Speaker
Marius Holletzek
Global Head of Brand Strategy, NIO
Marius Holletzek is Global Head of Brand Strategy and Experience at NIO Inc., responsible for NIO, ONVO and firefly. Together with his team, he built the firefly brand from the ground up and created Horizon, NIO’s luxury limited-edition label. Previously at L’Oréal and Interbrand, he has spent more than a decade making premium brands felt in the details.
Who is Marius Holletzek?
I’m Global Head of Brand Strategy and Experience at NIO Inc., where I lead the team shaping how NIO, ONVO and firefly look, feel and behave across every touchpoint, from retail spaces and launch events to digital journeys and special editions.
Over the past decade I’ve built and led premium brands across automotive, beauty and lifestyle. At NIO, my team and I built the firefly brand from the ground up, from positioning and naming to identity, retail and sensory experience. Together, we also created Horizon, NIO’s luxury limited-edition label, defining its design codes, materials and storytelling. Before that, I managed Garnier at L’Oréal and advised brands in aviation, telecom and FMCG at Interbrand.
Across all of it, I’ve come to believe that premium is no longer defined by what a brand promises, but by how much care people can feel in the details.
What is your vision on our creative industry?
AI is rewriting the economics of our industry. Images, copy, interfaces and even entire customer journeys can now be produced in seconds, at almost no cost. That is a real gain in speed and possibility. But it also creates a new kind of sameness, and a new kind of doubt. When anything can be generated, people start asking a quieter question: did anyone actually care about this?
I believe that question will define the next decade of brand building. Premium used to be signalled through materials, price and exclusivity. Increasingly, it will be signalled through evidence of human attention: the detail no one asked for, the moment that anticipates a need, the small surprise that makes someone feel seen. The answer is not more features. It is more intention.
For our industry, this means brand and UX can no longer be managed as separate disciplines. A brand is not what it says in a campaign. It is the sum of what people experience: in an app, in a showroom, at a battery swap station, in the tone of a service message. Every touchpoint either builds trust or quietly erodes it.
The innovations that excite me most are the ones that create room for that care. These include AI that takes over repetitive production, so teams can invest their time in craft. They include in-car and service AI, like NIO’s companion NOMI, that gives technology character and warmth. They include personalisation that feels like recognition rather than surveillance. And they include sensory design (material, light, sound, scent), which reminds us that experience is never only visual or digital.
Technology makes things easier to make. Care makes them worth keeping.
What are you bringing to UX Rotterdam?
Designing brand experiences people can feel
AI has made production effortless. Interfaces, imagery, content and service responses can be generated at scale, and they increasingly look and sound the same. In this landscape, the most valuable thing a brand can offer is no longer perfection, but proof that someone cared.
Drawing on our work building premium brands at NIO, from creating firefly from the ground up to developing Horizon, NIO’s luxury limited-edition label, this keynote explores why care has become the defining signal of premium, and how UX teams can design for it deliberately.
We will look at the psychology behind it. People value what feels effortful. We remember experiences by their peaks and endings. And one unexpected gesture often outweighs a long list of features. We will look at real examples across physical and digital touchpoints. And I will share a practical lens that teams can use to find, prioritise and protect the details that make people feel seen.
The central idea: in a world of infinite fast paced output, attention is the new luxury, and UX is where a brand proves it.
April 22 & 23, 2027
2 DAYS CONFERENCE TICKET
€649,-
+21% VAT
REGULAR PRICE TICKET
Regular price of tickets ends 1st of March 2027
Your ticket gives you access to:
All keynote talks on the main stage big theater and in the small theater
Any workshop (first come, first seated) across both days
Evening events: To be announced
Daily lunch, coffee, and snacks
Networking lounges (including the exclusive recruitment lounge)
Selected video & keynote slides archive after the event
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