Polestar Analytics  ·  Pulse identity  ·  Three concepts for review

Start here — pick a concept, pick an app.

Switch apps and the shared element does not move, redraw or resize — only the name does. Switch concepts to compare all three on the same app in the same second. What each one is arguing, in four lines, sits under the canvas.

— stays (the suite)— swaps (the app)

Concept 01 — Wordmark and initials

  • No symbol at all. The suite name is the logo; the app's initials sit beside it in a lighter weight.
  • Legible anywhere. A browser tab, a 12px table header, the corner of a slide. Nothing to lose at small sizes because there is nothing but type.
  • Fastest to extend. A new app is a new word — no drawing, no approval on a shape.
  • The trade. With no shared shape, distinctiveness rests entirely on the word and the blue.

02  What Pulse is

A surname for a growing family of apps

Pulse is the umbrella over Polestar's analytics applications. Each app answers a different question, for a different industry, for a different buyer — but they share a platform, a team and a way of thinking.

Right now three are live. More are coming, and we do not yet know what they will be called. That is the real design problem: the identity has to be finished today and still be correct for an app that does not exist yet.

App 01

HCP Pulse

Prescriber performance

Pharmaceutical commercial and field teams

App 02

Market Mix Modelling

Budget allocation and ROI

Retail and CPG marketing leadership

App 03

GRC Pulse

Rules and governance

Risk, compliance and the C-suite

App 04

Not named yet

Unknown use case

The system has to work before we know what this one is

HCP and GRC carry the suite word in the lockup — HCP Pulse, GRC Pulse — with the app code in ExtraBold and Pulse in Light at the same size. Market Mix Modelling keeps its full descriptive name and takes no suffix.

03  Why a wordmark

Because an icon per app pulls the suite apart

  • Analytics apps are named, not seen. They live in nav bars, browser tabs, deck footers and email signatures — places where a symbol has to be explained and a word does not.
  • A symbol per app does not scale. Ten apps means ten symbols to invent, defend and keep distinct from each other. It usually falls over around app four.
  • Recognition should compound. Every app that ships should make the next one more familiar, not add a new thing to learn.
  • Hierarchy can carry the difference. The app code is the loudest thing in the lockup; the suite is the quietest and the most repeated. That is the right way round.
This is why the earlier icon-led route was dropped. A set of small abstract glyphs read as generic clip art at the sizes these apps are actually used at — and none of them said Pulse.

04  Concept 01

Wordmark and initials

No symbol · One line · Smallest footprint

What it is

No square, no mark. pulse in blue, the app's initials beside it in ink, the descriptor on a second line beneath them. The suite name is the constant; weight and colour carry the hierarchy.

The p is drawn, not set — its descender runs well past the depth the typeface gives it, down to the descriptor. That one deviation is what stops the lockup reading as ordinary type, and it is why the wordmark ships as outlines rather than live text.

Why it suits Pulse

  • It is legible everywhere. A browser tab, a 12px table header, a footer, a slide corner. Nothing to lose at small sizes because there is nothing but type.
  • It is the fastest to extend. A new app is a new word. No drawing, no approval on a shape, no new file.
  • It is honest about what these products are. Named tools inside a platform, not consumer brands that need their own emblem.
  • It works alongside the other two. If Concept 02 or 03 is chosen, this can still survive as the in-product lockup for places where a square is too heavy.
Because there is no shared shape here, the suite is carried entirely by the word and the blue. That is the trade: maximum flexibility, minimum distinctiveness.

Construction

One baseline for the word and the code, a second for the descriptor. Everything is type except the p's extended descender.

On dark

The blue lifts to a lighter tint so the word stays readable against near-black.

The set — parent and every app

Parent — the suite
App 01
App 02
App 03

In context

ScenariosChannelsResponsePlan
App icon
Control coverage, September

05  Concept 02

The mark in negative space

Arrow · Growth · Existing asset

What it is

A solid blue field with the Polestar mark cut out of it. The mark is not drawn on top of the field — it is the light coming through it. The blue is the logo; the mark is the hole.

The mark runs off the right-hand edge rather than sitting politely inside, so the shape reads as a crop of something larger instead of a badge or a sticker.

Why it suits Pulse

  • It reuses what we already own. The mark from an existing product arrives whole — we have added nothing to it and taken nothing off it. Recognition transfers for free.
  • The counter reads as an upward arrow. The knocked-out shape resolves into an arrow pointing up and to the right — growth, momentum, a number going the right way. That is the outcome every app in this suite is bought to produce, and it is said without a single extra element.
  • Negative space does the work. Nothing is illustrated. The idea only appears once you look, which is what stops a corporate mark feeling like a stock icon.
  • It survives being small. One flat shape, one colour, no strokes to thin out at 16px.

Construction

The type's top edge sits on the mark's top edge, its descriptor baseline on the mark's bottom edge. The gap between mark and type is fixed.

Reversed

On blue the figure and ground swap: the mark becomes the blue and the field becomes white. The shape is identical.

The set — parent and every app

Parent — the suite
App 01
App 02
App 03

In context

DashboardPrescribersReports
App icon
Q3 spend efficiency review

06  Concept 03

The letter P in negative space

Initial · Counter-form · One curve

What it is

A square field in which the letter P appears as the channel between blue shapes. The P is never drawn — it is what is left when the blue stops. Two arms break out through the left edge, so the letter is finished by the space around the square rather than contained by it.

Why it suits Pulse

  • It is the suite's own initial. No metaphor to defend in a room, no symbol to explain to a new customer. It says Pulse and stops.
  • The bowl is the only curve in the system. Everything else — the mark, the type, the grid — is straight and engineered. One curve keeps the identity from reading as purely mechanical.
  • It is unmistakably a container. The square already fills its own frame, which makes the app icon, the favicon and the avatar fall out of it with no extra drawing.
  • The negative-space idea is shared with Concept 02, so the two are siblings rather than alternatives — if a future sub-brand needs its own letter, the same construction takes it.

Construction

Identical grid to Concept 02. Only the shared element changes; the type block is set from the same three rules.

Reversed

White on blue. The counter-form now reads as blue, which is the version that works best as a favicon.

The set — parent and every app

Parent — the suite
App 01
App 02
App 03

In context

OverviewPoliciesControlsAudit
App icon
National prescriber summary

07  How it extends

Adding app number four

Four steps, no new drawing, no new decisions.

Step 1
Place the shared element — the mark in Concepts 02 and 03, the drawn pulse wordmark in Concept 01. It never changes size, colour or position.
Step 2
Set the app code at 73% of the shared element's height, the top of the type flush with its top — ExtraBold in Concepts 02 and 03 with Pulse after it in Light, Medium in Concept 01.
Step 3
Set the descriptor at 25% — Light and widely tracked, baseline flush with the mark's bottom edge, in Concepts 02 and 03; Medium and title case on its own baseline beneath, in Concept 01.
Step 4
Check the gap between the shared element and the type is 18% of its height. That is the whole rule set.

Three apps that do not exist yet, built from the same four steps — shown in Concept 02

Invented — app 04
Invented — app 05
Invented — app 06