DESIGN-LED THINKING @ CATALYST FOUNDRY
Springboarding from our innovation team at Verizon, I co-created Catalyst Foundry, an internal incubator, where I co-led a team of product managers, engineers, and designers across a portfolio of projects simultaneously in a startup studio model. I implemented the ideation framework and agile development process for our team of 25 that resulted in the launch of over 5 seed-funded products in the first year. While at Catalyst Foundry and Verizon, I co-authored 25 patents, 20 of which were granted by the USPTO.
My focus was leading product design to explore and prioritize dozens of different ideas via rapid design sprints. Inspired by best practices evangelized by Google Ventures, IDEO and Stanford d.School, I drove a process of early concept validation through user stories, design prototyping, and qualitative user research interviews. I also worked with each idea creator to coalesce a concept into a compelling story and pitch presentation before development.
Once we had strong hypotheses, the real fun began: developing and launching products using the build-measure-learn iterative cycle gathering behavior metrics and feedback from users. Check out this case study for an augmented reality app that we built.
We explored concepts in areas including: productivity, dynamic music and video, social gaming, voice AI and chatbots, early education tools, topic-based conversations, crowd-sourced sentiment analysis, augmented reality, and connected home.
Below are few of our developed products.
OUTTA: MAKE & DISCOVER VIRTUAL SPACES
Just in time for augmented reality to hit mainstream, Outta lets you add filters, animated stickers, photos, GIFs, and messages in the real world to share with friends and others.
CROSSROADS: FIND YOUR TEAM
For players of the popular games Destiny, Overwatch, and League of Legends, there is no slicker Team Finder app out there with this level of raid scheduling and management.
FRIENDUEL: PREDICT & BATTLE
Frienduel lets you compete with friends by predicting outcomes of upcoming events in sports, pop culture, business, music, entertainment, and more. If you can out predict them, you win. Simple.
VIBE: LOCATION-BASED SENTIMENT
Vibe uses sentiment analysis to measure and evaluate locations based on “positivity” rather than “activity”. With a live visual feed, users can check and compare the vibe of different areas.
ENJOYCAL: DIGITAL WALL CALENDAR
EnjoyCal is a centralized digital family planner that provides synced calendars, photos, weather, trafc and todo lists. The lightweight internet-connected touchscreen easily mounts on a wall.