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Sunday, 22 July 2007 | Levent OZLER
The O2 Cocoon: A Life Within
A breakthrough in mobile design, the O2 Cocoon is the latest O2 handset developed specifically for the style-led consumer, combining iconic design with a number of unique features that make it one of the best quality music players and mobile phones on the market.
A product of extensive consumer research and drawn from customer insight, the O2 Cocoon packs a range of eye and ear-catching features - such as the capacity to store 500 high sound quality songs using the 2GB internal memory and an additional 500 songs using a 2GB micro SD card. It also includes a never before seen LED display - in a unique and sleek white clamshell design. A key feature that consumers rated high in testing is the blue LED display which can be programmed to show time, 'now playing' information, caller ID and also displays the beginning of text messages as they arrive in the users inbox.
Developing The Master Plan
Revolution is a group effort. In 1971, when architects Richard Rogers and Renzo Piano won the coveted prize to build the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris, one of the most iconic cultural centres in the world, the duo didn't hole up in a studio by themselves. Rogers and Piano enlisted the assistance of partners Sue Rogers and Peter Rice along with structural engineers Ove Arup to develop a radical approach to building design called "Bowellism" - or "inside/out", which rocked the foundations of the architectural blueprint forever.
Rogers and Piano's masterpiece was the result of looking sideways at building design. A combination of strong beliefs and ideals brought a very unconventional and exciting possibility to life that has since generated countless others to follow in their footsteps.
In Amsterdam, the innovative crew at Streative Branding have hatched a unique blueprint that will shake up the mobile phone consumer phone market from a disillusioned 'sea of sameness', just like Rogers and Piano knocked the croissants out of the hands of the Parisian public over 35 years ago.
When O2 approached us with their marketing requirements to work together to establish a design blueprint and strategy, the key objective was to reduce the relentless 'churn-and-burn' gridlock the mobile phone has been facing over the past several years. The ultimate goal was to design iconoclastic and beautiful phones based on consumer experience instead of stereotypes.
We'd like to think of ourselves as a new breed of 21st Century Design Architects.
Streative acts as a catalyst, antagonist, behaviour scientist, urban archaeologist, social anthropologist and the protagonist of 21st century storytelling. We investigate market trends and consumer desires and then recruit the perfect blend of like-minded creatives to help us inject new life into an otherwise static product category. We believe every product on the market possesses 'A Life Within' and our ambition is to unearth that potential and revive it for the next generation.
Laying Down The Foundation
The foundation of the Streative blueprint literally begins on the street with 'Project Mole'. Strategically recruited around the globe, our Moles are hand picked vanguards of the creative industry with deep roots in the arts, music, design and street scenes. They're influencers and activists, thinkers, cynical risk-takers and multi-taskers. They've got an insatiable appetite for information and are highly in tune with up and coming brands, fashion, trends, music, art and design. As you are reading this, our Moles will be tunnelling through the most secret corners of Harajuku, sweet talking their way in to sneaker preview sessions at design shows and starting conversations with just about any urbanite that looks cool enough to have an opinion.
Project Mole has inspired and influenced companies to rethink their channel strategies, upgrade their operations and rewire their communications. In short, we've helped companies become more genuine because we have authentic, up-to-theminute information.
We know that consumers in New York and London are saying goodbye to bling and hello to a pared down 'New Luxury' and that the current hype in Tokyo and Seoul is for 'Humanizing Hardware', while over in LA and Sydney people are gravitating towards the 'Simplexity' of style and design and scaling down to a less complicated lifestyle. Streative acts as the mortar that plasters together Mole insights, cultural movements, social commentary, desk research and client ambitions to deliver unique services and products. This textured information forms the base from which we intuitively construct our visual story for O2's device and marketing teams.
With O2 passionate about the promise of developing a new design DNA for their consumers, Streative then began the task of recruiting visionary and like-minded designers who share our passion for shaking up the design blueprint with bleeding edge innovation. With O2 the first building block of the foundation was laid.
Scouring the globe for new design talent, one of our Swedish Super Moles tweaked our radar in the direction of Syntes Studio. Syntes is an innovation studio bursting with forward-thinking industrial engineers and product and graphic designers from Stockholm. After a whirlwind courtship, Streative, O2 and Syntes began constructing a mobile phone that would respond to consumers' increasing demand for simple and intuitive technology. The collective goal was to create a mobile phone that reflected a shift towards the desire for organic forms while also making reference to O2's naming rights sponsorship of 'The O2', (formerly known in London as The Millennium Dome). Both reflects a beautiful and simple structure, yet is bubbling with A Life Within.
 Constructing The Model
When the team gave birth to the O2 Cocoon design, a completely new design identity was constructed. It's a seamless clamshell design that's clean and tactile on the outside and technologically advanced on the inside. The Streative trend blueprint illustrated how consumers were demanding a mobile phone that was 'experience focused'. We believed that the world was not waiting for another static tech gadget. Instead our hearts were set on establishing a phone that was an extension of ourselves.
The O2 Cocoon features simple, yet extremely sophisticated, solutions to common mobile phone problems. Where our Moles identified exasperation with having to click through six interfaces to set their alarm clock, the team moved the function to the forefront. Then we took it one step further by developing a patented 'Nest' so the phone could dock itself on your bedside table at night to replace your alarm clock. When we heard of Moles wanting to share their MP3 mobile downloads with friends, Syntes cleverly interpreted this desire by installing speakers on either side of the handset, a unique 'y' jack, a plug-in to hook up to your stereo, and added 'air holes' at the base of the Nest so when docked the sound won't get blocked from the speakers.
But even the most logical inventions are not always embraced by the industry. Manufacturers said the O2 Cocoon couldn't be constructed because it broke the mold of every current mobile phone 'clone' on the market. But at Streative the word no is yes in disquise. It cost the team, O2, Syntes and Streative 19 months of blood, sweat and back-tothe- drawing board tears of hassling and negotiating with contractors and factories halfway around the world before we were finally able to bring the O2 Cocoon to life.
Our revolutionary blueprint for O2 branded devices is steaming full speed ahead. We're continually scouring smoky café's, lurking behind the scenes at trade shows, investigating design school cafeterias and inhaling the latest news on the freshest talent from the street. Which is to say, we've only just begun on this amazing design journey. We hope you're waiting with bated breath for the next string of Streative design collaborations with O2.
Streative's Blueprint Principles
Deconstruct and Rebuild
Look Sideways
Create a customized blueprint
Knock it down, strip it to the bare bone
Investigate what makes the consumer tick
Get the word straight from the street
Think visually, literally and laterally
Create desire-based products
Evolve not Revolve
Build it to last
A product is not static
Make it deep, personal and meaningful
Take everything to heart and soul
Take nothing at face value
Tweak instead of Mask
Improve the product
Enhance the features and form
Holistically heal the category
Collaborate Instead of Dominate
Draw together like-minded people
Seek for influencers with vision and style
Create global dialogue with design collectives
Collaboratively shape the world in which we live
Blend together a melting pot of inspiration
Compliment not Complicate
Life is stressful
Support increasingly busy lives
Eliminate confusion and distress
Less-is-more simplicity
Get down to basics
Innovate not Renovate
Raise the bar
Get really excited and they will too
Inspire a fresh approach to the future
Take risks
Reveal instead of Conceal
Make it all relevant
Be authentic and honest
Remove the anorak mentality
Breathe life in to the details
Listen instead of Hear
Step back
Forget 'me too' design
Intuitively interpret needs
Create extensions of self
Never, Ever Give Up
Streative Branding: http://www.dexigner.com/directory/detail/9336.html
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