Finnish Mobile Wallet Pivo wins 
Red Dot for interaction design

Finnish service design and innovation agency Nordkapp and the major Finnish bank OP-Pohjola have won the sought-after Red Dot for interaction design in the Red Dot Award: Communication Design 2014, for the interaction design of Mobile Wallet Pivo.

Pivo is a mobile wallet application that follows your consumption habits and shows the state of your personal finance in a clear and intuitive manner. The application was launched in May 2013. The development is being driven by an OP Pohjola’s internal team in Oulu, and complemented by design agency Nordkapp in Helsinki. According to it’s users, it is the best finance app in Finland. It looks beautiful, feels easy and effortless and most of all, has become an integral part of people’s daily lives. The majority of the users open the application at least weekly while one third uses the app daily. These numbers are quite extraordinary and are being surpassed by only by the likes of Tinder and Facebook.

Despite the extremely tight development timeline, Pivo has exceeded all expectations we set for the app. In addition to this, the quality of the app is just outstanding, and has 
become the pride of the whole organization.
—Kristian Luoma, Business Development Manager, OP-Pohjola

Pivo is an exceptional example of results where modern, lean and multidisciplinary way of working can lead. By combining product management, development and design tightly together, we’ve created something that is quite special — a finance application that users love, and that feels easy and effortless. At Nordkapp, we would like to thank our clients at OP-Pohjola for an opportunity to work with such a great product team and partners.
— Sami Niemelä, Creative Director, Pivo Design Lead, Nordkapp

About Pivo and OP-Pohjola

OP-Pohjola, the largest national bank has a long history of innovation and firsts. In late 2012 the bank set it’s sights on an application which sets a whole new standard on personal financial services. The result is Pivo, the Finnish mobile wallet.

Pivo is an internal startup of the largest bank in Finland, OP-Pohjola. Previously Pivo has been awarded Gold in Digital Design and Silver in Best Product Design at Vuoden Huiput / best of the year 2013 Finland, and Best Design and Best Mobile App -awards at Grand One 2014 in Helsinki, Finland. Pivo naming and branding was developed in collaboration with advertising agency N2 Helsinki and media agency Toinen PHD. 
Read the thorough Pivo case study here: http://nordkapp.fi/cases/pivo/english.html

About Nordkapp

Nordkapp is a service design and innovation agency based in Helsinki, Finland and working globally. We help our clients turn the internet into business and experiences people love to interact with.

The services we offer help companies become more innovative and more successful by being able to seize the opportunities faster and better. The domains we are 
exceptionally experienced with are media, retail/e-commerce, financial, social gaming, public services, aviation, energy and internet of things / emerging technologies.

The Red Dot Design Award

The Red Dot Design Award is one of the world’s largest design competitions. The international jury selected the winners from over 7000 entries over judging sessions running over several days and only the best works win this seal of quality for design. This year, the jury granted the award to 584 outstanding creative achievements. The winners will be celebrated at the official awards ceremony on 24 October 2014 in the Konzerthaus in Berlin.

Lehdistötiedote 18.8.2014

Pivolle Red Dot-muotoilupalkinto

Nordkapp ja OP-Pohjola ovat voittaneet himoitun Red Dot-palkinnon Mobiililompakko Pivon suunnittelusta Red Dot Award: Communication Design 2014 –kilpailussa.

Pivo on mobiilisovellus joka auttaa sinua saamaan enemmän irti nykyisestä lompakostasi. Sen avulla tiedät aina mihin sinulla on varaa, näet miten ostoksesi vaikuttavat tulevaisuuden varoihisi, löydät tarkempia tietoja mihin olet käyttänyt rahasi sekä löydät etusi ja useimmiten käyttämiesi palveluntarjoajien tarjoukset nopeasti. Sovellus julkaistiin toukokuussa 2013. Päävastuu kehituksestä on Oulun OP-Palvelut –yksilöllä, ja suunnittelussa sparraa Helsinkiläinen palvelumuotoilu ja –innovaatiotoimsto Nordkapp.

Sovelluksen julkaisua seuraavien viikkojen aikana useat kymmenet käyttäjät arvostelivat sovelluksen sekä iOS App Storessa että Google Playssa täyden viiden tähden arvoiseksi. Lisäksi sovellukseen rekisteröityneet käyttäjät ovat pysyneet kasvaneesta volyymistä huolimatta äärimmäisen uskollisina: 33 % käyttää sovellusta päivittäin, 66 % viikoittain – tämä on erittäin poikkeuksellista mobiilisovellusten saralla mihin tahansa verrattuna.

