EARLY INSIGHTS, LASTING IMPACT
Research is fundamental to every stage of the product development journey, extending far beyond simple insight gathering or idea validation. We evaluate end-user desirability, technological feasibility, and business viability, along with how these three areas intersect, throughout our entire development process. Many organizations treat these critical considerations as separate, often late-stage checkboxes. However, we believe in assessing the maturity of each at the right moments from the start. This proactive and integrated approach allows us to identify gaps and assumptions early, focus on the most critical client needs, and deliver thoughtful, well-timed, and actionable recommendations.
Our research process
Step One
This very early, exploratory phase focuses on detecting shifts in human behavior, emerging technologies, and evolving markets. Research at this stage doesn’t yet build directly toward desirability, feasibility, or viability, but maintains a broad scan across all three. It aims to identify signals from the noise, uncover early opportunities, and ultimately lay the groundwork for strategic direction.
Step two
Research in this phase supports early business case assessment by framing the opportunity: identifying likely users and stakeholders, outlining their potential needs, and exploring initial feasibility, regulatory, and market considerations. The goal is to gather enough directional insight to determine whether the opportunity merits deeper investigation.
Step three
This phase focuses on understanding the people, environments, and systems at the heart of the opportunity. Through various research methods, we clarify who the users and stakeholders are, what they’re trying to accomplish, what tools, settings, and processes they currently use/work within, where unmet needs or pain points exist, and more. These insights not only further define the opportunity but also inform business viability.
Step Four
Research in this phase begins to engage feasibility while continuing to deepen desirability. By validating the value proposition, researchers help shape the product narrative and identify key use cases. This guides the drafting of early product requirements and supports initial prioritization and iterative testing of architectures, features, and functions. At this time, the focus remains on refining ideas and not finalizing direction.
Step Five
This phase focuses on understanding the people, environments, and systems at the heart of the opportunity. Through various research methods, we clarify who the users and stakeholders are, what they’re trying to accomplish, what tools, settings, and processes they currently use/work within, where unmet needs or pain points exist, and more. These insights not only further define the opportunity but also inform business viability.
Step Six
Research in this phase begins to engage feasibility while continuing to deepen desirability. By validating the value proposition, researchers help shape the product narrative and identify key use cases. This guides the drafting of early product requirements and supports initial prioritization and iterative testing of architectures, features, and functions. At this time, the focus remains on refining ideas and not finalizing direction.
Step Seven
This phase focuses on evaluating real-world product performance, adoption, and user experience. In addition to identifying opportunities for continuous improvement, post-launch insights inform assessments of marketing effectiveness, business model alignment, and how closely outcomes match early market predictions.
Our Core Capabilities
With a range of research capabilities at our disposal, we choose the right methods to address your specific needs, delivering targeted and actionable insights.
Immerse ourselves in real-world contexts to understand behaviors, environments, and cultural nuances as they naturally occur.
Facilitate conversations that uncover individual or group perspectives, beliefs, motivations/barriers, workflows, lived experiences, and reactions to specific topics or concepts.
Analyze industry trends, competitor strategies, customer segments, and market dynamics to identify potential opportunities and threats.
Design and deploy tools to efficiently gather quantitative or qualitative data from targeted or broad audiences.
Visually represent the end-to-end experience of a user’s interaction with a product or service to identify key touchpoints, pain points, moments of delight, and opportunities for improvement.
Conduct repeated cycles of testing and feedback on design concepts to identify strengths and weaknesses, refine features, and enhance usability and value before final development.
Perform rigorous statistical analyses and create predictive models to interpret complex data sets, identify patterns, and support evidence-based decision-making throughout product development and evaluation.
Support compliance with regulatory standards by designing and conducting controlled trials to assess product safety and efficacy before market launch.
Monitor product performance in real-world settings after launch to identify potential issues and guide ongoing improvements.
Our perspective
If you’re aiming for a solution that’s well-defined, efficiently developed, and ready for adoption, thoughtful research is key. Engaging in research early and often throughout development ensures a strong foundation that provides long-term value to the product, project, and team involved.
Research is needed to define the problem space with precision. In doing so, it helps clarify project objectives, align stakeholders, and reduces the likelihood of miscommunication between teams. Work with us to uncover what’s most important to solve for, surface hidden assumptions, and establish a strong foundation for development.
When research insights guide the process, teams can move forward with greater confidence and less second-guessing. By taking an objective, third-party stance, we help limit the influence of internal biases and external pressures. Let us help you gain clarity so you can act decisively at critical moments.
Research-aligned development reduces rework, avoids late-stage pivots, and helps teams anticipate challenges earlier. This focus improves resource efficiency and team morale and shortens time to market. Partner with us to plan smarter, iterate more effectively, and stay ahead of what’s coming, so you can spend less time reacting and more time creating.
Having a deep understanding of user needs, regulatory pathways, and economic trends and factors helps ensure that your solution fits not just the problem, but the real-world context in which it will live. We will help you surface and navigate the factors that shape success.
Our work
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Additional capabilities
Don’t let your valuable research sit on a shelf, we provide the additional capabilities to turn those insights into impactful and market-ready solutions.
Our research approach uncovers valuable insights into user behaviors, needs, motivations, and pain points. This directly informs our user experience design process, ensuring that every interaction is intuitive, effective, and truly resonates with the target audience. By grounding design decisions in solid research, we create experiences that are not only user-friendly but also drive engagement and satisfaction.
Understanding human factors is crucial for safe, comfortable, and easy-to-use products. Our research explores user interaction, ergonomics, cognitive processing, and safety concerns. This focus on the human element provides the important foundation for our design teams to create user-centered solutions prioritizing safety and usability.