The
Overview
Brief
Team: Engineers, Researchers, Gragic Desingers, Product Designers
Tools: Figma, Photoshop, Google Suite, Open AI API
Responsibility: User Interface, User Experience, User Research, Product Management
The context
In 2024, the Sanxingdui Encounter—a cultural phenomenon from China’s Bronze Age—was scheduled to tour the U.S., marking a significant opportunity to introduce American audiences to this ancient civilization. I was approached by Memor NYC Inc to help launch their new Memor museum website and a product Duibao, a robot inspired by China's ancient Sanxingdui civilization. The goal was to introduce Duibao to an American audience, not only as an educational tool but as part of a broader brand initiative to create a cultural IP, much like Disney. However, while the robot was fully designed and being produced in China, the app essential for connecting it to the American market was far from ready.
The impact
- Research and Design: Led research and design to define the MVP, ensuring it was user-centered and launch-ready.
- Positive User Impact: Achieved 79% positive feedback for app's ease of use and innovative features.
- Collaboration & Leadership: Streamlined communication across teams, significantly improving the design-to-development workflow.
- Established Best Practices: Contributed to design system and development standards within the team.
- Business Growth: Design strategies directly improved retention, referrals, and user growth, contributing to overall business success.
A glimpse of
Final Design
A glimpse of Final Design
The Timeline
The
Challenge
- Product Challenge: The Duibao robot was designed for the Chinese market, using WeChat mini program for setup. For the U.S. market, this wasn’t feasible, and we needed to build a new app and integrate Duobao with U.S.-based AI models, requiring a completely new solution.
- Physical-Digital Integration: Bridging the gap between the physical Duibao robot and the app, ensuring seamless data flow and intuitive interactions.
- Technology Trade-offs: Balancing tight deadlines and technological limitations to effectively develop the Minimum Awesome Product (MAP) for pre-sales, while managing UX trade-offs for North American users.
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The
Research
Understanding our Competitors
To gain a comprehensive understanding of competitors, we conducted a thorough analysis of key rivals in the market. This in-depth examination empowered us to pinpoint areas of strength and weakness across various platforms. The image compares five AI products for education, entertainment, and affinity, showing Miko 3 and Codi as top performers. Alpha 1 Pro is excluded due to its $699 price.
Insights
Analyzing competitors like Miko 3 and Codi highlights opportunities for Duibao:
- Combine screen-based and screen-free features for balanced engagement.
- Support routines with interactive cultural content.
- Enable user customization for a personal touch.
- Add strong parental controls for safe, appropriate usage.
Interview & Survey
To view more research insigts please view the fulll report.
Insights
- Users preferred an intuitive setup process that mirrored familiar experiences with smart devices, such as Alexa or Google Home.
- The educational content needed to strike a balance between being informative for adults and engaging for children.
- Social sharing features were a top priority for users, as they wanted to share their cultural learning moments with friends and family.
User persona
After interviews and surveys, we identified three personas. The first one is Life Sharer, Jane Lee. She is passionate about life and love to share it on social mediaal. In addition, She is also a Cultural Education Advocate and Duoduo's mom. Duoduo was born and raised in the U.S. of Asian descent.A very active child, full of curiosity about everything.Especially likes all kinds of cool gadgets. The last persona is Emily, who is a Cultural Collector and attracted by unique souvenirs as a memento of my travels.
User Story
Given the tight timeline and focus on cultural enrichment, we will center on Jane Lee. Jane is a mother who loves traveling, learning, documenting and sharing. She loves to experience different kinds of history and culture, to see the beautifully designed, culturally rich and meaningful exhibits, to enrich her life, and to share her experience with her friends and her kids. After visiting the “Sanxingdui Encounter” exhibition, she purchased Duibao to learn more about the history of Sanxingdui...
Design
process
Feature Prioritization
Based on pain points from life and marketing insights, we brainstormed core features. Collaborating with the product team, I helped define the MVP, focusing on essentials like network connectivity, virtual tour guides, and chat history sharing. I made strategic design decisions to ensure usability while integrating Duibao’s playful, cultural elements—such as the interactive virtual guide—to provide an engaging educational experience without compromising user satisfaction.
PART OF THE Prioritization FEATURES
ON BOARDING
Knowing that the app’s core function was to connect Duibao to Wi-Fi, I focused heavily on reducing friction in the onboarding process. I designed a step-by-step Bluetooth pairing flow, ensuring users could effortlessly connect their robot and enabling app-driven Wi-Fi setup, complete with visual cues and instructional prompts for an intuitive, frustration-free experience.
Iteration
ON BOARDING
One of the key user engagement points was Duibao’s ability to log and share interactions. I designed the UI to allow users to save and revisit their conversations with Duibao. More importantly, they could share these chat logs via social media or email, turning cultural learning moments into sharable content—a decision rooted in driving product virality.
ON BOARDING
This feature added depth to Duibao’s capabilities, turning it into an educational guide that could answer real-time questions about the exhibition, further linking the product to the Sanxingdui brand.
The
Outcome
Connect to Bluetooth & WiFi
Share chat history
guide tour
Design
system
Font
color
Text ON Background
Icons
The
Reflection
The Duibao project was a lesson in navigating cross-cultural design and bridging physical-digital interactions. I defined a user-centered MVP by prioritizing features like Wi-Fi connectivity and virtual tours, ensuring it resonated with American audiences, as confirmed by quality testing. Leading a remote, multidisciplinary team, I introduced efficient workflows, reducing task completion times by 73% through iterative design. Despite tight deadlines, I maintained focus on user needs, delivering a launch-ready product that showcased my adaptability, strategic decision-making, and ability to inspire collaborative success.
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