Pivo on ylittänyt kaikki odotukset huolimatta erittäin korkealle asetetusta rimasta. Tavoitteiden täyttämisen ohella se laatutaso joka ripeästä aikataulusta huolimatta saavutettiin on ehdoton ylpeyden aihe läpi organisaation. Pivo on muotoilullaan ja luovalla ratkaisullaan aidosti murtautunut yhdeksi käytetyimmistä sovelluksista lataajiensa keskuudessa.
—Kristian Luoma, Business Development Manager, OP-Pohjola

Pivo huikea esimerkki siitä minkälaisia tuloksia nykyaikainen, ketterä monitoimijamalli saa aikaan. Tuotteistuksen, palvelumuotoilun ja kehitystyön saumaton yhdistäminen on mahdollistanut sen että Pivo on taloussovellus jota käyttäjät rakastavat, ja jonka käyttö on helppoa ja vaivatonta. Nordkappilla olemme syvästi kiitollisia mahdollisuudesta olla mukana osana näin loistavaa palvelua ja kumppaniyhteisöä.
— Sami Niemelä, Creative Director, Pivo Design Lead, Nordkapp

Pivo ja OP-Pohjola

OP-Pohjola-ryhmä on Suomen suurin finanssiryhmä, joka loppuvuodesta 2012 otti tavoitteekseen mobiililompakon lanseeraamiseen, joka mullistaisi käyttäjiensä taloudenhallinnan ja ostoksilla käynnin. Syntyi Pivo, suomalainen mobiililompakko.

Pivo toimii OP-Pohjolan sisäisenä startup-yrityksenä . Aikaisemmin Pivo on palkittu Digitaalisen Muotoilun kultahuipulla ja tuotteistuksen Hopeahuipulla Vuoden Huiput-kilpailussa, sekä Parhaasta Designista ja Parhaana Mobiilisovelluksena Grand One 2014-kilpaulussa. Pivon nimeäminen ja brändi kehitettiin yhteistyössä Mainostoimisto N2 Helsingin ja mediatoimisto Toinen PHD:n kanssa. 
Tutustu Pivoon syntyhistoriaan tarkemmin täällä: http://nordkapp.fi/cases/pivo/

Nordkapp

Nordkapp on palvelumuotoilu- ja innovaatiotoimisto. Autamme asiakkaitamme muotoilemaan internetiä liiketoiminnaksi ja elämyksiksi joita kuluttajat janoavat.

Palveumme auttavat yrityksia tulemaan innovatiivisemmaksi, ja menestymään helpommin ja nopeammin. Toimialoja joilla olemme erityisen kokeneita ovat talous, media, kauppa, sosiaalinen pelaaminen, julkiset palvelut, lentoliikenne, energia ja esineiden internet/uudet teknologiat.

Red Dot -muotoilupalkinto

Red Dot -muotoilupalkinto on yksi mailman suurimmista designkilpailuista. Tänä vuonna kansainvälinen tuomaristo valitsi voittajat yli 7000 lähetetyn työn joukosta, ja vain ehdottomat huiput saivat muotoilupalkinnon. Voittajia juhlistetaan virallisessa palkintogaalassa Berliinin Konzerthausissa lokakuussa 2014.

What’s going on in Barcelona you might ask? Matti & myself are here, visiting the Mobile World Congress side event 4 years from now. Like the title says, the event concentrates on the dominant themes from four years from now: internet of things, wearables, startups, product design and all that in a super vibrant setting. Lot of interesting people, technology & things which actually deserves it’s own post, coming up soon.

Elsewhere, Vuoden Huiput (Design & advertising grand prix of Finland) shortlist was released a week ago. Pivo, the mobile finance app we helped OP-Pohjola design was shortlisted in three categories: Digital design, Service design and Productization of design. We’re grateful for a great client letting us into a great piece of work, and for everyone who participated making the product happen from N2, Toinen to the internal product team and everyone else involved. Let’s have a toast at the awards in few weeks.

Carrying on the same theme, I have the the honor to be invited to be head the digital jury at Küldmuna 2014, Estonia’s equivalent to Vuoden Huiput next week. I am honored and excited to see the Estonian talent in it’s full glory.

