Back in 1999, when the world was bracing itself for the dreaded Y2K bug, a budding entrepreneur was building a business during his college classes. When Shaun Tyndall was shy of 20 himself and people were dialing into their America Online accounts, he was learning how to design a logo and build websites in “cyberspace.” In May of 1999, Inclind was incorporated and, over the last twenty years has evolved significantly from a one man band crafting proprietary ColdFusion websites to a digital agency that champions open source in all aspects of our work — from how we build websites to how we work with people.

In the early stages of building the business, the name Inclind was born out of the fact that, like many solopreneurs, Shaun was inclined to do any and all of it. Inclined to design, code, build, support, maintain, clean the office bathroom - you get the picture. That word became the business name but with a small hang up — the domain name www.inclined.com came with a price tag of $15,000. And so, an entire business was built around the cost of a domain name — www.inclind.com which came at a slightly better deal of just $15.

Fun Fact: Inclind’s first website was for the Hobie Cat International Championships in Dewey Beach. The job was traded for a Photoshop license.
In the early 2000s, with the dawn of Web 2.0, Inclind found its way to Market Street in Georgetown, DE and websites were becoming less static html pages to more interactive (remember Flash anyone?) and content manageable. Inclind grew from a party of one to a team of 15. But then the economy tanked and clients lost money and things took a step back. Then, Steve Jobs gave the world the gift of iPhone and gave Adobe (and Flash) the finger.

Along came the design and development of responsive, mobile-friendly websites and the evolution of open source content management solutions like Drupal and WordPress. Social media was emerging and giving people a platform to share and connect and usability became a number one priority while websites started working more like software. The web development process began mimicking the software design process. Through this evolution, Inclind found ways to help clients harness all of these exploding technologies and create efficient digital marketing systems. One thing has been consistent over the ever-changing web world, Inclind is always focused on helping businesses measure their ROI.

While 20 is hardly old in people years, in business years, it’s a big milestone and, when you celebrate a milestone birthday, sometimes a little makeover is involved.
For the past six months, we have been working on a rebrand exercise. The seal, our logo mark of the last 5 or so years, represented the transition from old school propriety to friendly open source. But it was time to retire him. So the big question was, what best represents where technology is going and how we as a technology company would align with the future outlook?

Our new logo mark is a pixelated, multi-color brain. So what does that mean to us? It’s about utilizing computer-assisted Intelligence. One of our strengths as a web development agency is helping clients with determining the right technology stack to execute a project. These technologies are getting smarter and smarter but it still takes the human brain to know how leverage the right ones to get the right solutions. The pixelated brain symbolizes the fusion of artificial and real intelligence — a current and future focus of web technology.

We always have our eyes on the future of our industry not just in the way we build websites and applications but on how we work as a team. Moving from a brick and mortar location to a distributed office — not being bound by a physical location — allows Inclind to be scalable and flexible while tapping into talent far beyond a 30-mile radius. Our client list has grown from businesses in our backyard to working with international organizations like the United Nations Environment Program based out of Nairobi. It means you can run a successful and innovative technology company not just in Silicon Valley, but from your hometown of Milton, DE, near your family and lifelong friends.

When asked where he sees the next 20 years going, Shaun says he would like to see a move back into the idea of the open web. “Through social media and sites like Amazon, the web has become a system of walled gardens and people are losing confidence in these walled gardens. Giant companies are controlling what people experience. I would love to see it move back to the wild web, where things are more open and shareable.”

Inclind builds and supports all things open source. Let us put our brains to work for you. Chat with us about your next Drupal or WordPress project. Looking for a support partner to help support, maintain and growyour website, contact us!