700303Assessing the market potential of a novel transitional shelter design for use by displaced communities worldwideClosedGRD Proof of MarketInnovate UKIn the wake of the 2010 earthquake in Haiti, 1.5 million internally-displaced persons were driven from their homes and forced to seek shelter in emergency accommodation. After months in basic tent shelters, families were slowly re-housed in transitional shelters. Transitional shelters aid the re-housing effort, bridging the gap between emergency relief and permanent homes in disaster areas worldwide. These shelters provide a space for sleeping, washing, cooking and the care of children. Additionally, they can be used for the storage of supplies, household possessions and tools that are essential to rebuild communities. Transitional shelters allow families to be kept together and facilitate community cohesion in the wake of devastation. Despite this, a surprisingly small proportion of displaced persons are able to move from initial emergency tents after a disaster. For example, according to the charity Habitat for Humanity (2013), only 4% of displaced persons in Haiti have been provided with transitional shelters – the remaining population survive in emergency tent shelters and remain vulnerable to earthquakes, mudslides and hurricanes that blight the region. International aid organisations working with displaced communities have expressed a need for a new type of transitional shelter – one that is simple enough to be erected quickly by non- skilled members of affected communities but is robust enough to withstand harsh environmental conditions. We have developed two transitional shelters to meet these demands. ‘HuSh1’ is an easy-to-assemble flat-pack shelter that can be constructed in less than ten minutes by a small team of local people, without the need of specialist tools. The second shelter, ‘HuSh2’, is able to resist a Category 5 hurricane, allowing for its deployment in hurricane-prone disaster zones where it can be used as a storage facility, basic health centre or school, in addition to providing much-needed accommodation