Linksys is a brand American company selling data networking hardware products. Linksys was founded in 1988 by Victor and Janie Tsao. Since 2013 the company is owned by Belkin.
Meaning and history
Linksys is an American company producing network equipment. It was founded in 1988. Based in Irvine, California, Linksys specializes in products and solutions that make sharing broadband Internet connections, files, printers, digital music, videos, photos, and games over a wired or wireless network simple and affordable.
Linksys was founded by a married couple, Janie Tsao and Victor Tsao. It happened in 1988. The immigrants from Taiwan had already lived in America for more than twenty years.
A milestone in the history of the company was in 2001 when the first million Cable/DSL Routers were sold. As a result, Linksys became the largest manufacturer of such products in the country.
In 2008, Linksys joined the company Pure Networks, which had previously produced software for it. And after five years, Linksys moved to Belkin, a well-known manufacturer of accessories for home users.
What is Linksys?
Linksys is the name of a technology company from the United States, which was established in 1988, and acquired by Belkin in 2013. Linksys is engaged in the production of data networking hardware products, which today can be found worldwide.
1988 – 2003
The original logo consisted of an emblem on the left and a wordmark next to it. The emblem was basically a rectangle divided into two halves, each with a letter ‘L’ in it (one turned upside down). The wordmark, for its part, used thin, blue letters to write the company’s name. Besides a continuous white line in their base, there was nothing special about the font.
1988 – 2013
This was a secondary logo, which basically was the same wordmark as in the main design, except colored black.
2003 – 2007
The following logo used the same wordmark, again. This time, they painted it light blue and added an inscription saying ‘A Division of Cisco Systems, Inc.’ beneath. It was a basic sans-serif font of the same color as the main word.
2007 – 2013
In 2007, they decide to rearrange the letters of the main wordmark. In short, the white line was removed, the letters became bolder and the lines were uniformly wide this time.
2011 – 2013
That’s another secondary design. Compared to the previous version, they painted this one completely black. The additional text below was removed, by they instead added a thin ‘by Cisco’ inscription on the right.
2013 – 2022
The Linksys logo is an example of minimalist design. Just a monochrome wordmark, that is it.
But the typeface and combined “N” and “K” letters make the logo modern and very recognizable, which is the main brand’s aim, as Linksys products are sold to consumers off-the-shelf from consumer electronics stores, Internet retailers, and big-box retail stores such as supermarkets.
The monochrome palette is a good choice for any technological company. Black is a color of confidence, strength and power, and it’s contrast with a white background gives a feeling of reliability and high quality of the brand’s products.
2022 – Today
The company kept the logo simple and didn’t add any details to the name. It played with the font and color of the logo, adding a new spin to its brand image. It introduced a vivid blue color that made the logo stand out among the typical black-and-white logos of other companies. For the font, they chose something similar to Devoid Medium. The unique feature of this logo was the first letter, which featured a double line and a small circle in the upper right corner. This made it look like it was a connection symbol rather than a letter, which is a great symbolism and association for a company in the communications industry.
Font and Color
The progressive uppercase lettering from the primary Linksys badge is set in a modern geometric sans-serif typeface with futuristic shapes of the characters, softened angles, and straight cuts of the bars. The closest fonts to the one, used in this insignia, are, probably, Aspire Small Caps or Vipnagorgialla Semi Bold, but with the letter “K” significantly modified.
As for the color palette of Linksys’ visual identity, like many other technology-related businesses, the brand uses blue as the main color. The blue here is bright and intense, close to an electric-blue hue, which looks progressive and evokes a sense of motion, development, and growth. The contrast with the clean white background creates a very bright and fresh composition.