Design is often seen as the final layer of a product—something added once the technical work is done. At ASSA ABLOY Opening Solutions EMEIA, it’s embedded from the start. Perla Munhoz, Director and Head of Product Design, is part of the CTO team helping ensure that locks and access control systems are developed not just for functionality, but for usability, sustainability and manufacturability.
Munhoz describes her role as a balance of strategy and execution, working closely with engineering, product and customer-facing teams across the region. Her focus is on delivering design that supports innovation at every stage—from early concepts through to installation and user experience.
Design, she explained, isn’t just about appearance. “Our goal is to make sure design is never an afterthought,” she said. “It’s about making life easier for the people who use our products.”
Together with her team, Munhoz contributes everything from photorealistic renders and CAD concepts to prototypes, user testing and site assessments. This helps sharpen decision-making, speed up development cycles and ensure that products meet both commercial and technical expectations.
Her journey into the role began with a childhood curiosity in Brazil, building and dismantling objects, long before she imagined a career in design. After moving to Sweden to study mechanical engineering and product design, she joined ASSA ABLOY in 1999 as a trainee and rotated through production and R&D.
That early hands-on experience, she said, gave her a lasting appreciation for how design decisions affect the real-world performance and longevity of a product.
In recent years, she’s championed initiatives like the Stockholm design studio, a usability testing space designed to simulate real-life scenarios. It’s a practical tool that encourages collaboration between design and engineering teams and offers a model that can be scaled across other markets.
Looking ahead, Munhoz is also committed to encouraging more women to explore careers in engineering and design. Visibility, she believes, is key.
“When we show what’s possible, we help others imagine themselves in our shoes,” she said. She credits her mother—who came from a modest background in Brazil and worked to support her education—as a quiet but powerful role model. “Her leadership taught me that with humility and persistence, anything is possible.”
For Munhoz, design is not just what a product looks like—it’s how it works, how it feels, and how it fits into the bigger picture of smarter, more secure environments.