AI kills cycles.
Strategy keeps brands alive.
AI is speeding up design and prototyping at a brutal pace. For founders, the edge won’t come from faster code or prettier renders – it comes from identity. This week, creative trailblazer Johan Ronnestam makes the case for archetypes, cultural resonance and why awesome is the only option for hardtech brands that want to matter.
What else matters right now? Across the Nordics we’re seeing new LiDAR partnerships, a record quantum raise in Finland, and NewSpace debates landing in Sweden. Dive in.
Nordic Hardtech Partners 🤝
Nordic Hardtech is a community for builders of complex tech companies based on physical products. Here are some of our outstanding partners.
- Lightbringer: AI-powered patent platform helping tech companies protect their edge fast, with in-house legal expertise. Watch our recent IP webinar.
- Recuro: Growth partner for hardtech and deeptech. Book an intro.
- SISP (Swedish Incubators & Science Parks): The network for 60+ incubators and science parks in Sweden. Find yours here.
- The Yard: Gothenburg’s hub for co-working, community, and serious hardware. Explore their memberships.
Nordic Hardtech Spotlight
This week: Branding Beyond the Algorithm with Johan Ronnestam
When Hardware Meets Awesome
"In the end, strategy beats tactics"
In a world where AI can turn a napkin sketch into a 3D animation with audio, the challenge for founders is no longer what can be built, but why it matters. That’s the provocation from Johan Ronnestam, strategist and creative director (among many other titles), who has spent three decades exploring how technology reshapes business.
– We’re living through a creative revolution that feels bigger than the early internet. The tools are insane. But if everyone can create anything, the winners will be those who know exactly who they are, says Johan.
Speaking at the DK Festival in Rovinj earlier this year, he laid out how AI is collapsing the distance between imagination and execution. A quick sketch of a surfboard becomes a comic strip, then a 3D movie. That same logic, he argues, will soon hit product development as hard as it has hit marketing.
– If I can go from sketch to movie in seconds, why not from sketch to prototype? That changes how we think about product cycles.
Johan points to the way his own teams already blend AI and CAD in daily work.
– We use AI in creating rendering material for companies like BAUX, often mixing CAD and AI. Stable Diffusion integrated in SketchUp makes it easy to generate moodboards, and sometimes we let AI create architectural concepts that we then use in real projects. Beyond visuals, we’ve used AI for music, voiceovers, illustration and even production-ready code, Johan explains.
For hardware founders, the lesson isn’t just about speed. It’s about strategy. Johan leans heavily on a positioning model based on Carl Jung twelve archetypes to explain how brands acquire meaning. Ferrari becomes the Lover, Mini the Creative, IKEA the Caregiver. But his point is that even the most technical hardware product needs an archetype to come alive.
– Brands are like black holes until someone fills them. People use them to say who they are. That’s true whether you’re selling cat food or a climate battery.
He has applied the method for years with Nordic companies like Twinfinity, Apprl, Svedbergs and Fagerhult—shaping everything from product design to full brand platforms.
The biggest challenge is sticking with your brand strategy
Ronnestam warns against what he calls “drifting.” In fast-moving sectors, it’s tempting to rebrand whenever a trend pops up. For hardware companies, where the cost of change is magnified by long cycles and complex supply chains, the damage is even greater.
– The biggest challenge is sticking with your brand strategy. Don’t redesign because someone on the team is bored. Do the right thing for the audience, even if it takes years to pay off.
At the core of his message is a single word: awesome. For Johan, that means high energy, emotional punch, and the kind of impact that makes people smile before they know why. He breaks it down into six rules: create emotional impact, master storytelling, be visually magnetic, show purpose and boldness, connect with culture, and embrace AI without losing the human connection.
Johan sees clear parallels in hardware.
– For Svedbergs, different product lines need to embody different feelings while still belonging to the same brand. That’s where clear guidelines rooted in archetypes help—defining the emotional palette up front so that one line can play Creative while another leans more towards Caregiver.
Define your brand carefully
That pursuit of “awesome” is not a luxury for consumer goods or luxury brands alone. It is, Ronnestam insists, a survival strategy for deeptech.
– In the end, strategy beats tactics. A robot arm, a quantum chip, a solar cell—none of these win just because they work. They win when they resonate with culture, when they make people feel part of something bigger.
For early-stage founders, Johan’s advice is to define identity early and make the most of today’s accessible tools. He recommends using moodboards to capture positioning, experimenting with AI to play with language, colors and visuals, and leaning on ready-made platforms like Webflow or Shopify to build a presence that feels larger than the company’s size.
– To change the world with hardware, you can’t afford to be bland. You need to be awesome, says Johan.
Lately ⏮️
Selected news from the hardtech ecosystem
- Hardware margins are brutal, but a new course breaks down BOM, ASP and LTV into startup-friendly terms. A must-read for anyone building devices.
- From Luleå to California: Flasheye signs new international agreements that push its 3D sensor software onto the global stage, proving Swedish deeptech can compete worldwide.
- The world’s largest life cycle assessment platform is born as One Click LCA acquires SimaPro and PRé Sustainability — a big push for climate tech in hardtech.
- Finland’s IQM just raised €275M, marking one of the largest quantum B-rounds ever in Europe. Backed by Ten Eleven Ventures and Tesi, the funding accelerates global growth and chip production at home.
- Sweden is waking up to NewSpace. In a 34-min fireside chat, ex-SpaceX engineer Aaron Dinardi unpacks what it takes to launch here — and why now.
Up next ⏭️
What's brewing in the community?
- Swedish Againity is hiring a Sales Lead to open a new market segment for its ORC turbines — turning industrial waste heat into fossil-free power worldwide. Apply here!
- And T.Loop is hiring a Project Manager for Site Development — a hands-on role shaping the future digital landscape. Read more and apply here.
- 🏃♂️Innovationsstafetten returns to Lund on Sep 19. A 4×5 km relay through Nobelparken and Brunnshög celebrates the city’s innovation pulse with Ideon and Medicon Village. Gather your team and sign up here!
- Pythom Space and Yes.inc host a founder event in Stockholm on Sep 23 — backed by NVIDIA, Google Cloud and Lovable. Expect ‘Silicon Valhalla’, swarm sats, orbital rockets and more. Join here!
- On Sep 22, Founder Institute hosts Pitch Your Startup to Nordic Investors, a live online session where early-stage teams refine their pitch with direct feedback. Register here.
🎙️ Who should be our next podcast guest?
We’ve had hardtech founders scaling from lab to global, ecosystem builders shaping deeptech hubs, and investors backing the boldest bets. Now we want your input — who deserves the spotlight next?
Nominate a guest, tip us off about a story, or just tell us who you’d like to hear on the mic. Drop us a line or connect on LinkedIn.
Nordic Hardtech is a platform for the hardtech ecosystem — sharing knowledge, bringing inspiration, and building community through podcasts, newsletters, events, and more.
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