Simmunome Inc
Developing an MVP for a SaaS platform that predicts drug efficacy
ROLE
Team
Timeline
Simmunome lacked a streamlined platform for drug researchers to utilize their models effectively and generate disease model predictions. Currently, customers manually email Simmunome to develop the models. I was hired to design MVP that allows customers to independently create and utilize their models.
Gathering requirements
By conducting stakeholder interviews, I identified the platforms's two main features.
After speaking with stakeholders, I pinpointed key features.
Feature #1: Target validation is the main feature that will help drug researchers determine whether a molecular target has a chance of affecting a biological network and visualize the results.
Feature #2: Biomarker Discovery - streamlining uploading datasets and displaying the group reconciliation flow
“If we have a platform, we can serve more clients with ease of access and less direct communication with us so they can use our service by themselves
Nardin Nakhla
Cofounder at Simmunome
Designing a core feature #1: Target Validation: Validate which disease pathways are affected by therapy and, most importantly, which are not.
I explored two concepts, mostly different visualization pathways from the selected node to each endpoint.
Concept A All the information is displayed on the same page when clicking on a node.
Pros:
Less clicking is required, allowing users to view different paths (Interrupted/Non-interrupted) on the same page.
Cons:
In large models with hundreds of nodes, displaying the summary on the same page can be distracting.
Scaling can become an issue as the model grows.
Pros:
Users can see the entire visualization of different paths and the summary of each path more clearly without clutter.
This provides a more accessible view of non-interrupted paths, as each node's details are isolated on a separate page, reducing distractions.
Cons:
Moving between pages can lead to a loss of context, making it harder to compare information from different nodes quickly.
Concept testing
I tested the concepts. Concept B won but needed 2 big changes.
1st change:
Initially, the summary was displayed by the node. However, separating them into different sections would make it easier to focus on each one individually.
2nd change:
Since some nodes may have multiple interrupted paths, it would be helpful to have a preview of these paths to make navigation easier.
Designing a core task #2: Biomarker discovery.
The second feature I designed was the upload flow to create a project, identify which group is the control group, and reconcile groups if more than one modality is used to generate an analysis (also known as Group reconciliation).
Impact
Shipping and releasing the features.
Once the 2 features ship, I will work with the engineering team to track the Task Completion Rate and Time on Task to make sure that each of these flows are completed successfully.
The MVP is planned to be released in the Summer of 2024.