We couldn’t think of anything funny to say today, but then this press release came in :
Zero-Knowledge Systems Inc., a provider of managed Internet services to broadband providers, announced today that it has changed its name to Radialpoint.
“Radialpoint is a name and brand that reflects our business today and the unique vision we have for managing and delivering future Internet services,” said Hamnett Hill, President & CEO of Radialpoint.
“Zero-Knowledge was a name that served us well for many years, but no longer fits the company or its products. As we continue to add leading broadband providers […], it is important that our name and brand accurately reflect what we do and the market leadership we have achieved in the managed Internet services industry.”
The name change was approved by Zero-Knowledge’s board and shareholders in late February 2005.
Radialpoint retained Idiom, a firm that specializes in naming, to assist its re-branding efforts. Pentagram developed the look and feel of Radialpoint’s name, logo and brand.
3 responses so far ↓
1 Giants Fan // May 4, 2005 at 4:13 pm
More comic relief can be had by tuning in to the Giants radio broadcase and listening for a Standards of Excellence commercial.
After hearing it about a thousand times, I can tell you that they sell…..ummmm……something, and that they used to be called…..ummmm……something else.
Regardless, they do it really well.
2 zhu // May 5, 2005 at 10:05 am
It’s really too bad. Even though it has a lot of negative connotations, Zero Knowledge is so much of a better name than Radial-what? What’s worse, is that at a minimum, they paid $50K to re-do this ($20 for idiom, $30 for pentagram). Ugh.
3 Abnu // May 5, 2005 at 10:56 am
Zero knowledge is a really dangerous thing, and the company had probably been getting some negative feedback about the name.
But I don’t get the point about Radial-what? It’s really quite forgettable, as the previous commenter noted. And, like an earlier post on Snark Hunting noted about Bluecanoe, hopefully the Radialpoint alloneword is a typo. Oops, it’s not, but that’s probably to create a neologism that will escape the language police in Quebec, where the company has its head office. Both words, radial = radiale and point = pointe are familiar linguistically en français, which might have a lot to do with the choice of name, unfortunately.
Apart from that, a more sensible approach to “re-naming” Zero Knowledge (even along these lines) might have been to build on the existing brand with a name like Radial Knowledge — and radialknowledge.com is available at the time of this writing. Oh well, good for somebody else.
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