Inventing the personality of a voice assistant for a large bank turned IT company

In 2019, Sber, a large bank that is rapidly transforming into a technological company, asked us to conduct design research for the visualization of their voice assistant. Our task was to formulate the assistant's motion principles for different applications: in 2D and 3D environments, software and hardware platforms.

Using the brand's colors, we developed a set of static and animated visualizations, finding the assistant's personality and connecting it to the bigger story of the brand.

Rebranding

The largest bank in Russia for more than a century, Sber, over the last decade, developed many new client services that expanded the company's activity far beyond the boundaries of finance. To emphasize this diversification, the company went through a rebranding that included a new name, logo, color scheme, and so on.

We were invited by the Sber design department to explore animation principles that could become a part of the new Sber identity—technological yet friendly and helpful.

Our task was to develop a set of rules that would be used to animate a new symbol of Sber — a gradient sphere, the 'essence' of the updated company.

This character was to be integrated into hardware and software applications as a voice assistant, released at the same time as the new brand itself.

By our suggestion, the assistant's main features were its fluidity and mobility. Altering its surface colors and shape, it could transit between different actions and states.

Willing to accentuate the connection between the assistant and a user, we also suggested using an illusion of depth created by the blurred contour of the assistant. Moving away from the surface and out of focus, the assistant could take a break to find the necessary information, and moving back, it would focus the attention on the user again. 

Another feature of the assistant was its independence. Outside of the interaction with the user, the assistant was not supposed to stay still—it could move around and examine its surroundings, like a scanner, one of Sber's new symbols.

Existing not only in a mobile app but also as on screens embedded in the bank's interiors and in a smart speaker, the sphere would personify the company's new identity, an intelligent helper.

Credits

Creative Direction: 
Maxim Zhestkov, Igor Sordokhonov

Art Direction, Design, Animation: 
Phil Bonum, Sergey Shurupov, Maxim Tleubaev, Dmitriy Ponomarev, Artur Gadzhiev

Writing:
Anna Gulyaeva

Year:
2019