English | Deutsch 
The early partners: Andreas Haug, Hartmut Esslinger, Georg Spreng
frog design was founded in 1969 by designer Hartmut Esslinger, around a single guiding principle: “form follows emotion.” An adaptation of the familiar phrase “form follows function,” the new maxim set the tone for frog’s design philosophy by declaring that a product’s effect upon its user was as vital as its functionality. Together with partners Andreas Haug and Georg Spreng, Esslinger opened a studio in the Black Forest of Germany to promote this concept of emotional design – viewing every act of creation as a small step towards improving the everyday life of the individual.
Soon after, the company – then Esslinger Design – received its first big break: a commission from German electronics giant Wega. When, a few years later, Wega was bought by Sony, frog found itself working for a massive corporation. The partnership was a huge success, spanning decades and generating more than 100 products, including the mold-breaking black-box Sony Trinitron TV. Gradually, the young design firm became known for its innovation, risk-taking, vision, and success.
Apple IIc
It was precisely this mix that appealed to top executive Steve Jobs when he began searching for the elusive magic that would give Apple a market edge. The year was 1981, and computing was a sea of anonymous beige boxes. Jobs combed the world for a strategy-focused design company, and knew he had found it in Esslinger’s team. A multimillion-dollar deal was struck, enticing the company to establish a California office. A few years later, the Apple IIC was launched to great fanfare, named “Design of the Year” by TIME Magazine, and inducted into the permanent collection at the Whitney Museum of Art. Apple’s revenue soared from $700 million in 1982 to $4 billion in 1986.
With the move to California, the company changed its name to frog design – not for its ability to metamorphize, though this would certainly prove the case, but for its international roots: (f)ederal (r)epublic (o)f (g)ermany. The lower case letters offered a nod to the Bauhaus notion of a non-hierarchical language, reinforcing the company’s ethos of democratic partnership, both within the design teams and in its client relationships.
Since then, frog has continuously expanded beyond its industrial design roots, evolving to better address the technological and cultural developments of the marketplace. In the 1980s, the company took on corporate branding, recognizing the value of a consistent user experience across platforms – from product design and engineering to graphics, logos, packaging, and production. Its redesign of the Logitech products and brand identity led the computing giant to raise its revenue from $43 million in 1988 to over $200 million in 1995, securing a number-one market position. A few years later, frog reexamined the entire Lufthansa operation – from airport signage and plane interiors to the flatware used for in-flight dining. By exploring the interactions between various consumer touchpoints, frog helped brands create more meaningful product and service experiences.
In the 1990s, frog launched a Digital Media group and began growing its expertise in user interface design for websites, computer software, and mobile devices. Its 1999 redesign of SAP’s enterprise software fostered new levels of efficiency in business management worldwide; its 2000 web design of Dell.com set the standard for e-commerce; and its 2001 collaboration with Microsoft helped create the look and feel for Windows XP – touching the lives of millions of consumers across the globe. More recent collaborations in web design, software, mobile devices, and consumer electronics are helping to shape the digital experience still as we move into an era of ubiquitous computing.
In recent years, frog has expanded its offerings once more to include strategic advising on high-level business challenges and long-term planning. Today, the company is a strategic-creative consultancy, in which designers, strategists, and technologists work hand in hand to identify the best possible solutions for Fortune 500 clients. With eight studios internationally and more than 500 employees, frog serves many of today’s top businesses, including Alltel, Disney, GE, HP, Logitech, Microsoft, MTV, Seagate, Yahoo! and others.
