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Developer Updates
Developer Updates
We have asked Koo Bhangra who took part in the branding workshop the other day, to work with us on the design of our brand, logo, initial artwork.
Koo has worked with me for nearly 15 years, alongside clients such as Adobe, MSOS, the BBC and many others. He is a lovely guy who is seriously talented.
His company The Unloved, is the only brand which I cannot love, but he still refused to change it to The Loved!
Watch this space.
I have decided to hold off on this process until we are just about to launch. In order to obtain a patent, we would have to reveal a lot about what we are doing and the nature of software is that someone else could then imitate (not copy) the process and idea.
I would rather they try to do this after we have got going rather than before we have left the starting blocks.
After an excellent workshop the other week, we have now met with Bee Jacobs a couple of times and she has also been beavering away.
We have now produced a Brand overview which I have sent to Koo the designer for him to work from. This document presents the character of the company, why we are doing what we are doing, what we believe in and who we are....
All of these characteristics of the Forghetti brand need to flow through everything we do, from the design of the logo, through to the way we answer the phone and sign off our emails.
I am really pleased with the outcome of this very enjoyable process. I know that some of you have been through this experience with your own companies. If not, then I recommend that it might be a good idea!
Developer Dave (as I like to call him), who I have been working with for many years now spent the day with us (really Lee) this week.
Whilst we do not store anything of real value to anyone in the database (in relation to passwords themselves), we will be holding names, email addresses, usernames etc. So that we are able to put a badge of "We are encrypted" all over the website and platform, Dave is working with us to ensure that there is a suitable and reliable encryption procedure in place.
Without wanting to get too technical, whilst all the data on the Google Cloud Platform is encrypted by two-factor authentication and Google's own Oauth security, if (and it is a big if), someone was able to get into the database, they would be able to see all of these values. The encryption that Dave is putting in place, will ensure that even if they did get into the database, they would not be able to read anything they found...
I have been speaking with the guys over in Indonesia and we are making some progress in setting up the deal with them. I have now a service agreement which covers their activity which is just waiting for us to put in the start dates and then we can sign it.
I am holding off a little as it is a fine balance between engaging them too early and then having developers on hand twiddling their thumbs or too late and then not having the resources available to us.
I am looking at engaging them with 3 developers most probably sometime between the mid/end of November. This will hopefully give us enough time here to work on the encryption of the Google Cloud Platform databases (See the other post here relating to this) as well as to apply the branding and style to the app design.
I appointed Blake Morgan in the end to do this work. They have now completed the global search of the name Forghetti and for your interest here is a summary of the outcome.
I have a call with Ben Evans on Monday, but in summary the search identified only two marks of any real interest, both marks are, essentially the same, and are for the mark FOURGHETTI (along with a stylised element) and cover Italy and, through what's known as an International Registration, the US and China. The mark is owned by BELLUZZI SILVIA SARA.
The marks appear to be those of the Fourghetti restaurant in Bologna, Italy. However, as well as covering the obvious restaurant and franchise type services the marks also, strangely, cover the development of software and hardware. We believe that they may assist franchisees by providing computing systems (payroll, booking etc).
So, there's no obvious commercial conflict between the relevant businesses but, from a strict legal analysis (and looking at Italy, the US and China only) there is a risk here. That risk is, in essence, that the marks are highly similar and that the goods/services are, at least, similar/highly similar. Accordingly there is a risk that a likelihood of confusion could be demonstrated. Of course, in the end, it is for the owner of the trade mark (BSS) to raise the issue if they see fit to, if not then there is no issue.
I am minded to just carry on as I really think this is irrelevant, but I will revert after the call.
A great workshop with an interesting selection of people taking part.
The day was a 5 hour mega workshop (split with some sandwiches half way through) where we shared our views and insights about the product, the target marketing, the reason for why it was needed, what the feelings were when you needed it and the concerns one might have around online security more generally.We discussed our opinions on existing brands, what we do, do not like, their personalities, design, statements....We then moved onto our the different characters that we wanted our product to have, it's personality, positioning, values, mission.... and we covered the wall with different ideas and words both positive and negative. The picture below shows the wall at the end of the day.
The take home from this is that we are now a lot closer to being able to provide Koo with a creative brief to go away and work with on the design of the branding. Bee did a great job in working through the different tasks with us and she is now tasked with the challenge of putting the brief together. Very cool, very productive. I look forward to seeing the output from this exercise.
Laura Hill also joined us for the meeting with Bee Jacobs.
Laura is a Director of Waypoint Digital Marketing, with whom we (Summit) do a significant amount of work. Laura is a great person, with loads of energy, contacts and ideas as well as a very direct voice... a spade is a spade!
Laura kindly introduced us to Bee and I hope will be able to take part in supporting us on the journey with input on content and social media side of things... a good sounding board, I am sure we will see her at several of our brain storming sessions...
Having had phone conversations with several potential positioning specialists and "wordsmiths" I have ruled out two of them (one was too important for herself and the other was to much of a B2B personality).
We met however on Monday with Bee Jacobs who was introduced by another potential team support Laura Hill (see below).
The meeting with Bee Jacobs to get her involved in the branding, positioning and messaging that will help us to put the product on the map in a fabulous way was an inspiring one... she is clearly a expert in this and I am excited to see what she has to say next.
https://beejacobs.carbonmade.com/
She got the concept immediately and would be a customer. She has some amazing experience and as a Mum to little people here in Winchester... is not looking to move back to London for her day job any time soon.
We will need to grab her attention from irritating little projects working for UEFA!!
Meeting with Steve Cluett - Winchester based designer who is able to work with us on the development of the branding and advertising material. He is a decent guy with a lot of experience...
After an initial meeting with Mike he provided us with a quick summary of his thoughts and a round up of how he sees the positioning of the product.
He provided us with this brief presentation.
I am making contact again with Downing IP, although as a word of caution I have been advised by Wilsons to be cautious of the timing of this - we do not want the competition to be all over us before we are live.
I have asked Wilsons to quote for this work so that I can ideally keep some of this legal under one roof... Blake Morgan are also on the radar... so making decisions very soon to get the ball rolling.
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