Building a cybersecurity platform from the ground up
As one of the two founding designers at Mimic, I shipped a technically-driven MVP and evolved it into a user-centered cybersecurity platform while establishing a comprehensive design system and brand identity from scratch.
A year after I joined, Mimic secured $50 million in funding from Google Ventures. The exceptional design quality was called out by our design partners.
This is the best looking MVP I've ever seen from a startup.
— REI, Design partner
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Team
Members
- Product designer (me)
- Design architect
- 2 frontend developers
- Product manager
- Chief product officer
My role
- User research & strategy
- Usability testing
- UI design & evolution
- Design system development
- Brand development
Background
Initial MVP delivery
When I joined Mimic as one of the founding designers, the goal was clear: Ship an MVP fast to attract early customers and investors. Given the tight timeline and limited access to users, we prioritized technical requirements when building the first version of the platform.
This approach allowed us to demonstrate our technical proficiency and launch on schedule. The initial MVP impressed early users with its capabilities, but our post-launch research revealed a critical gap: Proper user research.
Research
Post-launch initiative
To address this gap, I worked with the UX architect to spearhead a comprehensive research initiative.
- Card sorting study to understand how users conceptualized platform information
- Interviews with internal users who would be interacting with the platform
- Analysis of discourse in online cybersecurity communities to identify pain points and workflow patterns
Key insight
The deeper user research uncovered a critical insight that reshaped our product strategy: We weren’t designing for a single user type, but two distinct ones.
| Manage (IT Operations) | Monitor (Security Analysts) | |
|---|---|---|
| Primary role | ||
| Primary role | Deploy and maintain security agents | Investigating security events and incidents |
| Key concerns | ||
| Key concerns | Connectivity status, credential management, configurations, operational health | Timeline of events, severity assessment, threat detection |
| Urgency | ||
| Urgency | Critical for our near-term growth: Getting security agents deployed | Increasingly important with growing platform maturity |
This insight led us to prioritize the "Manage" persona in our immediate development cycle to drive what mattered most at the time: Getting nodes deployed across customer systems.
Solution
Information architecture update
Based on our research findings, we reimagined the node navigation to directly reflect the two personas, splitting the Nodes Overview page into “Manage” and “Monitor” sections.
Node Details redesign
Along with refreshing our information architecture, I prioritized redesigning the Node Details page, which is a critical touchpoint for installing, deploying, and troubleshooting the nodes.
Before
The initial MVP version of Node Details were laid out linearly with no regard to the user's workflow
After
- Separated connectivity from the node operational state to reduce confusion
- Surfaced connectivity details only when issues surfaced, reducing information overload
- Categorized node events to enable filtering for faster troubleshooting
Node Details page when node is connected
Node Details page when node is degraded
Configuration experience
A major milestone in our roadmap was improving the node configuration process, but early discussions stalled as the team debated priorities.
To break this deadlock, I…
- Designed a comprehensive "Ferrari" version of the configuration feature to align the team's vision
- Scaled back to a focused "skateboard" MVP that began with single-node configurations
- Created a flexible, modular workflow that could grow with our evolving needs
Configuration experience walkthrough for the developers to review
Uncovering the third persona
One of the key debates centered on whether to start the configuration process from the node or the configuration file. Based on the assumption that IT operations would have a list of installed nodes they needed to configure, we decided to enter the flow from the node.
However, user testing revealed a crucial third persona hidden in plain sight: internal configuration engineers.
These internal users were our real, immediate users. They focused on configuration file development rather than node management, and their workflow centered around rapidly iterating on configuration files.
Leveraging flexible design
Fortunately, anticipating the future need for multiple entry points, I had designed modular screens that could be swapped around. My flexible design approach enabled…
- Support for both customer deployment and internal testing scenarios
- Seamless extension to bulk configuration capabilities
- Acceleration of our overall development cycle through faster internal iteration
Additional contributions
Design system establishment
Alongside product design work, I built Mimic's comprehensive design language to ensure visual consistency, scalability, and accessibility across all touchpoints.
Component library
- Established foundational components with primitive, semantic, and component tokens
- Created a cohesive set of UI elements based on brand guidelines
- Set up tokens for light and dark mode capabilities
Information architecture framework
- Analyzed common user workflows to identify repeating page patterns
- Created templates for recurring page types like "details" views and "overview"
- Designed information architecture patterns that maintained consistency across different sections
Brand experience
- Developed unified visual language across various channels and mediums
- Created templates for pitch decks and marketing collateral
- Enabled non-designers to create on-brand materials
Maintaining the brand experience across all touchpoints, like this architecture diagram in one of Mimic's white papers.
Accessibility
Check out the Mimic marketing website and do a tab test — the developers and I worked together to ensure keyboard operability, among other accessibility features.
- Implemented WCAG compliance standards for the marketing website, ensuring accessibility while protecting the company from lawsuits
- Established guidelines for future accessibility compliance
- Hand-crafted the hero image for the landing page of the marketing website
Conclusion
Google Ventures invested in Mimic amid strong competition from numerous investors, validating our tactical design approach to balance quick wins and long-term vision.
What started as a technically-driven MVP evolved into a user-centered platform with scalable design foundations, positioning Mimic for long-term success.