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History of PAOS:the 1990s

  • Prehistoric PAOS:the 1960s
  • the 1970s
  • the 1980s
  • the 1990s
  • the 2000s

PAOS moves forward (representative examples of work and research developments):the 1990s

'90

Receiving the Katsumi Masaru Award

Motoo NAKANISHI was named the first person to receive the Katsumi Masaru Award. This award is given in commemoration of Japan's father of design and his lifelong contributions to the field and has been dubbed the Akutagawa Prize of the design world. As already stated, Mr. KATSUMI's wish to visit the PAOS offices remained unfulfilled, but it was indeed a great honor to be singled out as the first winner of this illustrious award. In passing, the certificate of merit was designed by Mr. Ikko TANAKA.

HANSSEM: PAOS' first Korean project

PAOS' dealings with Korea began with a CI project for Hanssem Co., Ltd. Hanssem went on to develop a profound understanding of design and, under the leadership of Mr. Chang-Gul Cho (the current chairman) and Mr. Yang-Ha Choi (the current president), evolved into Korea's largest system kitchen, furniture and interior design business. Hanssem came to PAOS via Mr. Young-Jae Cho, an old friend of NAKANISHI's who is a professor at Seoul University and a leading figure in the Korean design world. The project received an award from the State for best practice in CI representative of Korea.
That year, Mr. KIM Min, an intern who had been with PAOS for a number of years, returned to Korea and established PAOS Seoul as a liaison office. This organization has gone on to become CDR Associates.

'91

Publication of New DECOMAS

"New DECOMAS – Design Conscious Management Strategy" (Sanseido Publishing Co., Ltd.) went to press. The plan, with this book, was to create a CI design textbook, and it comprises the curriculum for a one-year, fifty session program covering all CI processes, which are intended to be studied through design work. It was envisaged that the mastery of all the processes outlined in the book would give rise to outstanding, system-oriented designers.
Local language versions of the book were later published in Korea, Taiwan and China. Plans to publish an English language version of the book in Australia were regrettably abandoned for reasons unknown at the manuscript stage, although the English version must be the one which is well received in areas like Europe and the United States.

'92

NTT DoCoMo: turns spotlight on brand strategies anew

The mobile telecommunications network arm of NTT was spun off. This move marked the beginning of the so-called mobile phone era. PAOS put forward the "DoCoMo" brand name and an eye-catchingly distinct logo design, which highlighted the "anytime, anywhere, with anyone" characteristics of the personal communication network age. This innovative brand name and design became synonymous with mobile phones when the company was launched, and transformed the brand into a household name overnight.
When DoCoMo was launched many at NTT were hesitant to make the move to the new company simply because not even those involved in the CI project could have conceived that DoCoMo would evolve at such a precipitous pace or that its rapid growth would eclipse the parent company

'93

The encounter with China

PAOS' first contact with China came in the form of a telephone call from Mr.Ikko TANAKA requesting NAKANISHI to present a lecture in Beijing. NAKANISHI went on to take up the invitation of the client: Mr. CHEN Han-Min, the leading professor of the visual design department of the Central Academy of Fine Art, Beijing (now National Tsing Hua University Art School).
A two-week trip to Beijing was initially scheduled; at that time, however, Beijing was astonishingly impoverished and dirty. NAKANISHI made elaborate video records of the city, but was amazed to see such curiosities as brand new Mercedes traveling alongside rickshaws. The car sent to pick up NAKANISHI – Honggi – stalled nine times during the short fifteen-minute ride to the Academy.
NAKANISHI gave a series of special lectures at the Central Academy of Fine Art, but it was the ardent eyes of the students, which seemed to devour NAKANISHI's words verbatim, that left the strongest impression. Added to which, the rule requiring a Party member to be present at all gatherings that was still in place in China at the time was even applied to university lectures, and the eeriness of being under the observation of eagle-eyes still lingers.
NAKANISHI lectured in the mornings, but was startled to find that his afternoons had been filled with interviews with a succession of senior officials and dignitaries. He met the deputy minister of economic affairs (now vice-minister of economy, trade and industry) and top officials from the State Administration for Industry and Commerce, All-China Federation of Industry and Commerce, and National Advertising Association, among others, and each day his schedule was packed with more of the same.
Stranger still was the fact that, though this was NAKANISHI's first visit to the city, the locals knew a great deal about PAOS and its president. This mystery was, however, resolved on the last night of his stay. Taken to Wangfujing Street, Beijing's premier commercial district, to his amazement, NAKANISHI found huge stacks of Chinese language versions of his books on sale. There were Taiwanese pirates of books on PAOS alongside arbitrary editions that had been brought in from Taiwan. This was a flagrant infringement of copyright, but ironically, it was these bootlegs that had, unbeknownst to NAKANISHI, turned him into a star in China.
At any event, this trip marked the beginning of a close relationship between PAOS and China, and left NAKANISHI with the distinct impression that encounters are a truly miraculous occurrence.

'94

1994 onwards
Cheil Jedang: developing a CI for a Korean food manufacturer

PAOS' second CI project for a Korean company was commissioned by Cheil Jedang. PAOS had already received numerous requests from Korea, but results showed that the majority were quote-unquote "fixed races" where the winning firm had been decided from the outset, leading us to conclude that POAS had been used to simulate the style of an international contest. PAOS still has a number of proposals which it put together for such Korean companies, but in most cases, we failed even to receive notification of the results of the screening despite the initial enthusiasm of the companies concerned.
By contrast, Cheil Jedang's response was unequivocally courteous and the contract we exchanged with the company one of the most accurate we had concluded to date. Cheil Jedang is one of the founders of the principal syndicate in Korea: the Samsung Group. There were rumors that Mr. LEE Byung Chull, its founder and chairman, had sought a climate akin to that found in the Sumitomo Group, but factory tours revealed ubiquitous evidence of unity (a family approach) that went way beyond anything seen in Japan.

