For several months, our focus had been on creating a user interface for MFX’s CellisiumTM manufacturing-focused platform: our researchers, designers and developers working iteratively to release increasingly capable GUI software in tandem with the hardware’s own development. Our main aim was to enable early users to control this cutting-edge equipment as easily as possible without bloating the interface with controls for future functions that had not yet been realised in the hardware prototypes.

Supporting MFX’s presence at this conference was a significant shift in focus away from functional realities and towards illustrating an ambitious future vision. With our developers engaged delivering against immediate deadlines, we needed to deliver a compelling, high-fidelity vision of the interface for ExploriumTM, their experiment-focused platform.

No developers? No problem. The value we needed to deliver was in eliciting a positive response for conference attendees – in making them understand and believe in MFX’s ambitions. No hardware needed to be controlled. No connection to other devices necessary.

Starting with the UI kit and relevant interface components from our earlier work, we began to craft a self-contained experience that encompassed all of the key features slated for the future of ExploriumTM. Thanks to these building blocks, we swiftly created a series of screens that highlighted MFX’s innovative approaches to cell and gene therapy. We wanted demo users to experience a high-level overview alongside deep-dives into the data and analytics MFX aim to make available in pursuit of effective scientific outcomes.

With this skeleton structure of the screens in place and particular details well-defined, we moved to make the prototype something that could be felt, not just seen.

We leveraged Figma’s increasingly extensive interactive prototyping tools to make this demonstration appear real to those in front of the screen. Demo users could navigate through the various reactor chambers, see reagent and sensor levels rise and fall, and see first hand how cells might change across the course of an experiment. Suddenly, what might be an intangible idea becomes a tangible possibility for those who get to experience it.

The power of cloud-based tools like Figma also means that this demo experience wasn’t just confined to the conference, but could be shared with potential partners and customers across the globe: the right prototype, in the right place, at the right time.