we went. After a few months of collaboration through intensive brainstorming, feasibility studies, and proof-of-concept prototyping, the purpose for the Amp was born: An in-car device that connects passengers and drivers with a multi-color exterior display and a dead-fronted internal LED array that plays out messages personalized to drivers and passengers. If one is going to kill a pink fuzzy moustache, one better do it with a dual display icon that runs animations and allows drivers to interact with it via Bluetooth® Smart (BLE) through their phones, and power-optimizing the electronics to run for 8+ hours on a single charge. Check.

So what happened? We’re proud of a bunch of things. Lyft made literally a bazillion of them. We're proud we used a poka-yoke process for mistake-proofing. It guided us from 20 prototype models into a manufacture build quickly and seamlessly. Proud we got them from an estimated $35 to $26 a unit. But maybe most of all, proving engineering is an enabler for great design..