OilEx

OilEx is a digital marketplace for physical crude oil — connecting independent producers with global buyers and carrying a deal from discovery through negotiation, contracts and settlement. At Hunter Technology, I was the product design manager on OilEx from April to November 2021, working with product strategist Ilya Belikin. We pioneered a modular interaction pattern while tuning and growing the product through repeated shifts in direction.

What I did

• Product design ownership and user-story planning
• Product communication with frontend and backend developers
• High-fidelity prototyping and design documentation (Figma, Whimsical)
• Product website design and development (Webflow)

Why not a stepper

OilEx digitalises transaction workflows, and with blockchain smart contracts in the mix, the platform had to formalise what has been agreed, delivered and settled at each point in a deal. The obvious answer was a checkout-style stepper. But we weren’t sure of every required and optional step in a physical oil transaction — and the steps work differently for different businesses. The product direction itself kept moving too: one pivot toward a B2B SaaS model, another toward commodities beyond oil. So the design team committed to components that are modular, flexible and extendable, rather than a fixed pipeline.

Deal Actions

One element is common to every transaction: people need to talk. OilEx already had a chat component where parties connect, negotiate terms and arrange shipping and payment, so we placed a set of interactive cards next to the conversation — showing what has been done, what can be done now, and what is still to come. Users pick actions from a toolbox as the conversation unfolds instead of being marched through platform-defined steps, and each action triggers structured inputs like updating a price or uploading documents.

The system records every action on the ledger, so critical checkpoints are never lost in free-flow messages. The records form an activity log for the involved parties and drive automatic follow-ups — such as declining other leads for the same listing once a deal is signed.

Making it buildable

The caveat of a flexible design is the logic and conditions powering it. We had to maximise speed while avoiding unsustainable workarounds to deliver a live showcase as soon as possible. To keep communication with developers accurate, I prepared materials outlining every possible scenario for both the selling and buying sides of a transaction, presented alongside detailed user stories — the feedback was positive.

To attract partners, clients and users, we also built a product page that communicates how Deal Actions work, with examples of workflows that could be added to suit different needs.

OilEx shipped as a live beta. Deal Actions was designed so that new workflows — and new commodities — could be added without major redesigns to the negotiation and settlement components.