The world of Branding is one of many layers, from building and preserving your brand to collaborations. Over the past few months we have seen a lot of big brands collaborating with South African found brands. You may be asking yourself what cross industry collaborations are.

Cross Industry collaborations are those partnerships or agreements between two brands from different industries. This kind of collaboration is rare but there has been a change in the past month. Here are some brands that signed off on interesting cross industry deals:

Huawei x Bathu

On the 26th of August, Hauwei launched their latest nova series (nova 8 and nova Y60). The features of the new series had Huawei fans excited, but no one saw the big announcement coming. Above the cool features, Huawei fans were excited by the brands collab with well-known sneaker brand, Bathu. It is always good to see big international brands seeing value in proudly South African brands as a way to appeal to South Africans.

BMW x Drip

Drip is one brand that has been making moves this year. This brand dates back to 2003, their resilience is the reason they are making the right noises today. In July, Drip announced a partnership with Hip Hop artist turned to self proclaimed King of Ama Piano, Cassper Nyovest. The collab was through a new sneaker called Roots of Fame.

Fashion meets motoring with Drip’s lastest announcement of a store in the BMW Midrand dealership. This move dropped a lot of jaws as no one expected the luxury car brand to open its doors to a proudly South African sneaker brand. Talk about steps into the fast lane.

Facebook x Ray-bans

Sunglasses and social media, who would have thought that one product would come out of that…well Mark Zuckerberg and his team have done it again. Ray-Ban and Facebook have partnered to bring us Ray-Ban Stories, Facebook’s first smart glasses. The glasses come in Ray-Bans stylish design, built in with two 5MP cameras and a LED light that turns on when you are recording. These glasses have brought a whole new lens to the social media landscape, one can only wonder what’s next.

The Future of Collaborations

It seems like cross industry collaborations are becoming a norm, with brands from totally different spaces coming together to give us great products and innovation. Could this be because brands are trying to appeal to a wider audience and obtain a larger share of voice? whatever the reason may be, I am here for more cross industry collaborations.