Rob Boynes

Rob is a globally experienced design leader and product designer with a focus on user experience and product innovation. He works primarily as player/coach in early stage companies, from Zero to One startups to Series B+ scale-ups and has extensive experience as both fractional advisor, coach and hands-on practitioner - along with a keen understanding of agency dynamics.

Currently he leads Design and Product discovery at Bits, a growth-stage YC-backed fintech he previously cofounded in 2019. There he tries to solve the inherent and discriminatory product issues / biases around sub-prime credit - along with the associated complexity inherent with regulated finance products.

Prior to Bits he was CPO at Quota (now Finroy), an early stage SaaS AccountTech / FinTech company he cofounded that made SMB data and financial risk accessible to business owners and their supporters. While at Quota he also cofounded huumans, a neo-accountancy service focused on creating efficiency in Canadian SMB and Canadian Franchise account processes through lean product, big data and disruptive system architectures.

In London he was Vice President of Design for Verve, a series B, high-revenue scale-up that worked heavily in the 18-30 y/o advocacy, retention and events space. There he oversaw all aspects of global product and marketing design across multiple product verticals including marketplace (Pollen), travel, sports and entertainment with internal agency partnerships including Live Nation, the NBA and Bumble. During this tenure he build and oversaw large blended multi-discipline teams in London, Toronto, Las Vegas and Los Angeles.

Before Verve he was special projects design / product lead at Index-backed Citymapper, overseeing the conception and launch of SmartBus and SmartRide along with aligned software, app and open data projects. Before Citymapper he was the Vice President of Design at Sonr Inc - a globally distributed / remote AI startup based in San Francisco where he oversaw product and design from initial vision, conception and pitch to Seed then final acquisition working in partnership with Twitter / GNIP, Reddit, News Corp and Huffington Post. Sonr Inc exited to AudioBoom Inc in 2016.

He joined Sonr Inc after time as Design Director at Contentment, a SaaS startup focused on responsive digital content management and B2B visual creation tools (pre-Canva) that went on to gain a rapid pre-Series B exit in 2015. 

As well as startups, Rob has extensive traditional media experience having been a Creative Director focused on global product, content, brand and storytelling at MTV and Viacom (Comedy Central, South Park Studios, Nickelodeon), The Week, Conde Nast, News Corp, BSkyB / Fox, Dennis Publishing, Future Inc and the Haymarket Group. He has hard-won experience in editorial design, editorial communications and the cross over to brand, advertising, marketing and creative agency.

He is founder of the successful product consultancy AMP, launching innovative and experimental digital products for a wide range of clients including the Home Retail Group (Habitat / Argos), Edition Hotels, Storythings Agency, The Institute of Physics and The Economist Group.

He speaks and writes as a design leader for international conferences, agencies, publishers, incubators and investors in the UK, US and Europe. 

You can find out more information about his work history here, but here are his most recent roles in more detail:

Design / Product Lead
Bits (London)

  • Leading Product and Design from concept to execution

  • Building remote workflows and collaborative environments

  • Concept, vision and fundraising narratives

  • Full-stack product from existing iterating architectures to new-concept in-market MVPs

  • Scaleable UX and UI frameworks with fully-fleshed design architectures

  • Productizing AI (Claude, GPT, Grok) into existing traditional finance environments

  • Cross-coordination between business and technology

  • User research and feedback loop generation

  • Aligning with internal risk models, regulated finance guidelines and legal / financial frameworks

  • Development and concept of highly technical quantitive / qualitative data features

  • Y-Combinator backed, Mastercard partnered 2020

  • 70% IC / 30% Leadership

CPO
Quota / huumans (Canada)

  • Leading Product and Design from concept to execution

  • Building business models, flows, processes and KPIs

  • Concept, vision and fundraising

  • Full-stack product from MVP in-test to active acquisition and iteration

  • Scaleable UX and UI frameworks

  • Development coordination, timelines and multi-quarter roadmaps

  • Cross-coordination between business and technology management

  • User research and feedback loop generation

  • Investor-level communication and coordination

  • Development and concept of highly technical quantitive / qualitative data features

  • Seed through Bridge

  • 70% IC / 30% Leadership

VP Design
Verve (London / Toronto / Las Vegas / Los Angeles)

  • Leading and representing Design across Product and Marketing globally

  • Oversaw the merger and acquisition of multiple companies and their integration

  • Built a Marketing Design and Creative team from scratch between London and Los Angeles

  • Oversaw the scaling of Product Design into a global stakeholder environment

  • Instituted Design frameworks and asynchronous workflows into Product, Engineering and Marketing

  • Instituted new DAM, IP and asset protocols for archival and social usage

  • Instituted briefing process and briefing education across the global org

  • Oversaw creative-led global partnerships - both pitch and execution

  • Scaled Design in an organisation that scaled from 70 to 250 people in under a year

  • Implemented critique and communications across Creative, UX and Video specialisms

  • Aided Series B through C raise

  • 10% IC / 90% Leadership

Design / Product Lead
Citymapper (London / Paris / Hong Kong / Singapore)

  • Led special projects and growth products including Smartbus and Smartride

  • Service Design of systems, policy and technical implementation

  • Full stack Design of Smartbus from Service to Saas to Experiential to Visual to Communications

  • Led CX and UX communications strategy across both Product and Marketing

  • International press and conference speaker

  • Led Design and UX for internal tools teams including ML Mapping Saas and payments

  • Aided Series B through C raise

  • 50% IC / 50% Leadership

VP Design
Sonr Inc (London / New York / San Franciso)

  • Led and represented Design globally

  • Led and represented Product globally

  • Zero to one design and build of ML big data Saas and mobile applications

  • Oversaw partnerships (including Twitter, Reddit and NewsCorp)

  • Led UX testing, CX implementation and strategy

  • Led Design across Front End Development, Back End and API documentation

  • Led Seed to Angel to Series A pitch processes and storytelling

  • Investor liaison including due diligence for investor group

  • Led board and advisory board recruitment

  • 70% IC / 30% Leadership