In the past years, Eindhoven has become the innovation hub of the Netherlands. With its growing economy, the city has attracted more and more expats each year. This has had consequences on the social cohesion of its inhabitants. On one hand, there is the expat community which is trying to adapt and integrate to a new environment. On the other hand, there are the Dutch locals who are expected to get used to a changing environment. Repetitive contacts between the Dutch and expats are needed not only in the workplace, but also in the leisure environment. “Brainport Connects“ is a mobile web application which encourages forced interactions between strangers and pairs different nationalities within the play. 

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A big part of my professional identity is helping minorities, people who face injustice, and debating about situations in which misjudgment or negative, old mentalities are involved. Another thing that I believe in is empowering individuals to be more self-confident and believe in their own abilities. Since I came to the Netherlands, I have been struggling to grow my social circle. A few years ago, my parents migrated here and my mother became an expat spouse, trying to integrate and grow a social network here in the Netherlands. I have seen her struggle, but also my friends who graduated and became young, foreign knowledge workers in big companies which do not have much regard for the social life of their employees, especially the ones from abroad. I saw here an opportunity for a good research and design challenge which resonated with me on a personal level. What I wanted to create is a way of empowering  expats, especially expat spouses through giving them an opportunity to enrich their social network, especially with Dutch locals. I wanted them to have a chance to regain the social capital they lost and get a chance of finding new opportunities in their new environment with the help of their own network. Moreover, I love integrating technology into my designs since I come from a Computer Science background. I do believe in the role of technology as a mean to bringing people together if designed right, not as a cause of social anxiety as apps are deemed to be nowadays. 

The reason why I chose the event setting is not random, either. Research on the connection and engagement of  audiences at events is not very rich. Since my client is a pop venue, but also my conceptual partner is taking care of the cultural event agenda of Eindhoven, I saw the perfect context to dive into this field and create some value for them as well, since they mentioned they particularly struggled to create activities for internationals. Moreover, contacts in the workplace exclude the expat spouses who do not work and need their social capital more than their working partner. After the market and field research I conducted before choosing the topic, I realized that there is a big problem with event organizers not seeing the huge opportunity they have to connect the Dutch and the expats in their free time when they are most relaxed and willing to be social.