Brand check "Nokia": Courage to fill the gap
Heinrich Paravicini from Mutabor takes a close look at brand relaunches and brand designs for Werbewoche.ch. This time: the new logo of cell phone manufacturer Nokia.
Many still remember their first Nokia cell phone. Almost everyone had one. That was the time when making calls was still the core use of these devices and losing the charging cable didn't lead to an immediate panic attack because the battery easily lasted three days. What didn't last long was Nokia's success when a certain Mr. Jobs presented the iPhone in 2007. The rest is history. From then on, in business circles, the Nokia case was the prime example of how to drive a brand to the wall by making the wrong decisions against technological progress. The Nokia brand was also forgotten - at least by the end consumer. However, those who steadily attended the Mobile World Congress (MWC) in Barcelona - the most important B2B platform for mobile communications and network technology - found that Nokia had by no means disappeared from the scene. Rather, they were evolving into the innovative B2B network technology company they are today.
The logo: unchanged since 1979 - until now
Interestingly, despite all the innovation, one thing always remained the same: the Nokia logo. It has existed in unchanged form since 1979. Until now. At this year's MWC, the brand shone in a completely new look. More colorful, more gaudy, more luminous, more digital. And the new logo: angular, bulky, with patchy letters - devised by the global agency Lippincott.
A logo that heated up the minds of the industry. It seemed as if everyone hated it. This is interesting, since most people may have associated the old logo with little more than nostalgic feelings. Why Nokia took this step makes sense: they are no longer the cell phone manufacturer they once were. And the clientele they address thinks ahead and not back. They have learned to perceive the invisible as reality - just like the digital networks that surround us. And that's exactly what the new Nokia logo symbolizes very intelligently: It allows itself the courage to take a gap - and our brain does the rest.
* Heinrich Paravicini is founder and creative director of Mutabor.
