Making global payments work like local ones.
Designing a financial ecosystem that connects digital assets, local payment methods, merchants, and liquidity providers through clear, secure, and trustworthy experiences.
ROLE
Brand & Product Designer · Product Strategist
MARKET
Global · USA / Canada
SCOPE
Brand Strategy · Brand Identity · Product Strategy · UX/UI · Financial Systems · Design System
THE BUSINESS CONTEXT
Global commerce was open, Payment access was not
Customers in emerging markets could discover products and services from around the world, but completing the purchase was often much harder.
Many did not have an internationally enabled card or access to a dollar balance. Even when they had the money locally, overseas merchants frequently depended on payment methods and currencies that were unavailable to them.
The barrier was not the customer’s ability to pay. It was the incompatibility between local financial systems and global online commerce.
Friddy created a bridge
Friddy allowed customers to purchase from international merchants using familiar local payment methods and their own currency.
Behind the transaction, the platform coordinated the payment network, liquidity, digital assets, and merchant settlement required to move value between both sides.
The customer paid locally. The merchant received a global payment.
Making global checkout accessible through local payments
Friddy lets customers pay international merchants using familiar local payment methods and their own currency—while the network handles the complexity behind the transaction.
WITHOUT FRIDDY
International checkouts often require payment access that customers in emerging markets do not have.
Local customer
International checkout
No international card
Unsupported payment method
No USD balance
PURCHASE BLOCKED
WITH FRIDDY
Customers pay locally while Friddy coordinates the international transaction.
Local customer
Local payment method
Local currency
FRIDDY PAYMENT NETWORK
Liquidity provider
International merchant
PURCHASE COMPLETED
MY ROLE
Designing the brand and product as one connected system
As Friddy’s sole designer, I operated with the scope of a founding designer and product lead—working across business definition, brand strategy, product architecture, and hands-on product design.
I translated the company’s financial model into a structured product, defined how its participants and services connected, and carried that direction through the brand, customer journeys, interfaces, and design system.
Working directly with founders, stakeholders, investors, the startup incubator, and marketing and business teams, I aligned commercial ambition, product priorities, and customer needs throughout the work.
Brand direction
Defining Friddy’s identity, positioning, and visual language across the company and its products.
Product direction
Translating the business model into a coherent product architecture, user roles, capabilities, and priorities.
Hands-on product design
Designing key journeys, financial flows, interfaces, prototypes, and transaction states from strategy through execution.
Design systems
Building reusable foundations and components to create consistency across Friddy’s connected product ecosystem.
PRODUCT STRATEGY
Two use cases. One payment network.
Friddy supported two core cross-border scenarios: purchasing from an international merchant and sending money to someone abroad. The endpoints were different, but the underlying problem was the same—local payment methods on each side were not directly connected.
Instead of requiring a direct integration between every payment method, Friddy introduced a liquidity layer between both sides. A liquidity provider completed the payment through the destination market’s available rail and received FRC plus a bounty for facilitating the transaction.
How do you connect two local payment systems that were never designed to work together?
Rather than connecting every local payment method directly to every destination rail, Friddy used liquidity providers as the bridge between them.
The sender or buyer could pay through a familiar method in their market, while a matched liquidity provider completed the transaction through a payment method available in the destination market.
The rails stayed local. Friddy connected the value between them.
PURCHASE
// HOW THE PAYMENT MOVES
Buyer
Pays locally
Local currency
Local method
Liquidity Provider
Pays via destination rail
Receives FRC + earns bounty
Merchant
Receives payment
Destination currency
FRIDDY COORDINATES
FRC LIQUIDITY
Turning settlement back into usable money.
Completing a payment was only one half of the liquidity model. In return for funding the destination-side payment, liquidity providers received FRC plus a bounty.
FRC was Friddy’s settlement asset, designed to maintain a value equivalent to USD and backed by USDT. But holding FRC was different from holding spendable local currency, so the product also needed a way for participants to move back out of FRC.
Liquidity had to work in both directions.
An FRC holder could create a Cash Out request specifying the amount and preferred payment method. Another participant who wanted to acquire FRC could fulfill the request by paying through that method.
Once payment was confirmed, the FRC changed hands—allowing one participant to exit the asset while another entered the liquidity network.
LIQUIDITY PROVIDER
holds FRC + bounty
CREATES CASH OUT REQUEST
FRC amount + payment method
FRC BUYER
accepts the request
FRIDDY TRANSACTION CORE
Eligiblity
Matching
Escrow
Confirmation
Settlement
PAYS FRC HOLDER
through requested local method
FRC TRANSFERS
to the buyer
One shared transaction Three focused experiences.
Friddy separates each participant’s responsibilities while keeping every action connected to the same transaction.
ROLE-SPECIFIC EXPERIENCES
Each participant sees only the information, actions, and transaction states needed to complete their part.
BUYER EXPERIENCE
Pay locally
Use local currency
Receive confirmation
LIQUIDITY PROVIDER EXPERIENCE
Review eligible requests
Facilitate the exchange
Receieve a bounty
MERCHANT EXPERIENCE
Create payment request
Track progress
Receive settlement
FRIDDY TRANSACTION CORE
Eligiblity
Matching
Escrow
Confirmation
Settlement
EXCEPTIONS AND RESOLUTION
Disputes remain connected to the shared transaction.
EXPERIENCE ABSTRACTION
Bridging local payment with global settlement
A Friddy payment crossed two financial realities. The customer wanted to pay through a familiar local method and in local currency, while the merchant needed the transaction settled through Friddy’s financial network.
The product had to coordinate what happened between those two moments—finding eligible liquidity, matching the transaction, protecting the exchange, confirming payment, and completing settlement.
The complexity belonged to Friddy, not the customer.
The customer did not need to understand liquidity, matching, escrow, or settlement to complete an international purchase. Their experience needed to remain familiar: choose a local payment method, pay in local currency, and know when the payment was complete.
Behind that simple journey, Friddy could coordinate the financial and operational steps required to complete the transaction.
EXPERIENCE ABSTRACTION
// WHAT THE CUSTOMER EXPERIENCES
Choose local method
Pay in local currency
Payment confirmed
NETWORK ORCHESTRATION
// WHAT FRIDDY COORDINATES
Payment request
Eligibility
Matching
Settlement
Confirmation
Escrow