Our clients
Consultation
We are a design and technology studio trusted by global brands we respect and admire to take on their toughest problems.
Amazon
(2023)
In our first project with Amazon, we helped to elevate the experience at Just Walk Out stores by reengineering signage to explain how the technology works, build trust and confidence, excite shoppers—and keep them coming back. From a framework of systems and mechanisms, we developed a guidance system to educate and encourage shoppers at entry, exit, and in-store that is now being taken into real-world testing at JWO stores in stadiums and arenas.
Autodesk
(2018)
Autodesk recruited us to explore ways to make its Shotgun productivity tool easier to use. We developed UX designs and prototypes focused on help tips, onboarding, and strategies to get the most out of the software, which simplifies project management on large creative productions.
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
(2016-2023)
As close partners since 2016, our work ranges from a full brand refresh to one-off projects, including web and content development for two annual reviews, a revamp of Visitor Center exhibits, and conceiving, designing, and developing visuals for high-profile TED talks.
BOLD
(2018-19)
We created a new brand and design system for a website that helps job seekers get hired.
Delta Air Lines
(2015-17)
We helped Delta Air Lines harness the potential of its people by designing a responsive web app that enables employees to submit ideas to its new Innovation Team that would improve the experience of flying.
eBay
(2019-20)
We partnered with eBay to enhance the current user experience, and envision how technological advances can transform online retail. From improving the fundamentals of architecture, navigation, search, and account management to exploring new ways for buyers to interact virtually with products, brands, and sellers.
Eli Lilly
(2022-2023)
Our work for Lilly has centered on how UX and visual design can support patients and healthcare providers by facilitating deeper engagement with its products and services. We explored how NFC technology could be used to help patients self-administer medication, and looked at compelling ways to educate and engage doctors and carers about its breakthrough Alzheimer’s treatment.
Gates Ventures
(2015-23)
Over many years, members of the Pilot team have worked extensively with Bill Gates and his private office on the incubation, design, and development of several products and initiatives, including Gates Notes, Bill’s two TED talks on pandemics, The Last Pandemic exhibition, and the Big History Project.
Gates Philanthropy Partners
(2017-2021)
We’ve partnered with Gates Philanthropy Partners since 2017, helping them establish a unique brand identity and reimagined website. We’ve also supported its campaigns around the Giving Pledge, and designed and produced several annual Impact Reports.
(2022)
Our first partnership with Google saw us envision entirely new ways of gathering and sharing content by bringing together different files under a single format, which we brought to life with a sizzle reel and three end-to-end scenarios featuring live action, motion, and animation.
Hilton
(2017-18)
As part of a broader engagement with Hilton, we created a series of eight vision vignettes, exploring a variety of ways that technology will impact the future of hospitality for guests and staff.
NFFTY
(2014-16)
Three years of pro-bono work for the world’s largest and most influential festival for emerging young filmmakers. We created enticing idents, motion studies, and compelling campaign print materials.
Microsoft Office
(2014-18)
We collaborated over several years on concepts for productivity apps, related workstreams, and brand workshops. Those projects ultimately led to an extensive rebrand that communicates how Microsoft Office helps people and businesses achieve what matters to them. The rebrand was accompanied by internal communications and guidelines to ensure alignment and consistency.
Microsoft Azure
(2018)
We helped reimagine the Azure brand by creating a new design language inspired by the mathematical nature of many of the Azure product lines, using complex geometries and algorithmically generated patterns.
Microsoft M365
(2019)
We designed an ecosystem that seamlessly brought together a range of Microsoft products with innovative user features, such as voice input and control and easy switching between apps, to increase people’s productivity.
Pearson
(2014)
We designed and developed concepts and a simple prototype of a learning management system that enables teachers and students easy access to resources and materials for both in-school and home learning. The system was piloted in Brazil and ultimately adapted and taken up elsewhere, including South Africa and India.
Pivotal Ventures
(2017-20)
We partnered with Melinda Gates’s private office on a campaign to encourage more women to pursue careers in technology. We created a set of storytelling deliverables to inspire women to learn from others by sharing their stories.
PowerOf
(2020-21)
At the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, we were hired by the Gates Foundation to rapidly design a new website to help people find ways they could get involved in the response. Our work included branding, illustration, visual design, copywriting, and user experience.
Skype
(2014-15)
We worked with Microsoft’s in-house design team on several strategic projects to re-position Skype in the changing marketplace of digital video communications, including re-imagining the Skype desktop experience based on existing mobile architecture. We explored a range of models and visual designs, and delivered detailed design components.
Spotify
(2015-16; 2021-23)
Our deep and ongoing partnership has seen us design an ecosystem that enables Spotify to better understand and connect with the lives and loves of users, and give them more ways to listen to their favorite music. We also helped bring to life additional features, including staging and ticketing live events, ways to help artists tour by matching them with venues, and a new, top-tier premium service.
Toyota
(2023)
We are delivering a valuable set of tools and convincing concepts for how Toyota Connected can increase the footprint and value of their digital product solutions and experiences for customer and employees in the areas of Service & Maintenance and Payments.
Workday
(2022)
We laid the groundwork for Workday’s transformation into a world-class, user-friendly platform over the next five years with a series of vignettes and scenarios showcasing a new user experience model that included updated information architecture and incorporated emerging technologies. This was supported with a new visual design direction.
Zumiez
(2019)
We created a modular design system as the foundation for future online retail for the Zumiez app that brought greater personalization and ease for customers shopping for clothes and accessories using a mobile phone or tablet.
Incubation
We are an incubation lab with the confidence to invest in ourselves and others on joint ventures that explore big ideas.
Pitch
(2014-19)
Our first incubation project that had been in the works for years, Pitch is a dynamic presentation tool based around semantic zooming that allows for a fluid interchange between bird’s eye and detailed views of diagrams and data. It was used in TED talks by Bill Gates and Sue Desmond-Hellmann, former CEO of the Gates Foundation.
Tarmac / Ideas
(2015-18)
Building on the original concept that started as a joint venture with Delta Air Lines, we added increased functionality to make this an essential online and in-person collaborative tool that we used with clients for several years, including a pilot with Hilton.
Dynamic Wall
(2019)
We partnered with Hilton on developing an interactive light wall where content responds to gestures to create a range of immersive experiences and explored its potential for use in a variety of commercial settings.
Downwrite
(2019 - 2022)
We got together with Downwrite, a custom songwriting enterprise, on a joint venture to reimagine the entire experience of commissioning an original song. The site relaunched in spring 2021 with entirely new branding, and a slicker user experience for artists and commissioners.