Brand identity and design systems for startups
Service · Updated
I design brand identities and design systems for startups, usually together, so logo, website and product follow one set of rules. You get the logo and variants, colour and type that work in product UI, short guidelines and a Figma library on the same tokens. Brand identity starts from $2,000.
Why brand and system belong in one project
At most startups the brand gets made for the website, and the product gets designed in whatever Figma file engineering had open. Six months later the app and the site look like two companies.
At CodeAnt AI I built the visual identity, the component library and the design guidelines in parallel with the product, so the website and the app came from the same decisions. The design system half of that story, and the smaller one I built at xPay, are written up in my guide to design systems for startups.
What you get
- A logo (usually a wordmark first) with light, dark and one-colour versions, clear-space rules and a few examples of misuse.
- A colour and type system that works at 13px in a product table as well as in a homepage headline, with roles for success, warning and danger.
- Brand guidelines short enough that people read them, linked from the Figma file.
- Tokens and core components in Figma with every state (default, hover, focus, disabled, error, loading), named to match what your engineers use in code.
- Starter templates for the website, social posts and pitch decks, so founders can make new things without breaking the brand.
Both examples are from the E-Summit identity. A startup kit has the same parts, sized down to the surfaces you use.
Brand identity that has to survive real use
As design lead for E-Summit 2023 at IIT Roorkee, I led a team of 5 designers and 3 developers on the brand and website for one of India's largest student-run entrepreneurship conferences. The theme was "Reminiscing the Ethos: Bharat", and the easy answer was festival ornament. I drew from pre-industrial Indian craft traditions instead, and kept the identity to a small set of elements that scaled across posters, tickets, merchandise, the stage and the website.
I designed the sponsor brochure as a high-trust document rather than a print export, because for many sponsors it was the first thing they saw. The event drew 11K+ attendees and raised ₹25L+ in sponsorship.
Utkarsh combines design thinking with fast execution. For E-Summit he led branding, website design and graphics with precision, turning complex ideas into clear outcomes.
How it runs
- Audit what exists: Screens, site, decks, anything with your name on it. I list what repeats and what contradicts. Usually a few days.
- Identity directions: Two or three directions shown on real surfaces (a product screen, the homepage, a social post) rather than on blank artboards.
- Build the system: Tokens and components in Figma, then the guidelines. This is the bulk of the work, typically two to four weeks depending on product size.
- Roll it out: Apply it to the highest-traffic screens and pages with your team, and fix what breaks in real use.
CodeAnt AI: brand, product and system: Visual identity, component library and design guidelines, built in parallel with the product.
E-Summit, IIT Roorkee: The full identity system, from logo to stage, with the decisions behind each impact number.
Price, and who should look elsewhere
Brand identity starts from $2,000. What moves the number is how many surfaces the brand has to cover and whether the product UI is included. The pricing page has the starting prices for everything I do, and my startup branding cost guide lists public market ranges if you want to compare quotes.
If you need naming, trademark searches or a multi-market brand strategy programme for a large company, a branding agency is set up for that. And if your product already has a mature design system with a team maintaining it, you'd get more from a contributor inside that team than from an outside designer.
To start, email work@utkarshdesign.com with what exists today and where the brand has to show up, or book a 30-minute call.
Questions people ask
Can you work with my existing logo?
Yes. Often the logo is fine and the problem is everything around it, like colour, type and how the product uses them.
Do you do a rebrand together with a new website?
Yes. A startup rebrand with a new identity and a Framer site built by the same person is something I take on, so the brand and the site launch together.
Do you design pitch decks and marketing assets too?
Yes. At xPay I shipped landing pages, decks, graphics and marketing assets alongside the product work.
Will the design system match the code?
I name tokens and components to match what your engineers use and review the coded versions with them, so Figma and production don't drift apart.
Sources
- Guide to variables in Figma, Figma Help Center
- Design Tokens Format Module 2025.10, Design Tokens Community Group (W3C)
Start a project
Tell me what you're building and where it's stuck: book a 30-minute call, email work@utkarshdesign.com or send a brief.