Meanwhile, everyone’s hard at work back at the office. Suddenly there seems to be quite a few of large things moving onwards simultaneously: look forward for high impact things in commerce, banking and media/VOD sometime this year.

Here’s what people are up to, in random order:

Panu returned for a short break in the sun only to find himself in between two large projects in finance and commerce. Luckily both in slightly different phases in design and development.

Teppo and Sauli are still crunching it away with our long time operator client, working on an ecosystem revamp and an internal product/startup respectively.

Jukka will be joining them in a few, once he’s done transferring a lot of moving parts at Veikkaus to Lauri who’s helping out our team already. Naturally, he’s got a few other things on his plate too, ranging from a Windows tablet app with Tuukka to pieces in the legislative world, banking and publishing.

Aki is very busy doing what Aki does for several projects ranging from consulting front end architectures & processes to actual development work.

Timo is slowly wrapping up a large piece of work for a startup client of ours in Finland and the US. Looks like the thing is going to be huge — more about that later on.

Shakti just wrapped up a super interesting Android app with Jukka & myself. Our client is about to pilot the thing in India of all places, and we’re excited to see how it all goes down there.

Tuukka seems to have a steady flow of work in a few projects related to commerce, and of course Helsingin Sanomat apps as well.

Myself? While wrapping up the Android thing, I’ve spent a majority of my time on getting the company brand assets pieced together. Slowly but surely Jukka & myself nailed the company identity revamp which is rolling out slowly as we speak: presentation & documentation templates, business cards, signage — it’s been only three months since the move :) — and other bits and pieces. Looking pretty cool so far, and probably deserves it’s own blog post in the near future too. I’m also trying to get my head around the beef in internet of things, smart living and the real business opportunities around this sphere. And products – more about this soon.

Finally, we’ve been positively surprised by our ongoing recruiting efforts. A sincere thanks to everyone who’s applied so far — if we haven’t spoken already we will quite soon. And there’s still time to apply!

For you, people come first. You master human centric design methods and know when to research and when trust your guts. You work in Lean UX mode by default – less specifications and more hands-on design, prototyping and testing with developers and business owners.

Must-haves:

• Design skills: IA, wireframes, flows, prototyping
• Content skills: an eye for detail, writing and editing copy
• People skills: articulation and presentation skills

Senior Visual Designer

You have a deep understanding of scalability and different browsers, operating systems and devices. You enjoy working with all phases between ideation and delivery. Being a type nerd is a definitive bonus.

Must-haves:

• Design skills: typography, branding, UI best practices, flows, prototyping
• Content skills: an eye for detail, a sense of style for illustration & photography
• People skills: articulation and presentation skills

Front-end developer / Technologist

You have a hacker-like mentality & curiosity towards technology.
You are fluent with all modern front end technologies and frameworks, possess good rapid prototyping skills, an excellent eye for detail and a passion to keep on the cutting edge on all things digital.

Must-haves:

• Excellent HTML, CSS, JS skills
• Deep understanding and experience in front-end frameworks, responsive web design and productive development short cuts
• Good experience in modern content management systems, data base technologies and web analytics
• Independent decision making, a craving for quality end results
• A human centered stand point and a can do attitude
• Eye for visual design and ability to quickly catch and build on designer’s ideas

Nice to have;

• Node.js, Ruby, Python.
• e-commerce platform knowledge
• C#, C++, C
• Internet of things experience and electronics tinkering

General requirements

We are not looking for a specialist here. Instead, you’ll be working on anything from the abstraction and problem solving at the top end of the value chain to designing new behaviours, services, systems, interfaces and interaction. You work on products and services that are predominantly digital: different web browsers are the most common platform here. You also need to be comfortable with designing applications and software for mobile devices, embedded systems, internet of things and platforms enabling new product development.

We are a fast moving environment so you need to be a self starter who’s not shy of starting a conversation of your work with your team and clients. On a more practical level, you need to be at home with Creative Cloud apps and to have chops to build your own work don’t hurt either. Curiosity towards the world and new things is a must.

What we offer

As an organization, we have been running flat and lean way before they became trendy terms of the day. That is why we appreciate people who are not afraid to step up and take responsibility when needed. In return, we offer you the chance to do the best work of your life with the best and brightest colleagues you’ll ever have. All this in a relaxed but professional working environment in central Helsinki, with clients in southern Finland and abroad. And of course the usual state-of-the-art tools you need to get the job done.

