Meld Studios was an independent, employee-owned, purpose-driven, award-winning strategic design firm in Australia from 2009 until 2024.
We partnered with organisations that were committed and ready to navigate the most complex and critical challenges facing organisations, industries, communities, and the planet today and into tomorrow.
The key to doing this well?
Designing better futures with the people in your organisation and the people your organisation serves.
When you partnered with Meld, we set the conditions for tackling challenges that could not be solved alone.
Across our history, we had the good fortune to work with over 300 public and private organisations across 15 industries and involved over 15,000 people from all walks of life in shaping their collective futures.
Our experiences showed again and again that together, we can co-design:
- policy that drives behaviour and change
- strategy that captures future possibilities and drives collective decision-making.
- services that orchestrate built environments, technology, and ways of working best to meet the needs of people and the planet
- organisations with cultural and operational infrastructure that lead with purpose, support collaboration and set the conditions for working with impact
- transitions that require change and transformation across horizons.
We worked in multidisciplinary teams and led the co-design process. We were consistently recognised for high-quality work that led to positive change and demonstrable outcomes.
“Every designer at Meld Studios displays commitment to attacking design problems as a team.
Using human-centred design principles they collaborate with each client with the same level of passion and drive as the previous, proving that a problem shared is a problem halved.”
~ Dr Brandon Gien, Good Design Australia
We were also incredibly proud to be recognised as:
- The first Australian business to be Employee Owned by Trust (EOT)
- The Good Design Team of the Year (2022)
- AFR Best Places to Work in the Professional Services industry across Australia and NZ (2024).
Our employee ownership journey
Meld Studios was founded in 2009 with a mindset and commitment to bust through traditional approaches to business and people management. This was a commitment until our end in 2024.
We spent the last 15 years experimenting with alternative org structures, titles, management models, decision-making, cultural rituals, and operational ways of working.
In 2021 our founders—Janna DeVylder, Steve Baty, and Iain Barker— began exploring ways to ensure the longevity of Meld and its mission.
After a year-long journey with Employee Ownership Australia, Meld Studios became the first Australian company to become Employee Owned by Trust (EOT).
Being an EOT meant that:
- over time, we transitioned shares from our three founders (owners) to the Meld EOT
- all permanent employees were beneficiaries of this Trust
- as a beneficiary, every Meldster had indirect ownership of Meld
- every Meldster wore two hats: practitioner and business owner
- every Meldster had a direct say in the direction of the company through established engagement structures
- every Meldster benefited from equal profit distribution due to our collective efforts.
This brought our clients value because we cared deeply about the work we did and the outcomes we influenced together.