Erik Spiekermann is author, information architect, type designer (FF Meta, ITC Officina, FF Unit et al) and author of books and articles on type and typography. He founded MetaDesign, Germany's largest design firm, in 1979 and is responsible for corporate design programmes for Audi, Skoda, Volkswagen, Lexus, Heidelberg Printing, and Bosch, as well as way-finding projects like Berlin Transit, Düsseldorf Airport and many others. In 1988 he started FontShop, a company for production and distribution of electronic fonts. He is board member of the German Design Council and Past President of the ISTD International Society of Typographic Designers, as well as the IIID International Institute for Informationdesign.He now runs Edenspiekermann with offices in Berlin, Amsterdam, London, Stuttgart & San Francisco. In 2001, he redesigned The Economist magazine in London. His book for Adobe Press, Stop Stealing Sheep has been reprinted several times and translated into German, Russian and Italian. His corporate font family for Nokia was released in 2002. In 2003 he received the Gerrit Noordzij Award from the Royal Academy in Den Haag. His type system DB Type for Deutsche Bahn was awarded the Federal German Design Prize in gold for 2006. In May 2007 he was the first designer to be elected into the Hall of Fame by the European Design Awards for Communication Design.