Antidate launched with a unique take on dating in a pre-Tinder world. However, by 2016, with a new breed of competition in the industry and many online daters feeling fatigued and apathetic, it was time for a pivot.
I joined at this point and worked directly with the founders to explore new ideas and opportunities for the app, consulting with mentors at a leading digital product company using a lean canvas methodology.
We worked quickly to design and document a brand-new app and back-end from scratch. And within a few months, working closely with a third party vendor who built the app, we launched Antidate v2!
The new app takes a real-world approach to dating - utilising a user's location and our custom venue database to recommend venues and users, encouraging "Antidaters" to meet IRL rather than endlessly swiping and scrolling.
My role
- Sole technical member of staff, working directly with founders and management
- Defining technical approach and strategy
- Working with the team to define new product features and strategy
- Taking top level features and defining user stories and acceptance criteria
- Selecting and managing a third party vendor
- Managing scope
- Testing and releasing via the app store
- Applying for R&D tax relief and patents
- Managing, scaling and securing the app and back-end
- A crash course in lean canvas methodology
