Stears had built a reputation as West Africa's leading business intelligence platform, but their web experience was terrible, not responsive, slow, and subscribers couldn't access premium features on mobile. They were trying to raise a Series A, and investors kept asking about mobile.

The web platform was cannibalizing growth because users expected mobile-first experiences. Without a proper mobile app, the company was losing premium subscribers and missing revenue targets that would make or break their fundraising round.

I designed and developed the complete iOS and Android mobile app experience from scratch. This included advanced search with filters, bookmarking and saved articles, personalized content feeds based on user interests, push notifications for breaking news, offline reading capability, and a seamless subscription paywall.

I rebuilt the information architecture to work for mobile-first consumption, created interaction patterns that felt native to each platform, and integrated with their existing backend infrastructure without disrupting the web experience.

Midway through development, the executive team decided they wanted to pivot the entire business model from individual subscriptions to B2B institutional clients. This meant redesigning the entire onboarding flow, adding team management features, and creating a different pricing structure, all while we were already deep into mobile development.

I had to argue strongly to keep the individual subscription path alive (which ultimately proved correct), while also accommodating the new B2B features. The scope nearly doubled, but the timeline didn't budge because the fundraising deadline was firm.

The mobile app was the centerpiece of Stears' pitch to Serena Williams' MaC Ventures. They closed a $3.3M Series A with the design work directly cited in investor conversations.

The app drove 15,000 downloads in the first 30 days and increased premium subscriptions by 34%. Apple featured it in 'New Apps We Love' across African App Stores. App Store rating: 4.6 stars. The app became their fastest-growing acquisition channel, validating the mobile-first bet.