Cell therapy protocol designer

Enterprise medical software for cell therapy manufacturing

Role: Product & UX Lead
Duration: 3 to 4 months
Product: Protocol authoring and configuration software
Focus: Systems design, risk reduction, regulated enterprise workflows

The protocol library, with a date-range filter open.

Overview

The protocol designer is an enterprise application for configuring and managing the protocols that run on medical manufacturing devices.

At Strata, I led the redesign of the legacy protocol-authoring system. It had become hard to use, slow to configure and increasingly risky in regulated production. The work began after a former VP I had worked with joined the client and saw it needed a UX reset from the ground up.

One constraint shaped everything: the existing system had to keep running on live instruments. The new experience had to map cleanly onto the established workflows and underlying logic, and still be much easier and faster to use.

Problem

The legacy designer caused real operational problems:

Tools were fragmented and workflows inconsistent
Too much manual, repeated configuration
It was hard to see a protocol's structure and dependencies
Complex setup meant a lot to keep in your head
Little validation or feedback, so errors were more likely

Cell therapy manufacturing is regulated, so a usability problem is an operational risk.

First-run setup, where the user chooses a local or a network install.

Key decision

I kept the system's logic and changed how people see it.

The software had to keep running on live instruments, so the underlying logic and the established workflows could not change. I put the effort into structure: one authoring screen in place of several tools, steps shown in order with their dependencies, and validation that appears early.

Approach

The redesign had to make the system clearer without disturbing workflows that already worked. The principles:

Understand the domain deeply before proposing structural change
Respect the existing architecture and its constraints
Lighten the mental load with better structure and feedback
Show validation and errors early and plainly

I worked in rounds, proving structure and logic before any visual polish.

Adding a user in the redesigned interface.

Solution

We designed one protocol authoring experience to replace the fragmented tools.

Workflow and structure

Simpler protocol hierarchies
Clear sequencing and dependencies
Advanced configuration revealed only when it is needed

A new protocol with its first group and that group's environment settings.

Validation and error handling

Explicit validation states
Error messages tied to the protocol logic
Less reliance on knowing how the system works underneath

A full protocol: the steps in order on the left, the selected pump step's settings on the right.

Interaction and prototyping

Low-fidelity wireframes to test structure and flow
High-fidelity designs and interactive prototypes
Realistic scenarios tested before development was committed

Stakeholders could run complex workflows from start to finish in the prototypes, which cut the risk later on.

Outcome

The client estimated the new system could save days of work per protocol
The client awarded us the full development contract
The engagement grew into a multi-year partnership
Users reported shorter setup times and fewer errors
Critical configuration mistakes became less likely
The system is in production and still being refined

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