In your 1st semester project, you and your fellow students will conduct an analysis of a product or service, focusing on the interaction aspects between users and the service, human and technology as well as machine to machine. The project work will introduce you to time and interaction related issues in service cases, and you will learn how to apply appropriate methods and tools to organise sequences of events and interactions in service solutions that take into consideration people’s cultural and behavioural backgrounds.

User experience design for service interaction

This course trains you to research, analyse, prototype and conceptualise design considering all system aspects including the social and cultural contexts of use. You will gain comprehensive knowledge about user involvement in the design process, going beyond traditional methods such as usability lab testing. The course introduces you to the application of multi-modal methods and interaction design within contemporary fields such as surface computing, pervasive computing, social and mobile computing, and/or mundane computing.

Designing product service systems

You will be introduced to service design and gain knowledge and methodological tools to analyse existing services and to develop new services. The course will provide you with an overview of analytical methods to understand and integrate users’ needs, design methods to control and organise time and interaction-based elements of a services and representation techniques that can be used to communicate with the various actors involved in a service system.

Visualizing and Prototyping for Service Design

This module introduces you to visualization and prototyping, which are two important skills that enable you to better understand, describe, and communicate service systems. Through workshops, you will get to try out various techniques, where we explore their benefits in different phases of the design process and in different contexts, including both analog/live and digital/online.

On the 2nd semester, we take your learning a step further by adding hands-on experience on the design of a complex service on basis of a modular platform in which actors and competences are clearly identified, organisational and interaction aspects are planned and user participation is planned and supported. Through this project module, you will learn about the nature and structure of a distributed system, and you will become familiar with techniques that support the participation of actors with different backgrounds, skills and culture while integrating technical and human components on a service platform.

Perspectives in Service Design

You will be introduced to the many exciting perspectives on service design, encompassing both current aspects and future trends. The module takes you on a journey where we will explore the various applications of service design. We will also examine how these different perspectives can influence the way we design services and how distributed systems play a role in this process.

User participation and social innovation

This course provides you with advanced knowledge and methods to interact with users and involve them in a process of co-design and participation. You will learn to use methods and techniques from different disciplinary contexts and adapt them in order to stimulate and support users’ participation and the interpretation of their needs, behaviour and attitudes in relation to their social and cultural context.

Design futures

We venture into the intersection of design and futures studies to engage with foresight and futures thinking. The module provides you with an overview of both theoretical perspectives, practical methods, and exemplary cases within future design. The course will also allow you to tinker with methods connected to
speculative design, design fiction, and experiential futures.

As indicated by the semester title, you may choose to carry out a project in collaboration with a company as part of your ECTS credits on the 3rd semester. You can go abroad or stay in Denmark – it is entirely up to you, and we will assist you in finding a company or an institution with whom to collaborate. You can also choose to carry out a project where you do a theoretical elaboration of a topic or a case.

If you choose company-project collaboration or the theoretical project, you must also attend the course "Stragegies and Business in Services".

Strategies and business in services

This course will give you advanced knowledge on theories and methodological tools to analyse and suggest appropriate and innovative business models for service companies. Focus is on theories of entrepreneurship with emphasis on innovative business models for product-service systems. In the course, theories and methodological tools will be applied to specific cases.

You also have the opportunity to choose a course from another programme which may add to the profile you wish to obtain. At en.cpu.aau.dk, you can take a browse through the programmes offered. If you choose this option of having an elective course from another programme, it must be approved by the Study Board of Media Technology.

There are no courses offered on the 4th semester; this is entirely devoted to working on your master’s thesis. The work is carried out alone or in small groups.

Once you have finished your master’s thesis, you are Master of Science (MSc) in Service Systems Design.

For further information, please consult the curriculum for Service Systems Design.

Are you a student at AAU? In AAU Study and Wellbeing Guidance, we can help you with, among other things, choices during your study programme, study doubts, study techniques, motivation, wellbeing, leave and study resignation or perhaps just a conversation about your thoughts regarding your study programme and wellbeing. We are happy to talk to you about anything big or small.

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Aalborg University is famous for its problem based learning where you work in a group on a large written assignment often collaborating with an industrial partner. This study method is also called “The Aalborg Model for Problem Based Learning”. The method is highly recognised internationally, and the university is host to a successful UNESCO chair in Problem Based Learning in Engineering Education and a Centre for PBL and Sustainability approved by UNESCO.

The problem based project work at Aalborg University gives you a unique opportunity to acquire new knowledge and competences at a high academic level in an independent manner. You get to apply theory to practice when you work to solve real-life problems, and you will be well prepared for your future career.
Learn more about PBL.

When doing project work, you work closely in groups with other students. This gives you the opportunity to cooperate, share knowledge and to explore larger and more complex academic problems than what you would have been able to do on your own. Furthermore, the groups serve a social purpose and make it easier for you to get to know your fellow students and feel more at home at the university.
Learn more about teamwork at AAU.

Aalborg University works closely with the business community. This means that as a student you will work with real issues from companies and organisations. Thus, while you are studying, you already have the opportunity to enhance your academic competences with a business-oriented and practical angle.

At Aalborg University teaching is research based. This means that your lecturers are doing research within the same academic field as he or she is teaching. You thus have access to the latest knowledge and dedicated teachers who are passionate about what they teach. The teaching material not only includes books but may also consist of, for example, current academic articles from journals.

The laboratories at Aalborg University are of the highest standard, and they play an important role in teaching. You will work under the best laboratory conditions with access to the latest technology, which is vital for your benefiting from the teaching.

AAU Copenhagen is a part of Aalborg University and is located at Sydhavnen (South Harbour) near the city centre. Therefore, students at AAU CPH have access to the city’s wide range of cultural and leisure activities. AAU CPH is a relatively new campus with an international focus, an innovative learning environment and close collaborations with businesses, of which many are located on the campus area. Overall there are close to 3,700 students enrolled in AAU CPH’s exciting bachelor’s and master’s programmes. Learn more about student life in Copenhagen.