ProtoPie
ProtoPie Kinetics
Led ProtoPie Kinetics end-to-end as Product Manager and designer — defining scope, assembling a team of 5, managing weekly delivery cadence, coordinating sign-offs across QA, Legal, Security, and Marketing, and shipping a live product in 3 weeks. Kinetics maps physical object motion (attaching sensors to real objects like a tennis racket, plane model, or toy) to ProtoPie prototype interactions in real time. Made the deprecation call a month later when adoption data didn't support continued investment.
- Role
- Product Manager & Designer
- Team
- 5 people (design, engineering, QA)
- Timeline
- 3 weeks (+ 1 month post-launch)
- Year
- 2025
- Zero to shipped
- 3 weeks
- Zero to shipped
- Team members coordinated
- 5
- Team members coordinated
- Sign-off streams (QA, Legal, Security, Marketing)
- 4
- Sign-off streams (QA, Legal, Security, Marketing)
- Launch to deprecation decision
- Full lifecycle
- Launch to deprecation decision
1 / 1
Process
1. Scope Definition
Starting with a clear problem and a hard timeline
- Defined the product scope based on a real client interaction gap: physical hardware inputs (sensors, controllers) sending data to ProtoPie for live prototype reactions.
- Set a 3-week delivery constraint up front — not as a stretch goal, but as a forcing function to keep scope tight.
- Identified the five workstreams that needed to run in parallel: interaction design, firmware integration, app development, QA, and go-to-market.
2. Delivery
Running five workstreams simultaneously to a hard deadline
- Assembled a 5-person team and established a weekly delivery cadence with clear owners for each workstream.
- Coordinated QA, Legal, Security, and Marketing sign-offs in sequence without creating a sequential bottleneck — parallel sign-off tracks where possible.
- Shipped a live product in 3 weeks with all compliance gates cleared.
3. Post-Launch Decision
Making the deprecation call when the data was clear
- Monitored adoption metrics for 30 days post-launch.
- Adoption data did not support continued investment — usage was lower than the threshold required to justify ongoing maintenance costs.
- Made the deprecation call and communicated it clearly to the team and stakeholders. The product was retired without drama.
Outcomes
- Shipped a working product in 3 weeks — on time, compliant, and ready for public use.
- Demonstrated a full product lifecycle: ideation, delivery, and responsible deprecation based on data.
- The process became a reference model for fast internal product builds at ProtoPie.
Skills and tools
- Creative Technologist
- Interaction Design
- Motion