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Redefining investment types in Universe

PROJECT SNAPSHOT

FULL CASE STUDY

Overview

Clockwork Universe was initially structured around private-market investments (direct equity, funds, SAFEs, notes, etc.). This matched the needs of our early clients, who primarily managed private portfolios.

As the platform grew, a new segment emerged:
Wealth managers, multi-family offices, and hybrid investors who needed to centralize their entire investment universe, including public assets, real estate, alternatives, commodities, and cash positions.

This shift created a strategic need:

Universe had to evolve from a private-only tool into a true multi-asset portfolio platform.

But the existing investment type structure wasn’t built for that. It lacked the categorization, clarity, and scalability required for a diverse portfolio.

The problem

The previous taxonomy:

  • Was shaped almost entirely by private-market workflows
  • Didn’t reflect how modern, multi-asset portfolios are organized
  • Made it difficult to unify all holdings under a coherent mental model
  • Created friction for users trying to analyze or classify their entire portfolio
  • Wasn’t scalable for future product features (Explorer, Reporting, Analytics, Metrics, Risk)

Universe needed a clean, intuitive, and scalable investment type architecture capable of supporting any asset class, now and in the future.

My role

As Product Design Lead, I owned the redesign end to end:

  • Auditing the existing system, behaviors, and UI touchpoints
  • Defining clear mental models for multi-asset portfolios
  • Designing a new investment taxonomy aligned with industry standards
  • Writing behavior rules for each type (valuation logic, grouping, display, filters)
  • Defining how investment types appear in Explorer, Holdings, Investments, and Reporting
  • Facilitating cross-functional alignment with Product, Engineering, CS, and IS
  • Preparing documentation and support for a smooth implementation

This work required systems thinking, product strategy, and cross team facilitation, not only UI design.

Cross-functional alignment

This project required coordinating across Product, Engineering, Investment Solutions, and Customer Success. I facilitated alignment sessions to clarify terminology, resolve conflicting interpretations, and ensure every team was working from the same conceptual model.

By leading these conversations, design became the central point of shared understanding, allowing the organization to move forward confidently with a unified investment framework.

Design principles

I guided the redesign using three core principles:

  • Clarity: Investment types should reflect how analysts and investors naturally categorize assets.
  • Consistency: The same investment must behave the same way across all product surfaces and workflows.
  • Scalability: The model must support new instruments and future features without requiring structural redesign.

These principles shaped every decision and helped transform a legacy taxonomy into a coherent system.

The solution: A unified investment type framework

I redesigned the taxonomy into a single, scalable model aligned with real-world portfolio structures.

New Investment Types

  • Cash & Equivalent
  • Collectible
  • Commodity
  • Cryptocurrency
  • Fixed Income
  • Private Credit
  • Private Equity Direct
  • Private Fund
  • Public Equity
  • Real Estate Direct
  • Other

Why this model works

More intuitive for users

It mirrors the asset classes clients already use in their real portfolios.

Consistent across the platform

The new types follow shared rules in:

  • Explorer filtering
  • Holdings structure
  • Investments workflows
  • Reporting logic

Scalable for the future

New instruments or asset categories can be added without reworking the system.

Aligned with industry standards

Matches how wealth managers and investment teams classify portfolios.

How the model integrates across Universe

I defined the behaviors and interactions of investment types in all core modules:

Explorer

  • Unified asset-class-based filtering
  • Clean grouping and sorting
  • Consistent categorization visuals

Holdings

  • Standardized metadata
  • Predictable information architecture
  • Reduced classification errors

Investments Module

  • Simplified creation flows
  • Clearer guidance during type selection

Reporting

  • Cleaner summaries
  • Improved cross-asset interpretation
  • Foundation for future analytics

Impact

For Users

  • Ability to unify all assets, public, private, real estate, crypto, alternatives, in one platform
  • Clear, intuitive asset categorization
  • Reduced confusion when creating or analyzing investments

For the Business

  • Expanded product fit for wealth managers and hybrid portfolios
  • Stronger competitive positioning
  • A scalable taxonomy that supports upcoming features (risk models, benchmarking, dashboards)

For the Product Team

  • A shared investment language across all departments
  • More predictable implementation for engineers
  • Fewer exceptions and edge cases in logic and UI
  • Clearer decision-making for future product enhancements

Organizational impact

Beyond improving product consistency, this work created a shared language across teams.
The new taxonomy now serves as a foundation for engineering, analysts, CS, and Product, reducing ambiguity in daily workflows and enabling smoother decision making.

It also provides the structural foundation for upcoming initiatives, such as the new Explorer, advanced metrics, the Numbers API, and integration improvements, enabling the platform to scale more predictably.

Reflection

This project represents a crucial milestone in Universe’s evolution. By redefining the Investment Type framework, we created the foundation for a truly multi-asset platform, enabling richer analysis, broader market appeal, and a more intuitive user experience.

For me, it illustrates the kind of work I thrive on as a Design Lead. Solving structural problems, aligning stakeholders, and designing systems that scale far beyond the interface.

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