++

Nordkapp is a design consultancy located in central Helsinki, Finland. We are here to design the best products and services in the world. We take pride in our craftsmanship and skill to design things that feel effortless, look beautiful and become obvious and natural to the people using them. By designing better products and services, we create a better tomorrow for everyone. It’s that simple, really.

A lot of folks can claim to be the best in what they do but we actually have the references and history to prove it. Since founding the company in 2007 we’ve grown slowly but surely. Slowly because quality is everything to us, and surely because we are very passionate about out work and employ only the best people to work on great projects for startups, corporations and self-initiated products.

How to apply?

This posting is effective immediately, and closes when we’ve found the people we’re looking for. Send your application to work@nordkapp.fi enclosed with the following:

1. A link to your portfolio or a PDF showcasing what you’re good at
2. A short cover letter stating why you are the one we’re looking for
3. A short description of your latest piece of work you are proud of

All applications are handled discreetly and confidentially. Due to the large amount of email applications we receive, we may not be able to respond immediately but we will get back to you.

Nokia tuo tänään myyntiin ensimmäisen tablet-laitteensa, Lumia 2520:n. Helsingin Sanomat, Suomen ja pohjoismaiden suurin sanomalehti on mukana julkaisussa uudella HS Windows-sovelluksella, joka on suunniteltu yhteistyössä Nordkappin kanssa.

“Meille on tärkeää ollaan mukana tuomassa laadukasta suomalaista sisältöä myös Windows -alustan käyttäjille, ja seuraamme mielenkiinnolla, miten alustan ja meidän sovelluksen käyttö kehittyy,” Sanoman tablet-alustoista vastaava kehityspäällikkö Samuli Jakobsson kommentoi. “Nokia tuo peliin kovatasoisen laitteen, ja Hesari tarjoaa Nokia-tabletin hankkineelle 1 kk maksuttoman käytön Hesarin uuteen Windows-sovellukseen.”

“Verrattuna iPad- ja Android-sovelluksiin, Hesarin Windows 8-sovellusta lähdettiin tekemään rohkeammin käyttöjärjestelmän ja -käyttöliittymän ehdoilla ja tavoilla,” kertoo Nordkappin vastaava suunnittelija Teppo Kotirinta. “Windows 8:n suunnitteluohjeet korostavat esimerkiksi sisällön nostoja syvältä applikaatiosta Windows 8:lle ominaisiin leveisiin panoraamanäyttöihin, näin sovelluksesta hyvin erilainen kuin esimerkiksi iPadilla. Windows 8-alustan luonne istuu erinomaisesti nimenomaan sanomalehti-sovellusten tekemiseen, ja parhaat sovellukset ovatkin luonnostaan hyvin lehtimäisiä.”

Nordkappilla on pitkä kokemus vahvojen sisältöbrändien tuomisesta uusiin digitaalisiin ympäristöihin kuten Windows 8-alustalle. Suunnitteluprosessissa olikin alusta lähtien tavoite korkealla. “Tavoitteemme oli alusta lähtien tehdä maailmanluokan huippulaatua. Tämä osoittautuikin vaivattomaksi, koska Hesarin lehtibrandin hiljattain tehty typografiauudistus siirtyy hyvin vaivattomasti myös digitaaliseen ympäristöön.”, kertoo vanhempi suunnittelija Tuukka Sassi. “Toimimme luonnostaan ketterästi tiivissä yhteistyössä asiakkaan avaintiimin kanssa. Tablet-sovelluksia pitää ajatella liikkuvina ja elävinä kokonaisuuksina, ja niinpä teimmekin hyvin varhaisessa vaiheessa HTML-prototyypin jolla validoimme sekä luovien ratkaisujen että konseptin toimivuuden.” Tämän lisäksi työ luonnollisesti dokumentoitiin kattavaan tyylioppaaseen sovelluskehityksestä vastaavalle Futuricelle.

Sanoma on hyvin tyytyväinen yhteistyöhön: “Nordkapp ylitti odotuksemme suunnittelutyön ketteryydessä, tehokkuudessa ja laadussa. Yhdessä Nordkappin suunnittelutiimin kanssa saimme Hesarin sisällön taipumaan vaivattomasti Windows 8 -alustan periaatteiden ja käytäntöjen mukaiseksi. Lopputuloksena on raikas ja moderni design. Sovelluskehittäjien oli helppo lähteä toteuttamaan tätä hyvin mietittyä ja dokumentoitua kokonaisuutta,” kommentoi Jakobsson.

