Both Google and Lenovo have modernized their logos this year and it looks like there's one major similarity between the two: The angle of the slanted "e" is now identical.
The Verge first pointed this out with a fun animation that switches between the two logos. Google changed its logo to a"flat" sans-serif look last week. Lenovo, a Chinese tech company that owns Motorola, decided its logo should have a more boxy shape in June.
Take a look at the two together:
Business Insider/ Lucy England
And here's the animation from the Verge:
Business Insider/Rob Price
It's probably a coincidence that the angle of the two e's matches so precisely. But if the two companies were to work together, the logos would meld well.
Google caused a bit of a stir when it revealed its new logo using a Google Doodle animation, and the jury is still out on the stealthy redesign. While graphic designer Debbie Millman lauded the beautiful minimalism of the new look, Emmy award-winning art director and designer James Victore isn't impressed. He says the simplicity is really just a mark of unoriginality.
Fast Company's Mark Wilson notes that the sans-serif font is more readily portable to the phones, tablets, and watches that today's users work with every day - rather than the old logo that looked most at home on a desktop browser window. But typography expert Gerry Leonidas ripped that argument apart, writing that while it might have had some weight a few years ago, nowadays even cheaper phones have "not-terrible resolutions."
Kay Tappan of The Conversation pointed out that while an informal Ad Age poll shows a majority of people dislike the new look, Google hasn't created as much of a furor as Yahoo did when it rolled out a logo redesign in 2013.
She writes: "To introduce the new logo in a way that was consistent with previous Google Doodle animations was genius; I might be thicker than most, but I didn't actually realize a logo rebrand was going on. I just thought it was kind of cute how the hand reached up and tilted the last "e" ever so slightly."