Abstract
In this paper, two methods are proposed for determining potential cosumer needs and creating images of new products for them. The first method: after statistical analysis on the usage of currently available products, a potential vector of new usage can be found in the statistically represented space. Images of new usages can be read from this vector. The causal relations between those images are schematised by DEMATEL analysis and are classified into three levels of causal hierarchy. The images of new products are put into tangible design through those analyes. The second method: each tangible functional attribute of the product is expressed as an abstract functional concept. Potential new ways of achieving the abstracted function can, in this way, be found. In order to aid innovative thinking, dissimilar but compatible pairs of functions can be found in the statistically represented space of the abstracted functions.
