Connecting to the Internet in the 1990s was an act of faith. You needed a computer, a modem, a kit from an Internet Service Provider and a data connection through the telephone network.
It was not easy and sometimes failed. The promise of the new online experience justified staying at home fiddling with connections while others went out with friends. At the time, being a nerd meant not having much of a social life: unlike today, in the 1980s and 1990s, nerds were not fashionable.
Things changed quickly: for every person who surfed the Internet, there were 10 who talked about it, the Net began to spread in the imagination before becoming a habit.
In 1996, reading "Being Digital" by Negroponte sparked a revelation for me: the onset of the digital era, a meticulously laid out vision for the forthcoming societal transformations.
Together with some partners, I founded Arscolor Interactive, a digital agency that aimed to support companies in creating Internet-based services.
I could not have known at the time that that decision would change my life.
At the same time, Google was born, which changed many lives.
In the 2000s, developing Internet services meant having great faith in technology and how it could improve people's lives.
A quote by Picasso has always struck me:
"I do not seek, I find".
It means that things pass you by, the skill lies in selecting what you think can bring added value and discarding the rest.
This is exactly how innovation works and it is also how Arscolor Interactive has always operated.
Technological innovations were sweeping past our eyes; our task was to make them available to customers. The success of a digital agency hinged on the ability to sense change; it was a matter of speed.
Much like what a hunter does: aim, shoot, hit.
In 2007, Apple introduced the iPhone, giving change a sudden acceleration. I'm not referring specifically to technological evolution, but to the irreversible change in our habits, the foundations of culture, and modern society. With mobile devices, technology has definitively become an extension of the body, transforming humans into cyborgs. At Arscolor Interactive, we've always been adept at interpreting these changes, seeing them in advance, aiming, and shooting. Of course, we didn't always hit the target; sometimes, enthusiasm led to poor investments, but overall, we've always been able to understand which technology was useful to businesses and how to develop it. All of this no longer works today. Familiarity with technology and the proliferation of media have caused an information overload. Consumer attention has become the most precious asset.
The future belongs to brands and organizations that will earn the trust and time of their users by offering excellent digital products and experiences. From the perspective of a digital agency, this involves precisely understanding the habits, purchasing journey, and the way users interact with digital assets.
In recent years, we have invested time and money to refine our knowledge in data analysis and interfaces: being fast is no longer enough, patience and dedication are required. The farmer joins the hunter.
In non-metaphorical terms, this means that Arscolor Interactive has changed in recent years, thanks to the dedication of its team and the trust of its customers. We realized the need for a renewed corporate identity that reflects the evolution of the skills and services offered. The new identity is the result of a design process that involved the entire agency team through co-design, divided into various workshops aimed at bringing out the values and aspirations of a group that the AND EMILI brand summarizes.
AND represents the attitude towards collaboration between the agency, its team, and the clients.
EMILI is the bond with the Emilian territory whose excellences are known worldwide.
AND EMILI inherits from Arscolor Interactive technological skills, important clients, and a team of excellence that we are integrating with new resources. The growth plan involved updating the social structure and the recent move to the new headquarters in Reggio Emilia, which is subject to further expansion in January 2019.
The journey of AND EMILI begins today.
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