04
2018 / On the way to future mobility

The trademark of PSW on the move to the future

    Normally, an agency keeps to the briefing, the customer’s instructions. Even Tom Klein, owner of the Hamburg agency of the same name, and Lars Krüger of dies.das.digital, usually stick to the brief. But not this time.

    The management of PSW had invited several agencies to give the company a new look. This could have been another routine job, but Tom and Lars took a deep breath: Wasn’t the company embarking on a new journey? Hadn’t it completely changed since being established 30 years ago? “The previous logo of PSW was quite appealing”, says Tom. And isn’t the redesign of a logo a big step for a company? Something that has to be carefully considered?

    On the other hand: “AUDI AG has changed its logo four times in the thirty years that PSW has been in existence. In 1990, the “Audi” lettering stood in a brown-red oval. In 1994 it drifted down under the four rings in red; in 2009 the typeface changed, and the claim “Vorsprung durch Technik” was added; and in 2014 all writing disappeared, leaving only the four rings. None of this has hurt the brand.

    “So even an Audi subsidiary could be trusted to execute a fundamental change of the logo”, says Tom. “This made it possible to leapfrog the last three decades of brand design and to make a brand out of PSW and make it fit for the future”. The design team decided to interpret the briefing more freely and not just spruce up the logo, but fundamentally transform it. “It took courage, of course, but as designers, it was simply the only way to meet the challenge. Anything else would not have met the needs of the company”, Tom explains.

    The initials of the founders have been preserved, but they now complement an identity-creating brand message “engineers of the automotive future”. A modern green tone is also retained as an accent in the logo. However, the initials are now composed of circular arcs whose proportions are based on the logo of the parent company. “PSW is also in good company in a graphic-design sense,” state the two designers. “The new brand expresses the vision of the company as a leading development partner for the mobility of the future."

    The new logo creates a distinctive appearance and gives PSW an unmistakable and innovative communication profile. "The clarity, meaningful message and the modernity of the brand emphasize the progressive self-perception of PSW”, says Tom. The management was immediately convinced: “The designers have precisely met our vision with the new logo. Therefore, it was immediately clear to everyone: The design is the right one!” says the PSW management board.

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