Helsingin Sanomat Windows 8 -sovellus on ladattavissa Windows 8 Kaupasta nyt. Haluatko kuulla miten voimme auttaa sinua tuomaan palvelusi tai tuotteesi digitaalisille alustoille? Ota yhteyttä Ilkka Haavistoon, ilkka@nordkapp.fi ja +358 40 511 9038

Helsingin Sanomat Windows 8 app out today

Today is the day the long awaited Nokia Lumia 2520 tablet hits the stores. Helsingin Sanomat, the largest subscription newspaper in Finland and the Nordic countries is participating the launch with their new Windows 8 application designed in collaboration with Nordkapp, and developed by Futurice.

“We think bringing high quality Finnish content available to the people on Windows platform is very important, and we are excited to see how the platform and the usage of our app develops”, says the Sanoma tablet development manager Samuli Jakobsson. “Nokia is releasing a superb device, and to celebrate this HS offers a free month for the new HS Windows app users”

“In comparison to iPad and Android apps, the HS Windows 8 app was developed much more boldly in the context of the OS itself,” says Teppo Kotirinta, Nordkapp Principal Designer in charge of the app. “The platform design guidelines emphasize for example pulling deep content into the wide Windows panorama screens, and this makes the character fairly different to, say the iPad. The Windows 8 elements fit very naturally into designing newspaper-like canvases.”

Nordkapp has a vast experience on bringing strong content brands into new digital environments such as Windows 8. As always, the goal was set high begin with. “From the day one, our goal was to build a world class app. This folded in naturally with recent brand and typography revision by the HS team, and we were delighted to see how effortlessly the new type family fell into its place on Windows 8,” comments Tuukka Sassi, Senior Designer at Nordkapp. “Naturally we partnered with the HS team from the day one in very lean manner. One has to consider designing applications as living and moving systems, so from very early stage we brought a live HTML prototype to the table. This helped us greatly to validate both creative solutions and the concept itself.” In addition, Nordkapp delivered a solid styleguide for the Futurice development team.

Sanoma is very happy about the results “The collaboration with Nordkapp completely exceeded our expectations in the agility, efficiency and quality of work. Together with their design team our content fell into Windows 8 platform effortlessly, resulting into a fresh, modern and well thought solution, documented in a way which made it very easy for the developers to execute the work” says Jakobsson.

The Helsingin Sanomat Windows 8 -app is available at the Windows 8 Marketplace. We would love to talk to you how to transform your services into new digital platforms. To hear more about how we can help you, contact Ilkka Haavisto at ilkka@nordkapp.fi and +358 40 511 9038

Additional Images

HS Windows 8 and Nokia Lumia 2520 make a perfect pair

Consistent grid usage is the heart & soul of Windows 8

Windows 8 is by its nature very newspaper like.

Working with the revised HS typography was a delight

Last week was the Slush week. Media coverage was plenty so I’m not going to repeat the obvious but I’ll just say it was and awesome and HUGE event. Having been loosely partial to the first Slush at Korjaamo in 2008 and a speaker at last year’s event at Kaapeli, this year really felt like Slush has finally grown up into a well oiled, enjoyable and efficient machine to all things startup. Well done, team.

Most of our team were hard at work last week, but I managed to have a peek at the festival, courtesy of our startup client Usetrace. Despite us having no paid sponsorship or anything at the event, it turns out our work was still rather visible throughout the event. Our friends Tellybean were pitching like crazy at Reaktor Polte stand, Demos Helsinki‘s sustainable startup accelerator Peloton had their own stage on wednesday and a large booth on Thursday. Newest of the bunch, Usetrace had a booth there where they showed off the product we helped to improve. They also managed to close impressive amount of new users at Kaapeli. The coolest thing is they announced this week a seed round of €120 000 from undisclosed angel investors to grow the product. Congrats to all — our friends success makes us happy campers too!

