Cult Product Design firm Punkt Scales Up Ambitions With A cellphone Launch And “know-how Tamed” Rebranding

You is not going to be ready to swipe left or proper on the imminent MP 01 phone, nor will you be capable to use the newest fleet of cell apps, learn the information, or snap photos. but it is possible for you to to make calls, ship texts, and take again a few of your lifestyles from technology’s clutches.

while this selection phone isn’t “good,” it’s some distance from dumb. It represents Punkt‘s ambitions to scale from a design-trade darling into full-fledged know-how model.

formally launching at the London Design festival, the telephone took four years to strengthen and sparked a conversation about the firm in the process. while Punkt has earned a popularity for artful UI and practical, smartly-designed merchandise, the young model—its first product debuted in 2011 and these days it remains quite small at 9 individuals—hadn’t communicated its perspective very neatly. furthermore, designing cell phones is a completely different animal than alarm clocks. Founder Petter Neby enlisted branding specialists means to reposition to firm and give you the option to toughen and surmise its place. “We were not so clear on what we were about,” he says. “We changed into a adorable design firm sitting in Switzerland. We want to reach past a small design crowd to be a broader brand.”

Enter a philosophy of “technology tamed,” the guiding mantra of the MP 01 telephone, Punkt’s future trajectory, an umbrella for what it is created prior to now, and a phrase that’s emblematic of the company’s tradition.

“‘know-how tamed’ is set this idea of renegotiating our relationship with expertise,” Melissa Clark, client products and services lead at method’s London administrative center, says. “it is no longer about an all-in or all-out mentality; it used to be about making merchandise that will let you use technology as a software, however that shouldn’t dominate or overtake your life.”

To that end, the MP 01 is pared again to essentials: calls, texts, alarms, and reminders. there’s a contact record, pace dial, and push buttons, too. think of it as a weekend phone—a trend that even the slickest, high-tech producers have started to embody.

Punkt has a few customers in thoughts for the MP 01. the primary is the one who makes themselves to be had throughout the day via pc, but then likes to have an unconnected, regular mobile phone. The second is one that makes use of a smartphone incessantly, however wants to have off hours once they go away for trip or don’t need to be as reachable through electronic mail and social media (this consumer can get their calls forwarded to the MP 01, set up a twin SIM card to have the identical number, or have a wholly completely different number). The third are individuals who do not need a lifestyles on-line either as a result of they’ve taken a aware stance against it or as a result of they’ve never been linked (the latter is likely a generational divide).

“Punkt is attempting to be acutely aware of know-how,” Neby says. “it is 100% for technology, however pondering that we aren’t enticing with expertise as we will have to be. I are likely to name Punkt’s products ‘units for up to date people.’ we want cellphones, we need land traces, we need to charge other units. We wish to provide instruments that give us a bit of extra in keep watch over of technology. The smartphones and now smartwatches are using us greater than we are driving them.”

in their analysis, means found that there’s a growing motion for more aware use of expertise. working example: all of the digital detox initiatives. “I picked up this e book called on my own together via Sherry Turkle and in she asks, why are we expecting extra from expertise and less from each different?,” Clark says. “She writes about the power of conversation and how nurturing a dialog will also be. In many ways, technology is taking away that intimacy from one any other.”

To Neby, excellent design relates to the function of the product, has an element of timelessness to it, plus a little of poetry in the type—”one thing that talks to you beneath that rational pondering,” he says. The MP01 is constructed from sturdy plastic to for better reception, has a just right-sized monitor, intuitive navigation through the monitors, buttons which might be the entire same size for higher visible proportions, and its physique is at an eight-stage angle so that when it is used as a speakerphone, the sound reverberates off of the skin it can be set towards. The again has dot-shaped recesses for texture (like a golf ball) which might be additionally symbolic of the logo’s mark, a duration. Jasper Morrison was the inventive force behind the industrial design.

Neby has been testing the telephone out all summer. “One thing i believe that is interesting is you definitely make much more phone calls,” he says. “it’s a lot extra efficient. when you actually need to say something just make a cellphone name slightly than send an electronic mail.”

approach places Punkt’s “technology tamed” tradition underneath a bigger trend for “responsible objects“—products which are extra significant and have extra value to their customers, not simply more features.

“accountable objects are objects which are conscious about their use,” Neby says.

Clark chimes in: “when you are making objects or merchandise which might be taking away from daily lives, which might be turning into invasive and obsessive, is that excellent design?”

Punkt is building on the momentum from the rebranding and make contact with launch and plans to debut a product within the linked device realm next.