Creating the "Engage" Brand and Unity Home Theater

Merging Simplicity with Sophistication for Home Entertainment

Client: In2Technology

Industry: Consumer Electronics; Music & Entertainment

Services: Branding Strategy & Design; Industrial Design; Graphic Design

Challenge

In2Technologies, a company dedicated to bringing simple to operate audio and video solutions to people, came to RKS with a unique home theater-in-a-box concept called t-Shape™. The t-Shape™ is a full 5.1 channel surround sound system consisting of a TV stand with built in speakers and subwoofer and two wireless rear speakers. RKS collaborated with In2Technologies to elevate product design and branding to a more sophisticated level in order to engage consumers seeking simplicity and high quality audio performance.

Process

To define the primary consumer segment, RKS devised a three part research program. First, the team studied people in their homes, seeking to understand what part television played in their lives and how it is integrated into their living rooms. Second, the team analyzed the retail experience of shopping for and ultimately choosing a home theatre system. And finally, the team studied the unboxing and installation of competitive systems. These insights coalesced into the definition and selection of the primary consumer segment—women and young families.

This segment has a passion for digital media and demands convenient and high quality audio, video, and entertainment experiences, but lacks the time, desire, or skill-set to install a more traditional surround sound system.

Solution

RKS created four core brand values for In2Technologies: refreshing simplicity, elegant design, reliable performance, and seamless connectivity that builds the foundation for the creation of the “Engage” brand platform. This product brand is smart, elegant, and distinctive, offering simplicity with better performance, connectivity and design. Engage’s first offering, Unity, is a high-perceived value experience that goes from un-boxing to enjoyment of world-class audio in only 15 minutes, while at the same time easily integrating into virtually any living room.

“After interviewing 15 leading design firms, RKS was a notch above the rest! The commitment to excellence and success of our company felt like we were walking into a family, not a firm.”

- Todd Beauchamp, President of In2Technologies

Learn more about this program

RKS partnered with In2Technologies to develop its new A/V brand, Engage, and flagship home theater in a box design.

Who is the key decision maker in decorating a living room? If you look inside most homes today, you’d think the TV was calling all the shots. All furniture faces the hearth of the digital age. Cables snake out from behind the set and into all corners of the room. Remotes clutter every available surface, or hide in every nook and cranny.

Home theatre systems only make things worse. They come with multiple components that get spread across the room, and have to be wired together. Shopping for these systems is a nightmare. Sure, a professional set up is usually tidy and sounds great but costs a lot of money and most of us aren’t A/V professionals.

In2Technologies is dedicated to bringing refreshingly simple audio and video solutions to people, with a focus on great design. Under the leadership of industry veterans Todd Beauchamp (former Apple executive) and Mike Fidler (former Sony executive) designers enhanced and implemented a unique home-theater-in-a-box configuration called tShape™ that hides a full 7.1 channel sound system in a TV stand. They then came to RKS for two things: turning their technology into Unity, a winning flagship product and creating Engage, a strong home entertainment brand for their flagship offering.

RKS studied people in their homes and in stores, looking to see not only how people lived with their TVs, but what they experienced when they went to retailers looking to bring entertainment solutions into their homes. They are often not in a position to cut holes in the wall and ceiling to get the home theatre experience they desire. Researchers found the shopping experience to be overwhelming for many, because the category was full of techno-gadgets that looked like they needed a whole sound crew to set up.

Simpler solutions such as sound bars and subwoofers just didn’t offer an engaging and immersive home entertainment experience. The shelves were missing a full-featured solution that had a friendly, unifying voice. Once people choose a system and bring it home, the real work begins. Set up can take hours, involving reading manuals (or bringing in an A/V installer), figuring out components and wires, and programming remotes. On top of this, the room where a family spends most of its time together gets overpowered by the clutter.

In approaching the design of Unity, RKS designers realized that they would have to consider the solution as equal parts furniture and technology. The design had to confidently communicate its audio capabilities while seamlessly integrating into living room décor.

RKS collaborated with In2Technologies to refine their proprietary tShape™ configuration into an elegant and minimal package. Proportions had to be just right, and were treated with architectural precision. Colors, materials,

and textures were chosen with a careful balance of aesthetic appeal and high-grade furniture durability.

The set-up experience was crucial to the success of Unity. The goal was to achieve a system that could be set up in 15 minutes or less. The RKS design team again looked to furniture solutions and incorporating hardware that would allow for tool-less assembly with simple slide-and-lock motion.

The development of the Engage brand ran alongside the industrial design of Unity with each process feeding the other. RKS and In2Technologies worked together to define the category of consumers that currently felt overwhelmed and alienated by home entertainment offerings. Dubbed “Connected Echos”, they are women and young families with a passion for digital media and the internet who demand convenient and high quality audio, video, and entertainment experiences.

Working with Todd and Mike at In2Technologies, RKS laid the foundation for the brand with a positioning strategy and mission statement. The goal was to capture a brand centered around four core values identified for Engage: refreshing simplicity, elegant design, reliable performance, and seamless connectivity. The resulting Engage brand is a smart, elegant, and distinctive in a homogeneous segment for offering simplicity with better performance, connectivity and design.

Unity captures the spirit of the Engage brand: empowering people around the world to truly enjoy digital media entertainment through new design and technology that is not intimidating. It is a solution that sets up from un-boxing to enjoyment in 15 minutes, integrating easily into virtually every living room.

The Consumer Electronics Association (CEA), producer of CES, recognized the Unity Home Theater System in 2012 with an Innovations Design and Engineering Award based on its engineering, aesthetic, and design qualities.

Awards:

CEA Innovation — Design and Engineering (2012)

GOOD Design (2012)

Fast Company Design — Apple’s Former Audio Guy Rolls Out a Home-Theater System

IDSA Feature

Cnet.com — Hands-on with Unity Theater

Engage Unity’s Website