Tom Flanagan is the owner and chief designer for New Product Design.
On graduating in the 1980’s from The Queens University of Belfast with a Bachelor’s Degree in Mechanical Engineering Tom worked as a Design and Development Engineer at De Lorean Motor Cars, responsible for more than 25 projects, from fuel system evaluation and calibration to resolving throttle issues, suspension issues and designing a number of test rigs for verification of components and systems.
After the closure of De Lorean, Tom spent three years in a heavy engineering firm, followed by three years in a Dublin-based company as a CAD/CAM research and design engineer. In 1989, Tom joined a transportation equipment company in Galway, Ireland as a CAD specialist and design engineer. In 1993 he transferred to the corporate headquarters in Minneapolis, Minnesota specializing initially in CAD/CAM and CAE, and with additional training and experience in DFA, DFMA, DFMEA, Project Management ISO compliance and Quality Systems.
In 1994, Tom attended training in Toronto in the use of Alias Studio software for Industrial Design, followed by extensive training in the use of Pro-Engineer. From 1995, Tom began to switch focus from Mechanical design to Industrial Design, leading to the re-design of the company’s flagship product in 2001, which gained the company an IDSA/Business Week Gold IDEA award.
Since 2001, Tom has been involved in Industrial Design, Ergonomics, HMI design and the design of controllers and enclosures for medium/large equipment and has worked in a variety of industries, including Medical and Industrial.