Another big one last week was Long Play bringing home the €250 000 main prize of Uutisraivaaja competition, announced at Slush main stage on Wednesday evening. Long Play is a startup figuring out the future of long form journalism and we have been working with them on this since the last summer. The team has worked hard on a product which has 9 issues, or singles on LP-speak out, plenty of paying customers already in Finland and basically a proven concept. What we’re doing is helping them out to figure the service, scalability and of course visual identity. First major release of our work should be out by the end of year, watch this space… :)

In other news, Interaction Awards 2014 shortlist was out as well, and we’re representing Finland there with our interactive lawmaking / visualization tool Finlex Lainvalmistelu. Finalists are out in December, keep your fingers crossed for us!

Project update

Projects at the moment include: Panu & Tuukka working on a new multifaceted retail / ecommerce thing which will be piloted early next year.

Timo is working with an analytics startup building a serious competitor in that space with a team spread in three countries on two continents.

Teppo & Sauli are respectively chin-deep on various things at our teleoperator friend’s core business, and I’m putting final touches on a strategic thing related to this as well.

Matti is taking over Teppo on a large b2b project which will eventually have a huge impact on how businesses run their daily business.

Jukka is back from Japan after a month, and hit the ground running working with me on a banking client on designing the next versions of a few services, and also while on it coming up ways & stories to bring their whole online presence a new level.

Lauri is putting final touches on a short design fiction / concept video as a part of a larger technology concept work. Some parts of this were out in the open last week, but our lips are sealed for now.

I’m working few ends and couple of new exciting beginnings. Android pitches, new ways of working, our future offering, figuring out product design, on Nordkapp future & strategy with Ilkka, Panu & Marko. All kinds of exciting nuggets. It should be noted that our new (interim) website is slowly revealing itself while you read this. So go check it out.

One more thing – there is an IxDA Helsinki event at our office-in-progress tonight. Check out the details from here, and do join in!

Long Play photo:
Kimmo Hokkanen and Eva Persson at Uutisraivaaja blog

It also might be worth noting that carrying on the Nordkapp Day 0 tradition, the first thing we got in order at the office was coffee. We now brew our baseline with a brand new Wilfa Svart courtesy of distinguished mr Freese of Freese Coffee Co. With the increasing amount of coffee buffs in the office, we seem to be gathering a quite respectable amount of coffee paraphernalia around, too.

Projects

What comes to work, it was actually quite invigorating experience just to hang around at the office void of most furniture, sitting on temp desks & chairs, hacking away projects.

Matti has been taking care of quite a bit of moving parts in regards the move this Friday. Meanwhile he & Shakti helped Panu, Jukka & myself on a near-future technology project. We’ve now ran through from 100 + raw ideas to 60+ concepts and are now narrowing down into less than ten final ideas to be presented for clients’ management soon. Exciting stuff.

Timo is currently travelling and working from Sri Lanka on a CRM facelift. He’s also participating the WSA Global Congress, and will blog about it later.

Panu, Lauri, Aki, Antti and myself are working on several simultaneous things for our client in banking. We’re experimenting with a fairly lean way of working mixing visuals, content and code in a lovely mess altogether. And clients seem to quite like it — the first prototype we showed was thrown into a show & tell tour already. This is super nice considering the launch is still months away in 2014.

Meanwhile, Jukka has been wrapping up the same banking client, and also work on our own site & collaterals based on work we’ve done together during the past few months. Things are shaping up quite nicely, and we might even put a teaser out soon.

Teppo & Sauli are still very much engaged with the longtime client of ours on products design and development and everything seems to go quite well. Meanwhile, Tuukka got his first piece of work out in the public, and Aki is working on more heavyweight power plant UI magic for Fortum. More on these soon, and more things to follow as well.

That workshop I mentioned running with Jukka? After a few intensive days, the results were presented to the prestigious audience in Austria, with a superb feedback. Unfortunately, our lips are sealed for now.

Oh, and one more thing—

A popup studio in Tokyo

We are quite excited to share with you that from this week on Nordkapp will have a popup studio in the Mejiro district of Tokyo. Anyone interested talking to us in Japan should contact Jukka at jukka@nordkapp.fi

Until next week & onwards!

Changes in the line-up

First, since we last spoke there has been some changes in the personnel at the office. Our designers Tia, Akseli and Mikko have moved on and here’s to where: Tia is now working as a Senior UX Consultant at Innofactor, Akseli was given a wonderful opportunity to move on to our client Rovio (of Angry Birds fame) as the creative director of digital services UX. There was no drama involved, and we are grateful to all three for great things we did together, and wish them amazing things in the future.

