It’s All In A Name: The Birth Of Radar Hill
Est. reading time 2 minutes
In celebration of our 18th anniversary, we’ve decided to tell our own origin story here at Radar Hill. People often ask us how the company came to be, and especially how we chose the name Radar Hill, and we love telling them. It’s a great reminder of how far we’ve come, and of why we began this journey in the first place.
Before there was Radar Hill, we each had our own ventures. Way back in the year 2000, Shawn had his own company called Right-of-Way which he ran from his home basement, while Dan and Roger were running their Realassist company out of offices at DFH. Together we established a strong personal and business relationship, trading services with each other for years - but we wanted more.
This is where the conversations about Radar Hill first began to take shape; the idea that we could build on this relationship and grow together as a company. But there were still some details to be ironed out. Chiefly, what would this new business be called?
But, where to begin? Naming a company is just as difficult as naming anything else, as I’m sure anyone with a child or pet can relate to. Thankfully, fate had handed us a starting point, as both of our original ventures began with the letter R, it made sense the new one should do the same.
People often overlook the importance of a name, and for us we needed it to be an effective one. This meant short, easy to remember, easy to spell, and with a domain name we could use immediately.
In true startup fashion, we set about finding this perfect name in Shawn’s basement office, in a manner that must seem ancient to the 2019 reader. With a stack of reference points - National Geographics, atlases, and dictionaries - we set about refining the criteria.
We landed on the idea of something geographical and technical, as that would resonate with the image we wanted to present. The whole process had a chaotic auction house feel, with names being shouted out by Dan and Shawn, and Roger checking to see if the domain was available. It took hours, but it was narrowed down to two - Radar Hill, and Red Nile. Because the domain was better, and a closer geographic association (there is a Radar Hill on Vancouver Island), we settled on Radar Hill.
We incorporated on April 15th, 2001 as Radar Hill Technology Group Inc. The name of a company which began as a sliver of an idea, and has now seen nearly two decades of success and growth - with much more to come.
