Frog Design Inc.
Frog (styled as frog) is a global design and innovation firm founded in 1969 by industrial designer Hartmut Esslinger in Mutlangen, Germany as "esslinger design". Soon after it moved to Altensteig, Germany, and then to Palo Alto, California, and ultimately to its current headquarters in San Francisco, California. The name was changed to Frogdesign in 1982 (the name apparently originating from an acronym for Esslinger's home country, the Federal Republic of Germany), then to Frog Design in 2000, and finally to frog in 2011.
Evolution
Originally geared towards industrial design, frog has expanded its capabilities and is now a global product strategy and design firm. Many of its designs are of consumer electronics and computers.
In August 2004, the company announced that Flextronics International, a large electronics manufacturing services provider, was taking an equity stake in the company, a deal characterized by some commentators as essentially an acquisition. Flextronics CEO Michael Marks, in a March 2005 BusinessWeek article, said that Flex was going to integrate their San Jose-based industrial-design group with frog. The company is now a unit of Aricent (formerly Flextronics Software), which in turn is controlled by investment firm Kohlberg Kravis Roberts.
