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The Pole Star Brand Through the Ages: 1998 to Today

With over 20 years of experience under our belt, Pole Star has become an established and integral part of the maritime industry and its associated supply chains. Over the years, our company has developed rapidly and, during this time, the Pole Star logo has had a few faces. We look back at how our logo has been revamped to reflect an ever-changing Pole Star.

Our Original Logo

Back in 1998 Pole Star was born and, with it, our first logo was created showing our name alongside the combined globe and star image. 

The name Pole Star represents a significant part of maritime history before the invention of tracking technology, when seafarers would use the position of the Pole Star [Polaris], in the night sky to navigate their vessel. The Pole Star sits directly over the Earth's North Pole, staying more or less in the same place throughout the year, making it ideal to guide vessels through the seas at night. This part of history has special significance to us with our original product, Purplefinder, being the first of its kind; a  ship tracking solution that worked  in real-time from anywhere in the world.

Logo Facts & Trivia



2012 Rebrand


By 2012, Pole Star had rapidly expanded with new offices in Hong Kong and Panama, ranking in the Sunday Times International Track 100 for fastest growing companies. With the business’ expansion, our original logo appeared dated and failed to represent what we now stood for, and it was time for our first rebrand. Designed by Chris Bryant, our former in-house Art Director, the new logo created a more professional and polished look and feel that would successfully represent us across the globe. 

Logo Facts & Trivia



2020 Rebrand



In a year of great change and upheaval, 2020 shone a light on what Pole Star has always been; an integral support in the running of maritime trade and its associated supply chains. 

However, a general perception remained that Pole Star was solely a vessel tracking supplier, failing to capture the  full picture of our services. 

Despite our long history in ship tracking, we are now a leading data technology company, catering to clients across financial markets & compliance, governments, and the shipping and offshore sector.

A need for an updated brand story and visual identity emerged to better reflect who we are while emphasising our role as  technology innovators within the broader maritime industry.

Our New Logo

The 2020 revamp reveals a fresh and modern Pole Star, showcasing how our company has diversified over the past 22 years.

The new logo was designed by Gemma Randall, our in-house designer, who set out to create a more dynamic and stylised visual identity with a focus on technology at the forefront. 

The ‘techy’ typeface has been created exclusively for Pole Star to accurately present our business as a data & technology company, and not ‘just a maritime tracking company’. The stylised look of the new logo differentiates it from previous iterations, following our Managing Director's goal to aim for “radical change” in order to mark a new era for the company.  

Despite this change in appearance, certain elements have remained including our colour scheme of stark black and maritime blues to ensure the ‘feel’ of Pole Star is carried through. Alongside our rebrand, we launched a complete redesign of our website to reflect our new brand story and visual identity.

Deconstructing the Brand Logo


A New Focused Purpose

An important element in our new logo is the highlighted blue ‘A’, the ‘advancing arrow’, which is a symbol of Pole Star’s newly focused purpose, ‘advancing technologies for a safer, more secure world’. This is our goal that drives our business, pushing us to develop technology that can fulfill our vision of a transparent, safe and law-abiding maritime industry.

Brand Submark

Another element to our brand is the Pole Star submark, a variation of the main logo, which is used in scenarios when the main logo is not the best fit, for example, in our social media profile image. As the P* is an abbreviation of our name it is an effective shorthand for the main logo.

The submark honours our heritage by including the star element from previous logos, paying homage to Pole Star’s beginnings. 

There’s a hidden Easter egg in the design: The ‘advancing arrow’ symbol from the main logo is used to construct the shape of the star in the submark, tying together elements for a more cohesive design.

Pole Star Today

The Pole Star brand is not just our logo, it expands into all elements of our business; the website, products, business cards, brochures, letterheads, emails, adverts, social media imagery, and more. The rebrands are a reflection of where the business stood at that time in our history and with our recent rebrand this year, Pole Star showcases what we do best in 2020; utilising multi-layered data to develop pioneering technologies that empower real-world decisions.

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