Monotype, in collaboration with Alibaba, has developed Alibaba Sans - a custom typeface family that helps unify the company's branding across its vast international apps, platforms and websites. With this launch, Alibaba is authorizing all merchants and brands free access to the font system to enable them to express their brand identity and create businesses that are beautiful and simple.
Highly legible, energetic and expressive, the Alibaba Sans typeface family was designed by Akira Kobayashi of the Monotype Studio. The family consists of 11 weights, and was designed to be aesthetically pleasing from small to large sizes across any device or location-from display screens, across multiple office buildings on the company campus, to e-commerce marketplaces.
"Alibaba Group faced a common but significant branding challenge, in that it needed to convey its brand values across a wide range of environments, both physically and digitally," said Akira Kobayashi. "It was a pleasure to work with a team so dedicated to the importance of type, and help Alibaba Group realize the potential that a custom typeface has for unifying a brand."
The typeface family supports 172 languages and was designed with a strong emphasis on numerals and currency symbols, given the importance to the millions of merchants on Alibaba's vast worldwide digital ecosystem.
