The Design Institute of Technology (DIT) is an institute in the Department of Design of the HfG Offenbach and serves as a project and research platform for the Industrial Design teaching and research area represented by Prof. Frank Georg Zebner.

For years, design research and development has been successfully carried out here for major brands and companies in all industries. Among others, with Audi, Bosch, BMW, Brother, FSB, Gaggenau, Hansgrohe, Hewi, Lamy, Linde, Lufthansa, Porsche, Siemens or Viessmann.

The Industrial Design Chair (formerly Technical Products and Product Systems) maintains scientific contacts and strategic partnerships with research institutions on all five continents. These include academies and universities in Beijing, Brisbane, Buenos Aires, Hangzhou, Havana, Hong Kong, Cape Town, Melbourne, Moscow, New York, Oslo, Tokyo, Seoul and Shanghai. In the future, these relationships are to be bundled even more strongly in order to build an international network for exchange and cooperation in the field of scientific design research and design development.

Since 2012, the Institute has been working closely with the ZVSHK Zentralverband Sanitär Heizung Klima to develop solutions for the care industry and universal design in innovation and design projects. In doing so, common goals are projected with care associations and the trade associations as well as with the most important industrial companies in the sector.

Furthermore, the institute is actively involved in the development of technology networks. In the Central Innovation Program for SMEs ZIM, the (nationwide) industry and university network 'Future Network' was founded jointly by IHK Offenbach and HfG and the Design Institute of Technology, respectively. In 2019, the first LOEWE research project at the HfG was successfully completed: initiated in 2015 by the DIT and the IHK Offenbach and carried out and executed from 2016 to 2019 together with the industry partner InEar GmbH under the title 'Multisensorik‘.

The location in the Rhine-Main metropolitan region enables best contacts to national and international institutions in design and design research as well as design companies. These include the German Design Council, the Museum Angewandte Kunst or the industry network Wetzlar Network as well as the German Leather Museum.

The HfG Offenbach is represented by Prof. Frank Georg Zebner in the Design_to_Business network, a competence center and network for design in Hesse. Its objective is the promotion of creative industries and small and medium-sized businesses (initiated and curated by the IHK Offenbach). Among other things, Prof. Frank Georg Zebner is a mentor there for the area of product design (design and innovation).

The institute and the HfG are also partners in the Designpark Offenbach project, which is developing an urban-industrial concept for a former industrial area together with the city of Offenbach, the Offenbach Chamber of Industry and Commerce (IHK Offenbach) and Hessen Trade & Invest (HTAI).