Typography

Type is a foundational element of any branded visual execution—and our type choices signal our commitment to precision and excellence. Roche has a legacy in typography with an emphasis on legibility as a foundation of our design excellence.

Our text are set in Imago and Minion. The combination of Imago, a sans-serif face with technical appeal, and Minion, an elegant serifed face, allows us to dynamically and characteristically design our communication media.

Typeface weights

The interaction of our corporate typefaces lets you design communications with a dynamic approach. Imago is suitable for prominent titles and small-print content in graphics. But it can also be used for captions, marginalia, and contemporary-style body copy. Minion is best suited for large volumes of text and for emphasis.

Imago Roche Staff members have Imago Regular, Bold, and Italic installed on their PCs. Professional users have Imago Book, Medium and Italic at their disposal.	Minion Roche staff members have Minion Regular, Bold, and Italic installed on their PCs. Professional users have Minion Regular, Bold and Italic at their disposal and as an additional weight for print only Minion Semibold/Semibold Italic. Specific information can be found in the respective sections.

Use of colour

For our typography, start with Roche primary colours for headlines. It is recommended that body copy is always in black for the best legibility. Secondary colours may be used in typography for special cases such as callouts, quotes, or to tie to specific themes within a story. Gradients may be used in special cases and must be approved by the Creative Solutions team

Make sure contrast and legibility are adequate with headlines on colour backgrounds or pictures. Avoid large amounts of body copy on top of colour backgrounds.
Highlighting

If you wish to highlight a passage in your running text, use Imago Bold or Medium in the same size as the surrounding text. Optionally, you can also set this text in Roche primary or secondary colours.
Use of all caps

Caps can be a used for emphasis in both Imago and Minion for headlines and for design balance (e.g. on infographics). All caps should not be used in body copy.
Graphic effects

Graphic effects on text are not allowed unless approved by the Creative Solutions team. This includes:
- No drop shadows
- No outline text
- No glow
- No emboss

For most publications the optimal legibility is 12 words per line (or between 50-75 characters per line) and our text is set left-justified, ragged right. If you choose size differentiation between fonts, use a generous difference in the point size. If the fonts needs to have the same height, Minion will be set at 1.1 Imago size.

All employees have our fonts installed on their computers already, so there should be no need to download them again. If you do not have the fonts Minion and Imago installed on your computer, please contact your local IT help desk.

If technical reasons prevent the use of the Imago and Minion faces, for instance in Digital Media or Google Slides, they can be substituted with Arial or Verdana (for Imago) or Times New Roman (for Minion). Imago and Minion best unfold their effect in print media. We use Arial for e-mails and in the intranet, and Verdana for body copy in the Internet. Arial replaces Imago and Times New Roman italic replaces Minion italic on Google Slides.

Our typefaces are subject to copyright provisions; therefore, downloaded font suitcases may be used exclusively for Roche applications.

Fonts should not be handed out to third parties, as our fonts are licensed from a vendor and we need to keep track of third party downloads for contractual reasons.

Usage rights

Our typefaces are subject to copyright provisions; therefore, downloaded font suitcases may be used exclusively for Roche applications.

Use of corporate fonts for wordmarks

The visual identification of areas, teams, projects, etc. is based on wordmarks designed with Roche's Imago and Minion typefaces. The wordmark uses any combination of Imago and Minion (regular, bold, italic). You may use a combination of two colours.

The wordmark does NOT replace the Roche logo. Always use the wordmark within the regular framework of the Roche brand and logo.

For more on this topic please see the No-Logo-Policy.

All employees have our fonts installed on their computers already, so there’s no need to download them again. If you do not have the fonts Minion and Imago installed on your computer, please contact your local IT help desk.

Fonts should not be handed out to third parties, as our fonts are licensed from a vendor and we need to keep track of third party downloads for contractual reasons. Your agency can request the fonts separately by clicking here.