'95

The founding of PAOS Beijing

China requested that PAOS set up a local subsidiary, so we established an affiliate in Beijing that was wholly financed by foreign capital. This became PAOS Beijing and is recognized as the first wholly soft foreign-financed subsidiary in China. Mr. SONG Shi wei was installed as general manager and the company continues to be run under his guidance.

The Beijing Corporate Identity Convention

The Beijing Corporate Identity Convention (a joint project involving China, Japan, the United States, South Korean, Taiwan and Hong Kong) was staged by PAOS in response to a request for CI-based guidance and support in China's transition to a market economy. Mr. WANG Guanying, honorary chairman of the All-China Federation of Industry and Commerce was in attendance and the conference, which comprised an exhibition and symposiums, was a resounding success, leaving an epochal footprint in the history of CI in China.
PAOS subsequently received similar requests from the China Fashion Association, the State Bureau of Economics and the National Advertising Association, among others, which led to a series of lectures throughout the country, educational activities from the days when the field was still in its embryonic stages. As a direct corollary of these activities, the China Fashion Designers Association (China Fashion Association) came to PAOS for advice on various subjects and we gave numerous voluntary lecture presentations for their members. Since the organizer generally receives substantial fees from participants, this was essentially a charitable venture for PAOS. It was also perhaps instrumental in the Association bestowing on NAKANISHI the title of "supreme advisor", second only to Pierre Cardin. The young people that were rushing around the Association's offices in those days have all gone on to great things and while we regularly receive invitations to the Beijing Fashion Forum, an annual event that is held every spring, we are subject to special treatment, even among the many VIPs in attendance from around the world. This response is typical of China, a country that venerates "the digger of the well". In passing, NAKANISHI is known by the honorary title: Father of global CI design strategy.

'97

1997 onwards
The founding of PAOS Shanghai

In order to develop our business in a country as extensive as China, PAOS realized that it would need to establish a second subsidiary in Shanghai, China's economic heartland, as independent from that in the political center of Beijing, and this resulted in the founding of PAOS Shanghai. PAOS Shanghai came into being as a direct result of the meeting of NAKANISHI and Mr. WANG Chao-Ying (the company's present representative) who heard NAKANISHI lecture whilst studying at Musashino Art University.
Since its founding, PAOS Shanghai has produced a number of success stories, earning a name for itself as a planning and production specialist in the field of CI. Many of its employees have spent time studying in Japan, and the courtesy with which they deal with visitors from Japan is widely appreciated. This has also served to establish an extensive network of contacts that spans the two countries.

PAOS included in a text used by Harvard & Stanford University Business Schools

Harvard Business School and Stanford Graduate School of Business have collaborated in the production of a textbook for use on their MBA and MOT programs, which features a case study on PAOS entitled, "PAOS: Metapreneurs in Corporate Identity". The textbook is required reading for all marketing management students.
The case study was put together by Professor Tom Kosnik, a man celebrated for raising the largest number of Silicon Valley entrepreneurs, who spent close to three years researching PAOS and gathering information, and we are highly honored by his attentions.
When asked: "Why PAOS?" Professor Kosnik responded: "I have come across numerous consultants who seek to fix the physical and mental ailments of companies, but the PAOS approach to creating an emotional business environment, to reforming and energizing corporations, is a truly 21st century approach". When the textbook was completed, NAKANISHI received separate invitations to give special commemorative lectures from the two business schools.

'98

1998-2001
Focusing on reform in privatizing G-Mark

NAKANISHI, jury chairman of the G-Mark (Good Design Award) was asked to take on the privatization of the system, which had been operative for forty-one years. Entries for the award, which at one time had exceeded the 5,000-mark, dropped below 1,500 with the bursting of the economic bubble and the system was facing bankruptcy. To address the problem, NAKANISHI as chairman of the jury and the G-Mark's then director, Mr. Hikoharu KURE, joined forces in a bid to turn around the management of the failing award system and return it to profitability.
As with corporate restructuring, the rebuilding of a system that is suffering from fatigue necessitates a full managerial review, starting with the philosophy, the main imperative being to revamp all aspects of the system. The two men devoted three years to privatization and turnaround policies that were essentially equivalent to those employed in corporate restructuring, seeking the approbation of designers at key companies and cooperation with a policy that would transcend individual company boundaries and prioritize the Japanese design world as a whole, setting up new divisions to symbolize the move away from traditional design ideas, and so forth. The rebirth was successfully accomplished and G-Mark. has gone on to achieve great things.

'99

1999 onwards
Developing global standards for NISSAN VI

As articulated by its president, Carlos Ghosn, the goal of the Nissan Revival plan, a project PAOS was asked to take part in, was to transform Nissan into a power brand. The project, which was conceived to develop a globally standardized visual identity, commenced with a competition between six world-renowned creative offices, all of whom were nominated by Nissan. Despite several twists and turns, this task was eventually assigned to PAOS and we devoted three-and-a-half years to developing a prodigious visual identity system that would turn Nissan into a power brand. The Nissan Visual Identity System is what emerged from this process and it is currently being developed throughout the world.


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