The world of Mergers and Acquisitions traditionally brings to mind high-level corporate deals between huge multinational businesses in glass-fronted skyscrapers. But today’s world is different. An opportunity for a new investment brand, one using a digital infrastructure to generate the highest quality of M&A consulting with the best deals; Zumera.
Grown out of German investment bank Saxenhammer’s Digital unit, the leading German Investment boutique, Zumera aims to be the fastest-growing M&A Investment business for SMEs by 2025. Combining deep expertise with informed insight – high performance, effectively delivered. Zumera didn’t invent M&A, they improved it – using digital tools to ensure higher quality, more efficient processes and better deals for the clients. Their digital marketing-based approach targets entrepreneurs and medium enterprise business owners across all sectors.
“The entire project, from name and strategy to identity and deployment, took one hundred days – no mean feat for a brand in our sector with such scale and ambition. The naming process for the EU alone takes three months in registration once a candidate name is chosen. The team at SomeOne perfectly aligned to our own values – curiosity, flexibility, ambitious speed combined with a forensic eye for detail.”
Business owners often decide to sell their company around retirement age because they don’t have a succession plan in place. This kind of target customer may not consider M&A as an option. Zumera lowers the barrier to entry for medium-sized businesses to M&A processes of the highest quality.
“Visualising the concept of being a step ahead, the identity reflects progress and opportunity. The new core colour of Zumera Purple paired with a vibrant Neon has been chosen to intentionally differentiate Zumera from the M&A banking sector, traditionally a sea of blue and green. The Beam, present in the ‘Z’ of our work mark acts as an illuminating device, revealing opportunity at every angle.”
The Zumera team are the ‘best of the best’ in terms of talent, quality and, with a mindset of ‘entrepreneurs for entrepreneurs, an innovative approach to M&A’. As such, they needed a new, modern identity that has enough impact to stand out beyond the investment banking sector and that radiates trustworthiness. A brand that’s clear and approachable. A digital-first brand that understands its customers and their needs when looking for a partner in investment banking. A brand that’s culturally astute.
For our new brand it was especially important for us to create a modern brand that works in international markets. As a pioneer of digital transformation in the M&A sector, we wanted to create a strong foundation to scale and are very convinced about the brand strategy and the creative execution of the Zumera corporate identity. We can summarise that the first days with our new brand feel great and clients are excited to continue building. Thanks to the team around Gary and David for this excellent work.
The name
The business warranted a new name both to introduce it to the market and distinguish from the rest of the industry.The criteria was a name that was ‘coined’, short, powerful, easy to say and international sounding.Great care was taken in selecting a name that ‘sounded right’ and the most popular choice was Zumera, inspired by combining ‘Zoom/Zu’ (German for ‘to’) denoting a fast forward motion and ‘era’ from ‘a new era in M&A’.
Strategy
Our strategic thinking centered around the idea of being and enabling businesses to be ‘a step ahead’ – helping give opportunity a head start. Zumera exists to help all those entrepreneurs out there who don’t know their true value today or the possibilities ahead of them.
Identity
The visual identity dramatises the idea of ‘a step ahead’, of movement and shining a light on new opportunities for businesses and entrepreneurs.
Living the ‘step ahead’ philosophy, the visual brand identity had to be ambitious, flexible and adaptable for a B2B environment and in a wider context across all formats, from the inevitable PowerPoint to above the line communications.
Zumera announced their meteoric entry into the sector with an impactful out-of-home stunt – landing a geode of precious Zumera crystal in the heart of Berlin, close to the company’s offices. A ‘Breaking News’ report from the scene was broadcast Live on LinkedIn, followed by an interview with Felix Engelhardt, Zumera’s CEO & Founder.
Credit: Weber Shandwick Germany