Todot Design’s Bob Lei: Either Keep Progressing or Falling Behind

How many university students in Macao with design or art degrees have followed a career path in related fields after graduation? Quite many people. But how many of them have switched to other industries? Also quite many people.

Bob Lei Hou Keong, Design Director of Todot Design & Planning Limited, is an example of the former. Graduated with a design degree from the Macao Polytechnic Institute in 2009, Bob had worked for design companies in Hangzhou and Shenzhen to gain relevant experiences. Afterwards, he came back to Macao and set up Todot Design with his partners in 2013.

“When I came back to Macao, I felt sorry to hear that many of my friends in the design industry had switched to other areas,” he said. Although it is not difficult for design students to find jobs after graduation, Lei points out the income level for designers is not high and they often work overtime, leading to a fatigue in mind. But why is he still involved in the design industry after all? It’s due to his ardour for creations but also a sense of bitterness.

“I have worked in Mainland China for four years after graduation. If I switch to other industries, it feels like I have wasted my time. That’s why I have not given up and kept going,” he calmly explained why.

Currently, besides providing brand and graphic design services, Todot Design has established its own design label, Ultraworks. With the support from the Cultural Industries Fund, the brand has developed a series of watch products — ULTRATIME001. Taking inspirations from speedometer in a vehicle, the watch is different from traditional watches that have three watch hands. Its only watch hand is immovable, so the telling of time has to rely on the anti-clockwise rotation of its dial plate, on which the numerals are laid down in an anti-clockwise direction with irregular spacing. These elements illustrate its concept, which is a Chinese proverb “A boat sailing against the current must forge ahead or it will be washed back”.

“Many people have asked me about inspirations, but I don’t think inspirations are keys to design. In contrast, you have to pay attention to the details of your daily life from which a new idea may arise. For example, a client only requests your design service because of a problem, so your task is to analyse and resolve the problem.”

Before the launch of the watch series, Lei and his design team has done many researches to look for a breakthrough in the design. Their hard work at last pays off—the ULTRATIME001 watch series has won many regional and international awards in the past two years, including the silver prize of “HKDA Global Design Awards”, the Top 100 award of “Design Intelligence Awards”, and the “China Red Star Design Award”. Being delightful for garnering recognition from the industry, Lei said representing Macao to win these prizes make the whole experience more memorable as “only a few Macao-design products could win these awards”.

Albeit his past experiences of brand and graphic design, Lei said he still has many things to learn like marketing and brand management amid the development of ULTRATIME001 watches. And fortunately, a Shanghai enterprise has become the exclusive agent of their products in China, helping them set up an online-to-offline sales network in Mainland China that now accounts for 80 percent of the total sales points of the watches. Macao, Hong Kong and other regions make up the rest.

On top of being a designer, Lei is also a part-time instructor at his alma mater Macao Polytechnic Institute. Compared to the past, he thinks the students now know more the industry. “When I was still a student, concepts like design and the cultural creative industry were not popular. With the rapid development of information technology, students now have some design senses in general and are more proactive,” he said. As students now excel at using the popular design software, he focuses more on sharing experiences of how to run a brand and work in Mainland China in his lecture.

“I often tell them you should not only limit yourself to Macao and should not regard yourself a graphic designer only. Although I started my career as graphic designer, my works now are not only about graphic design. If you have a good idea, you can present it in different media, such as graphic design, products, and apparels.”

Like Ultraworks, there will be more products, such as stationery and apparels, in additional to watches. Lei said: “I always think the environment of Macao is simply too comfortable. After graduated from design major, many companies are willing to hire you as designer. Even though you can’t make it, you can still work in other sectors. In contract, designers in both Taiwan and Mainland China have a strong sense of crisis, leading themselves to grow and enhance their competitiveness.”

This is exactly the experience of “A boat sailing against the current must forge ahead or it will be washed back”.