Enabling Clients to Realize the Potential of Connected World by Creating Bespoke Products and Services Using Innovative Technologies: Solder

“We are a creative technology studio focused on turning ideas, user experience, and technology into innovation.”

Good design and satisfying user experience improve and enhance any digital product or service. With a rapidly expanding creative tech market, jobs blending art and technology are now in higher demand across a variety of industries. Creative technology offers new ways for businesses to market ideas, tell stories, develop concepts, and create connections.Today, technology-based activations have taken creativity to a whole new level. Content creators can transport audiences into digital experiences, and, subsequently, have those digital experiences respond to their actions, motives, and interests.

Solder is one suchfirm that creates products and services using innovative and emerging technologies to support their partner agencies and clients. They are a creative technology firm who develops and designs websites and web apps, production of user centric installations, creates proof of concepts, prototyping, digital design, user experience, app development, digital strategy, creative technology specialists, with a key focus on bespoke custom electronics.

The company was founded in 2018 and is headquartered in Norwich, England.

Glyn Cotton: Interview Highlights

Q. Can you tell us about the journey of your company to date?

We were founded in 2018 out of a three-person team; we were able to get some meetings in the diary and went to pitch at the O2. After some hard grafting and proof of concept, we won the work. Using our technical expertise we were able to come up with an innovative solution using infrared tracking and audio sensors to monitor and compare the audio level and movement during an event. We have continued to pitch diverse and thought-provoking ideas to a variety of clients that are seeking bespoke products and services that use new and emerging technologies. The team is continuing to grow and we are looking forward to some exciting projects in 2020.

Q. How successful was your first project?

Our first project was a great success but as with anything, we took learnings from it and are always striving to be the best at what we do and deliver cutting-edge projects for our clients. Each project comes with its challenges and opportunities for growth and we try and harness this at every opportunity. We are continuing to push the boundaries of innovation, we need to learn from every project to determine how we grow and develop within the industry.

Q. “Earning the trust and respect of consumers around the world is only possible by delivering high-quality service.” How do you interpret this statement?

It is vital in every industry to appreciate the importance of consumer experience and giving your clients the highest quality service and products you can provide. I believe that my team is always striving to achieve this and by understanding and pushing the capability of technology we are learning how to support businesses and industries further to make positive changes in their sector.

Q. Do you conduct ‘user research’ to work on providing a better user experience?

Yes, we do conduct user research; this enables us to create relevant products and services that are user friendly and suitable for our target market. You are more likely to be successful in the creation process if you have put your consumer at the core of the development and design process. When creating innovative products our users are at the forefront of every step; to ensure we are always diversifying, we need to make sure every product or service is empathetic to the user and this is only possible to understand through user research.

Q. How do you market your services?

So far most of our marketing has been traditional, word of mouth, a friend of a friend but we have recently employed a marketing executive to promote our services and products to a wider audience. We are hoping to take on new and exciting opportunities throughout 2020 and work with new brands and companies to challenge their current digital creative strategy.

Q. Do you have any new services ready to be launched?

Yes, we will soon be releasing a product that enables venues to track live time fan engagement through an audio monitoring system. With this data, they will be able to create a soundscape to represent the reaction of the audience and use this data to interact with the audience in live time. This will be aimed at sporting arenas and music venues.

We also have many products that have been already launched, including a device that can make contactless charity payments a memorable reward experience by triggering a variety of interactive external peripherals including movement, sounds, lights, and other interactions that can invoke an emotional response. This can encourage multiple donations or a greater number of donations by offering a more personable user experience.

A scalable interactive 15 segment LED panel that can be used to display weather, stock or custom information; this is in its prototyping phase and we are excited to see the potential of this product.

Q. What are your trajectories for the next five years?

Over the next five years, we plan to open offices in Hong Kong and Poland to increase our overseas exposure and be able to offer our wide range of products and services worldwide, as well as utilizing R&D time to ensure that we are always at the cutting-edge of technology and providing our clients and customers with the best experience possible. We are hoping that our headcount will be around 10x what it is now.

Meet one of the creative minds behind the

Success of Solder: Glyn Cotton

Glyn Cotton, Co-founder, serves as the Chief Executive Officer of Solder. He has a strong background in the production and technology sector. Glyn began his career as a project manager at a local technology company, later he began to work in a creative technology start-up. This led him to manage technology-focused project teams for many companies worldwide including Wrigley’s, Lucozade, Mars, Heineken, and Nissan. These projects made Glyn focus on experiential design and installations which led him to co-found Solder . Today, the company has grown from strength to strength working with international brands such as Heineken and the O2.

“The most successful way to overcome failure is testing. We are continually testing and monitoring our products and services to ensure we are supplying the best user experience possible.”