Lollypop: Creating Benchmarks with Creativity and Innovation

Lollypop
Lollypop

Through creativity, one can turn new and imaginative ideas into reality. It is characterized by the ability to perceive the world in new ways, to find the hidden patterns, to make connections between seemingly unrelated phenomena, and to generate solutions. Some people have an opinion that creativity has nothing to do with innovation; that innovation is a discipline, implying that creativity is not. One such innovative and creative company, Lollypop, a dedicated UI/UX design studio is changing this scenario. Insights Success Team interviewed with Mr. Anil Reddy, Founder & Design Director of Lollypop, on how Lollypop sets itself apart from others in the UI/UX Designing industry. We are pleased to share the inspiring words and insightful answers from him.
Tell us about your company and the services you are providing to the customers.
Lollypop is a team of outstanding intellectuals & expert designers on a mission to put ‘India on a world map as a digital design destination.’ We are a bootstrap champion, serving clients from across 11+ domains across the globe and have won various national & international awards for our designs. Recently, we were awarded the title of ‘Top 15 UX agencies around the Globe’ by a leading B2B portal Clutch.
We basically design solutions/experiences that users feel while interacting with companies’ digital product. To do this we undertake services such as Research & Testing, Experience Designing, and Interface Designing & Front End Development. We are a specialist in the digital experiences across Mobiles, Web, Desktop Applications and Wearables.
How you got success in implementing the idea to start Lollypop?
Honestly, Lollypop was born out of the compulsive discomfort that I faced during my professional journey. Majority of my designer counterparts abroad believed that India was unsuitable for digital design and to prove them wrong I returned back to my city, Bangalore, giving up all the leisure, as I was at the peak of my career during that period.
Post my return, I was exploring the market and realized that Indian entrepreneurial eco-system was not very receptive of the digital design and was still undergoing the transformation. So, I began alone spreading knowledge about design and taking up projects at an exceptional nominal rate.
In 2013, I finally founded Lollypop with a small team of designers and by providing intensive workshops to the clients; we managed to bag few projects. Soon, the digital revolution swept the country as anticipated and now when I look back, I realize, that Lollypop has grown at a rapid pace with a team of 60 plus and is continuously working towards its vision.
We have won multiple national & international level awards and are ranked among Top 3 in the field of UX/UI industry in India and are considered among Top 7 Designers around the globe.
Lollypop owes it a big time to its team and advisors who have come together to make this happen.
How is the UX-UI Designing market changing? Share your views on the same with us.
India is witnessing a shift from information economy and is now emerging as a design economy. Today, companies in every industry are becoming extensively focused on creating value through digital technology, User Experience (UX) and User Interface (UI) Design. The early adopters of ‘Design Thinking’ approach are ruling the entrepreneurial eco-system.
Gone are the days when Design was just another step. Design; is a culture, a habit, a management practice and most importantly it is a strategic investment that helps in taking calculated risk, increasing the success rate. Through design, every business house has started thinking about the product experience and its role in enhancing the life of the users. Design involves an in-depth study of the patterns and data and helps in identifying the new ones making the solution more feasible and usable. Design embraces every industry and of each size.
What makes Lollypop a unique player in this rapidly growing and competitive market?
We believe in building relationships and our only focus is to seek meaningful solutions that are presented in an appealing manner. We lay lot of importance in understanding our clients and their businesses that includes their target audience, market landscape, technologies, trends and so on. Secondly, we work hard to maintain a continuous feedback loop to ensure agility in the process and less iterations. Besides this we have a defined process that sets the basics in place allowing enough room for creativity which helps in exercising innovation and maintain quality over the par.
Basically our culture thrives on transparency, work ownership, learning and exploration. Every project designed by us goes through rigorous brainstorming and feedback. Open discussions, ideation and suggestions are important part of our process. We spend couple of hours every week learning from each other and upgrading our skills.
What roadblocks Lollypop has encountered while achieving success?
The roadblocks to the path of success have been numerous but the one that we are facing as of now is that, clients are more concerned about the beautification and less on problem solving. It is extremely hard for us to convince them that investing in research and focusing on solving the user’s problem is going to set the benchmark. Less investment in research will lead to much bigger problems and educating them on the same is posing a huge challenge.
Second challenge is still persistent and a pressing issue for many design studios. Availability of quality talent with reasonable expectation is quite limited. Moreover, the field is disrupted with big corporate houses paying exuberant salaries to fresh graduates.
According to you, what lies ahead in the future of UX-UI designing and what are the preparations made by Lollypop?
UX/UI design has an extremely bright future as the world is going to be digitally empowered and the line is thinning between product and experience. Design has become much bigger and moved to the domains such as IoT, wearables, VR & infotainment. All these sectors run on data, the most important tool for businesses; and proper visualization of data will be the key to a delightful experience, which can only be achieved through design in the form of smarter personalization, time saving interfaces, and intelligent yet empathetic devices.
At Lollypop, we have always been experimenting with new technologies, new domains, and new interfaces. Our learning culture allows us to be upbeat with the trends and we have built a strong team that has expertise in many domains.
What are the values and factors that drive Lollypop ahead?
According to our understanding, every company should embed the following values in their culture:
Continued focus on Quality: It is important that every aspect of your company revolves around ‘quality’ in everything.
Honest Communications: It is important to promise as per your capabilities. We believe word of mouth marketing is still the strongest form.
Mentors for Guidance: Learn to take guidance from people around. We cannot be good at everything, but we can have synergy of experience by bringing the leaders on board.
Learning & Innovation: Your culture should encourage new learnings and empower your team every day.

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