XPLANE (company)

XPLANE is a design company that creates illustrations for corporate clients. The company aims to distill complex processes into easy-to-grasp illustrations, using visualization techniques which it calls Pictonics. XPLANE was founded in 1993 in St. Louis, Missouri by David Gray as a visual arts company creating graphics for magazines such as "Business 2.0" (in particular that magazine's "XPLANATiONS"). It soon expanded into illustrating corporate presentations, business plans, and whitepapers; training; and interactive design.cite news|title=Illustrations draw investors|date=2000-08-10|author=Hope Hamashige|url=http://money.cnn.com/2000/08/10/cashflow/q_graphics/|work=CNN Money|publisher=Cable News Network] cite news|title=Xplane|work=St. Louis Business Journal|date=2000-05-06|author=Carla Dodd|url=http://www.bizjournals.com/stlouis/stories/2000/05/29/focus18.html|publisher=American City Business Journals, Inc.] cite news|url=http://www.bizjournals.com/stlouis/gen/Xplane_137A17A454C740098A1F0E73252908CE.html|publisher=American City Business Journals, Inc.|work=St. Louis Business Journal|date=2006|title=Xplane company profile] [cite web|url=http://www.theomcgroup.com/Visualising%20Value.htm|publisher=OMC Consulting Limited|work=Customer Create|date=April 2005|title=Visualising Value] [cite news|work=The Toronto Star|title=Bridging medicine's great divide|date=2006-09-26|author=Judy Steed|format=PDF|url=http://www.marsdd.com/portals/mars/story_docs/MaRS_in_the_Media/MaRS_TorStar-bridgingmedicinesdivide-09262006.pdf|publisher=Toronto Star Newspapers Limited]

In 2000, the company was awarded the "St. Louis Business Journal" Best Places To Work award for People Development. At the time of the award, the company had a policy of flexible working hours and of allowing employees two weeks at full pay every year for workshops, seminars, and training. Other employee prerequisites included discussion groups during the day, night classes taught by employees to other and to prospective employees, a weekly party on the company building's roof every Friday after hours, and a massage once per month. The company's headquarters are now located in Portland, Oregon. [ [http://xplane.com/#/about/ About us.] ] XPLANE. Retrieved November 26 2007.]

On its website, the company hosts two web logs, the xBlog (information on design topics) and the bBlog (business applications of graphic design), and case studies that include graphical user interfaces, statistical maps, and discussions of Internet protocols and brand strategy. The weblogs are run by Knowledge Manager Bill Keaggy, a digital designer who spends between 10 minutes and 2 hours per day on them. [cite news|work=Metropolis Magazine|url=http://www.metropolismag.com/html/content_1200/rev.htm|title=In Review: XPLANE|date=December 2000|author=Ken Coupland] [cite news|work=The Washington Post|title=A Day-by-Day In the Life|author=Leslie Walker|date=2001-05-17|url=http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A37168-2001May16] cite news|title=What's in a blog: Graphics firm Xplane uses blogs as marketing tools|date=2003-03-07|work=St. Louis Business Journal|publisher=American City Business Journals, Inc.|author=Chad Garrison|url=http://www.bizjournals.com/stlouis/stories/2003/03/10/focus5.html]

References

Further reading

* — a discussion of "Business 2.0"'s brand, illustrating some of the "little ant people" (as they were termed by the magazine's art director, Laura Morris), that characterized XPLANE's "XPLANATiONS", that came to be an integral part of that brand
* — a report of XPLANE's "xblog" electronic mail marketing campaign run by Bill Keaggy
* — a report of XPLANE that includes several example XPLANATiONS
* — Sikes interviews David Gray.

ee also

* Visual thinking
* Rich pictures
* Information graphics

External links

*cite web|url=http://xplane.com|title=Corporate web site|publisher=XPLANE