Inrange Technologies

We worked with CEO Bob Coackley at several phases of this company's evolution. In 1995, as manager of General Signal's subsidiaries Telenex and Tau-tron, Coackley acquired Data Switch Corporation; we created "General Signal Networks" to integrate them under the parent brand.

Then in 1998, General Signal was struggling and sought the higher multiple that Coackley's unit could command. Naming was a real challenge in the crowded hardware/software world; some 2000 candidates were generated, including an employee contest, and many names were searched. In the end, naming credit went to Coackley himself.

The logo design (with Connacher Design) lifts this name above the ordinary. It is an abstracted but recognizable Frigate Bird, aka Man 0' War, scanning the ocean horizon.

We created Inrange to be a freestanding corporate brand; but surprisingly, on the eve of its NYSE listing, General Signal sold itself to an auto parts company called SPX and included Inrange in the deal. Freedom, however, remains the message and the logic of its identity, and is the way it functions today. See www.inrange.com.