Seven years on, Newlands Scientific has become FeONIC plc, a company with a strong, clearly defined brand that adds weight and coherence to its range of groundbreaking products.
Neither the successful branding of this new technology, nor the products developed to commercialise it happened overnight. Indeed, creating a clearly defined brand did not seem like a priority until quite a way into the commercialisation process, when suddenly there seemed to be a profusion of different names, brands, licensees and distributors all vying for attention.
For example Newlands Scientific trademarked their technology under the name FeONIC, which immediately gave the technology its own identity and distanced it from its academic roots in magnetostriction.
Using FeONIC technology, Newlands Scientific created the Soundbug, the first in its range of hi-tech audio products. Soundbug was branded and distributed by Olympia, with FeONIC technology featuring on the product and Newlands Scientific applied to the packaging. This confusion of names made it difficult for consumers to identify with the product itself and its creators, weakening the company’s overall commercial position.
Newlands Scientific began working with the Design Council when it joined Designing Demand Innovate, a business growth service for technology ventures which is part of the Designing Demand programme. It consulted with design advisor, Oliver King from service design consultancy Engine, who suggested uniting each of Newlands Sceintific’s products under the FeONIC brand.
‘Newlands had a very complicated relationship with its suppliers and distributors,’ says King. ‘The company wasn’t getting the exposure it needed although there was a good ‘FeONIC technology’ community which had grown around the trademark.’
In 2004, Newlands Scientific changed its name to FeONIC plc, enabling all its products (now a range of seven) to be instantly associated with the brand and the technology behind it. Now all products are aggressively branded as FeONIC and gradually the company is seeing a demonstrable increase in sales of its products. Managing Director of FeONIC, Brian Smith says: ‘We now have an external team of commissioned based salesmen and sales have really picked up. Having a clear brand has made all the difference.’
As the company moves forward, more products will be developed for different market sectors, but, as Oliver King explains, this shouldn’t diminish the strength of the brand: ‘Brand names can often be constraining, but FeONIC is pretty flexible. It’s like Sony, which produces products for many different sectors but the name still suggests a quality that is common to all of them. FeONIC is becoming associated with enabling technologies, a strength that can be appreciated by all market sectors.’
