Finding the Right Company Name

How We Mastered the First Challenge

Whenever it comes to establishing a new startup, one of the toughest parts will always be to come up with a company name. Beside the fact a name can also be responsible for the success of your company, it also needs to communicate the values of your business and the products you’re developing.

Right after forming our group, we started to brainstorm multiple name options. Words like NameGoesHere Studios or AnotherLabel Games were mentioned, as we weren’t just a one-man business but a team of four creatives. However we didn’t get that far, as we already began thinking of a game we’d want to build. Eventually, everyone would head home in the late afternoon, hoping to come up with a name idea within the next days. Unfortunately brainwaves stayed away. Neither thinking creatively during falling asleep nor taking a long walk in the park had helped, which forced us to knuckle down again.

Research Didn’t Help this Time

In most cases, doing research can be a great trigger to get creative. Therefore we started thinking of game studios we like. Nevertheless Nintendo, Epic Games or Zynga couldn’t help us out this time.

Defining Guidelines to Focus Again

With the lack of creativity we had to approach the task differently. By defining three principles the name of our startup should represent, we brought back our focus:

• Identification — Both, the people and the product behind the brand should be able to identify with the name.
• Uniqueness — With dozen of startups founded each day, the name needs to be exceptional yet easy to remember.
• Amusement — As the key aspect will be about gaming, the name should appear satisfying and if possible deliver a message.

Sorry, the Name Does Already Exists

Whenever someone came up with an idea that everyone of the team liked, the next step was to google it, just to check the name’s availability. In most cases the reaction was the following: Oh damn. What a bummer, it’s already used. While it is impossible to find an unused name with the first try, it’ll soon get quite frustrating as you realize most names are already taken.

Suddenly It Just Fits!

Eventually, sooner or later, you will come to the point when someone of your team gets hit by a brainwave. Immediately, things will take their course plus in the end you got a name that just fits: Mosquitobyte.

“Ahem… Excuse me sir, I think there is a misspelling, isn’t it?“
“Oh thanks for letting me know, but no, this isn’t a mistake.“

We thought of adding a pun to our name since we do never intend to bite any of our users. Instead, we created a metaphor which hints at byte, which is used to store information digitally, even in games.

Looking back at the procedure of finding the name, it seems that sometimes things just need their time until they get right.