More than 176,000 hits and still going strong. Since the Eastman Innovation Lab (www.EastmanInnovationLab.com) was launched at the end of March 2004, nearly 18,000 designers, design engineers and other professionals have visited the site, a significant proportion of them from Europe.

“With this site, we set out to inspire and help designers in their quest for innovation and product optimisation,” said Gaylon White, Manager, Design Industry Programs at Eastman. “Major design firms continue to register, and the brand owner visitors reads like a Fortune 50 list. And the hits for the entire site are accelerating, 43,000 in just three months this year, compared to 80,000 for all of last year. The Eastman Innovation Lab is the first step toward realising our vision of a creative resource to connect brand owners and designers with inspirational and innovative material solutions.”

Earlier this year, www.EastmanInnovationLab.com received a gold award in the 2005 Industrial Design Excellence Award(IDEA). The competition is co-sponsored by BusinessWeek Magazine and the Industrial Designers Society of America (IDSA). A jury of 17 world-renowned designers and critics made the award for design innovation, benefit to the user, benefit to the client/business, ecological responsibility, and appropriate aesthetics and appeal. The Eastman Innovation Lab Web site competed against 423 submissions from 17 countries.