The HiQ brand identity awarded at prestigious European Design Awards

Tech consulting company HiQ, together with Great Apes and Earth People, is awarded at one of Europe's most renowned design competitions – a silver at European Design Awards for its very own brand identity.

This weekend, European Design Awards celebrated the best of brand & graphic design, illustration, and digital design in Europe at a ceremony in Luxembourg. The only Swedish winner in a branding category was HiQ, who was awarded a silver in Branding: Digital Identity Applications.

“We aim for our brand identity to be unique within our industry as well as remain loyal to the freewheeling spirit of HiQ as a brand and a workplace. It is inspiring and humbling to get this recognition, as a token of the hard work we put into our brand”, says Samuel Skott, CEO of HiQ.

HiQ, with a long history of digital design in its offering, turned to its own organization to work on the new identity. Helsinki based digital studio Great Apes, part of the HiQ group, is behind the concept and art direction for the identity that was launched in 2022.

”We are very excited that the HiQ brand is getting recognition on an international level. Especially since the identity is best described as a little mischievous. It’s playful, geeky and self-aware, and doesn’t blindly follow the common tech consultancy trends – so we are delighted that it stood out”, says Niko Sipilä, Design Director at Great Apes.

The identity is a reinvention of the previous HiQ identity – almost solely designed for digital use. It features a completely redrawn logo, expressive typography, a rainbow palette, and bespoke 3D-based illustrations which play a key role.

The visual identity has been brought to life through a close partnership with digital design and innovation agency Earth People – hand-picked for their outstanding abilities in illustration and animation.

“The illustration concepts explore almost surrealistic metaphors for fairly visually uninspiring topics. Quirky, weird, colorful and humorous combining organic and “techy” elements”, says Andreas Carlson, art director and illustrator at Earth People.

The winners at the European Design Awards are selected by a jury consisting of design journalists, educators and critics.

About Great Apes
Great Apes is an award-winning avant-garde digital studio specializing in experimental and innovative digital design & development.

About Earth People
Earth People is a digital agency specializing in digital services, apps, saas services, sites, integrations and physical installations.