Coincidentally, there are four (!!) new faces at the office. Say a warm welcome to Timo Rostedt, Tuukka Sassi, Lauri Borén and Shakti Dash.

Before moving in with us full time in the spring, Timo helped us with Pivo Android, and freelanced for a wide variety of clients such as Kela in Finland and in the US. In the past he’s worked also at Idean. I’ve known Timo way back since the turn of the century at Tampere School of Art & Media, and am thrilled to have him working for us. He brings a great set of talent in both visual design and building prototypes. An interesting detail about him is that he works from his home at Tampere, and visits the office and our clients in person whenever needed. At Nordkapp and aside Pivo, Timo has worked already on few other cases in publishing and banking.

Tuukka joined us in May, and he comes to Nordkapp from Activeark JWT where he was the Head of Service Design (and Markkinointi ja Mainonta blogger). He’s an industry veteran, and has worked in firms such as Gyllene Skor, Ego and Satama. With us, Tuukka has already teamed with Teppo to deliver a couple of killer Windows 8 and Android projects, to be released soon.

We also have international staff again with Shakti, who’s working with us as a designer while finishing his masters’ at Aalto University of Arts, Design & Architecture Media Lab. Previously he worked as UI/UX Designer for a Finnish startup Tellyo.

Our latest hire, Lauri comes from TWBA \ Helsinki where he worked as both Art director and latest as a copywriter. As a multitalented gentleman, he’s worked in the past as a web designer as well for Oulu based agency Työmaa. With us he basically just started this week and is getting his feet wet on a pretty interesting finance related project which crosses quite conveniently with his background and our line of work. We’ll get an official headshot of him soon.

Projects, projects, projects

Things are getting pretty hectic around here. Some things people are working on are:

Töissä.fi is a fairly ambitious (and first-in-the-world) service visualising the Finnish higher education career opportunities. The service beta was silently rolled before the summer for some additional data & testing. Jukka, our freelancer Antti H and myself did the design, and Flo Apps was responsible for putting it all together in code. The real deal will be out sometime this fall once the second major employment dataset is being released.

Jukka, Matti & Sauli are continuing their work with Veikkaus, designing their responsive digital services & games platform. Bits of the work are already out there (Keno, Lotto, Viking Lotto) and a lot more is under way. The results are also looking quite stunning. More info about this a bit later.

Jukka & Timo have also lend their skills to two banking projects, out soon. I am lending them a hand on this as well. Aki is happily building away some new exciting stuff for the Finnish Ministry of Justice. He recently also managed to deliver a product for controlling power plants for Fortum.

Before his departure, Mikko did stellar job on several Ruutu.fi services wrapped up a venture funded educational product UI for a VC Fund.

During the summer, Panu and myself helped out the jolly lads at Kallan & Co (of Kapu fame) over the summer on a supercool (and -secret) project for an international client. Our lips are, unfortunately, sealed for now.

Panu, Jukka and myself are also working on translating an pretty exciting emerging technology into viable products and services. This one may even go public at some stage, so more on this then.

Sauli, Teppo and myself are also working on a couple of different consumer services and a bit of UX strategy for a long time client of ours.

Other things out there include Pivo, the iOS/Android app for OP Pohjola. Pivo’s product lead Kristian also gave a talk about the product at NEXT Service Design Berlin mid-September, along with the likes of BBVA and BMW. See the video of his talk here and below

I also gave two talks recently, at the same day. First I shared our Urbanflow -project & learnings with the Australian offices of Arup, and later the day gave a talk about the future of web at Talentum UX Summit in Helsinki. The slides for the latter should be online soon.

In general I am super happy of the depth and quality of the work we’ve done recently. There are quite a few additional things waiting to be released in our bags as well. We’ve got a brand facelift rolling out on as I type, first on social media and later this month a brand new website with a load of new case studies, and killer photos by Aleksi Koskinen. On top of this in we’re moving offices this month. The Nordkapp 3.0 will be located in Kaisaniemi, Kaisaniemenkatu 6 to be exact. Exciting and very eventful times here at Nordkapp! Thanks for reading and check back soon!

This design camp is on 2nd — 3rd of April 2013. We will go through the whole Windows 8 UX design framework: navigation, contracts, layout, branding, Snap Views, Live Tiles, Touch, Animation — you name it. Coming out of it you’ll be ready to tackle an app market and ecosystem that has reached 60 Million users in just few months after its launch.

