About Abyss
Abyss builds asset integrity management software for the energy sector. Helping oil platforms detect external corrosion early. Using 3D scanning, Image recognition and narrow AI certified engineers identify high risk areas virtually and report insights to mechanical integrity engineers, who use the data to prioritise physical inspections and prevent critical failures.
Project Overview
As the first Product Designer at Abyss, I led the redesign of of their flagship application, Fabric(v2). with the goal of improving the accuracy and trustworthiness of AI-assisted corrosion reports. The project focused on isolating core functionality from v1 while enhancing internal workflows.
I collaborated closely with the Product Manager, Product Owner, Tech lead, ML Lead, and 4 Developers.
Key success metric: Improvement in the integrity of the findings coming from internal users over a 3 month design cycle.
Scope and Constraints
I had access to five internal users and enough time for research and design alongside ongoing usability testing. I planned the scope at the beginning and didn’t need to pivot from it as the key problem was validated early.
User Problem
Internal users (Asset integrity engineers) faced a significant challenge in data entry accuracy. Recent entries suffered from missing and duplicated data. They reported difficulties with manual input and tracking completed work.
Results
User outcome: Validated the improved integrity of corrosion findings
Business outcome: Improved the efficiency of internal users by 4x
Evaluation
- Incorporated engineers’ review and finalization steps into the analysis process.
- Validated a 3D point cloud view for smoother navigation.
- Introduced ongoing usability testing of the beta version of the app.
- Informed product strategy, taking it from initiative feature-based planning using a roadmap to outcome-focused planning using now/next/later.
UI Design
❝ This will give me a better perspective of what to look for and it will help me a lot ❞ Asset Integrity Engineer, Abyss Solutions
Learnings
I know for future projects a task can stop providing new insights if you haven’t moved to an interactive model of the task, I know to prepare for this earlier. Building the glossary helped me navigate the common industry abbreviations and terminology. I felt confident through research and ideation and I built a deeper understanding of interaction design and visual design.
Next Steps
Oil platforms are susceptible to additional issues that can lead them to failure. These include internal corrosion, corrosion under pipe supports, on bolts, flanges, and under insulation. The next project aimed to improve the detection of these various “damage mechanisms” on oil platforms, with the potential of assisting MI engineers directly so they can prioritize their inspection areas themselves, with the company’s belief in this leading to an increase in client usage.