History

Master-McNeil was founded in 1988 as a firm dedicated to naming and architecture issues. Since then we have come to be known as the thought leaders in naming. We have created hundreds of successful new names and dozens of architectures while advancing the naming discipline through articles, speeches, and teaching. Our staff is the most experienced in the naming world today.

From Master-McNeil's very first projects, we have offered a mix of creative and strategic services, providing creative and practical answers to strategic naming questions. Our names and architectures are known for their ability to express key client messages with clarity and power.

Specifically, Master-McNeil's services include:

• Company, brand, product, and service names
• Naming architecture
• BAsys Naming Architecture Automation
• Trademark searching
• Linguistic analysis
• Name research

As one of the original four naming firms worldwide in the 1980's, our naming process became the model for the many firms that followed. We provided the thought leadership for the systematization of name development, introducing, 1) the discipline of Naming Objectives and Criteria (sometimes called "Naming Parameters," "Name Specs," etc.), 2) the creative use of conceptual directions/metaphors, 3) conducting availability and linguistic screening prior to client presentation, 4) the integration of customer research early in the creative process, and 5) establishing relationships with sister naming firms around the world, in our case, in Europe and Japan.

Through lectures, articles, press and media interviews, book chapters, and the training of employees, the Master-McNeil name development process became widely known and adopted, to our great satisfaction.

Master-McNeil's thought leadership has continued with our development of brand architecture thinking, evidenced by our creation of the first brand architectures for such giants as Cisco Systems and Sun, and our recent patents (registered and pending) for the BAsys™ brand architecture automation system.

Our clients include leaders in their fields, such as Walt Disney, General Motors, AMD, Kodak, Nestle, Fujitsu, Chevron Texaco, Apple, Comcast, Cablevision, and Volkswagen.

© 2008 Master-McNeil, Inc. All trademarks are the property of their respective owners.
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