The days will consist of design presentations that are followed by labs. In the labs you will design your own application — putting the new knowledge directly into use. Remember to bring an idea for an app with you. You can work as a small team too. We’d prefer only max two people from a company. This event is mostly geared towards UI and UX designers.

NOTE: This event was overbooked in two hours (!), so we are doing a second one! The date of the second one is still to be confirmed, but we are aiming for 25th — 26th of April. That’s two design camps in April.

If you want to secure your spot in the second camp, what you need to do now, is sign up for the waiting list of the first event. You’ll end up on the waiting list for the second event in the process. You’ll be informed over email about confirmed date.

UPDATED LINK — There is now a different & new registration site for the second event at: http://aka.ms/UXCamp2. You need to sign up in there if you want to get in. Be quick.

First, a sincere thanks to everyone who sent in an application. We met many of you, and actually had really good conversations with most of the invited. The first* part of our recruitment process was decided just a little over week ago, and we invited Mikko to start right away. Since he just finished his master’s degree at Aalto’s International Design Business Management-programme, our timing was near perfect.

Despite being a fresh graduate, Mikko brings to the table experience from old Finnish internet giant Satama Interactive, and also at Trainer’s House after the merger. Most recently he worked at Outotec, a Finnish corporation who are the global leader in minerals and metals processing technology.

With us, Mikko has started applying his design thinking already on cases dealing with UX strategy and service design for online sales processes. Welcome, and good luck!

Recruitment update

Like hinted in the beginning, 2013 is looking pretty busy so far. That’s why we’ve decided to hire at least another designer right away. What we’re looking for now is mid- to senior visual interaction designer. Someone who’s not afraid of diving in head first into production work, but loves to take lead with his/her craft as well. We’re now going through once more the applications sent in already, but welcome new one as well. So if you’re interested of working with the best design office around, do shoot us an email and let’s take it from there. The old specs apply, but with a bit more leeway on the experience.

First, you have to be a really good designer. By “good designer”, we mean things like experience in years, point of view on what you do and experience in variety of work — in media and type. As an organization we are rather flat and have very low tolerance for nonsense so you have able to articulate what and why you do what you do.

It’s a cliche, but we want the A-level people, no less — you need to be a self-starter and a finisher with a point of view on your work. A practicing craftsman or a -woman who enjoys what they do and possesses curiosity for the world and the desire to be better designer every day. You have to be comfortable with client contact and collaborative way of working, sometimes at the office, sometimes at our client’s. Depending on the project there might be a fair deal of travel, too.

We work mostly in digital— meaning on at least 80% of your time you’ll get to work on things like web services, mobile apps, touch UIs and so forth. The remaining 20% could be on more intangible things like strategy, brand etc.

Second, an ability to cope with abstract ideas and switch between the craft and strategic/conceptual thinking is greatly appreciated. Actually enjoying the various states of ambiguity of a new project and willingness to take the lead on making things real is a definite plus. Ideally you have experience on working with new product development from the early idea to delivery and everything in between.

Third, you have to understand both technology and the people you’re designing for. Being able to prototype and (to some extent) build what you design is even better. In anything from cardboard to code.

What’s in it for you?

In return we’ll offer you a good variety of ambitious projects ranging from software products to startups services and experimental technology. We work for startups, corporations and the public sector on strategy, concept design, products and services on all imaginable platforms. Our designers are aligned with the sales team to ensure we sell the things we want to work on, too.

We consider ourselves to be the best studio around the Nordics so you’ll be in a good company in terms of personal development. Our goal is to be among the best of what we do on a global scale, so there will be no one stopping you to do the best work of your career. There’s very little bureaucracy here, good tools & toys to play around, flexible hours, and only thing that counts is the results of your work.

The working language in the studio is English if required, and projects are about 50/50. International applicants welcome, let’s make things work for you.

How to apply?

If you like the sound of what you just read, send us an email at work@nordkapp.fi and let’s take it from there. Please include your current work samples, cv or a Linkedin profile and any other URLs we should know about.

Deadline for applications is Sunday January 27th. Expect an answer from us by the end of the following week from the deadline.

The small print: At this time, we are NOT looking a narrow specialist but a T-shaped person, with a strong primary skillset and experience and curiosity towards the world and other disciplines. The finer details of your job will depend on who you are and what you do. Please note at this time we are NOT looking for juniors or trainees either.. Sorry, there will be separate opportunities later.