Making complexity understandable through product design as the ex-sole designer at Furucombo who shaped early composable DeFi experiences.

Creating Strategies in DeFi Chaos: Furucombo

Furucombo launched in 2020. It refactored the complex, cross-protocol mechanics of Web3 decentralized finance smart contracts and flash loans into a composable, visual cube system. Users could drag and drop these cubes to piece multiple actions into a single strategy and execute them within a single, atomic transaction.

In the design context of Furucombo, while Web3 decentralized finance back then was immensely powerful, most advanced strategies remained script-based, or users were confined to manually submitting isolated actions protocol by protocol, waiting for on-chain confirmation between each transaction and repeating this time-consuming, exhausting process until all steps were completed. This was simply because interaction models had not evolved alongside the underlying protocols. At first glance, this might seem like a superficial interface problem. The core challenge lay far beyond designing a standard UI layout because it was about defining a scalable abstract concept.

As the sole product designer on the team, my task was to architect a completely new 0-to-1 UX framework. I had to translate the raw logic of financial legos and smart contracts into a modular visual system, integrating it into an architecture where everything could be freely composed and sent in a single click. To support near-infinite strategy combinations, I designed a WYSIWYG-logic dynamic chained design framework and error-guidance visual interception mechanisms, creating a mental model that balances high flexibility with predictability. At the same time, I collaborated closely with engineers to translate this novel interaction model into a highly scalable design system and an intuitive, seamless product experience.

Furucombo showcase by prominent Web3 channel The Defiant

This design unlocked entirely new user behavior patterns. It empowered users without coding knowledge with a brand-new superpower: with a simple drag-and-drop interface, they could stitch together multi-protocol actions (including swap, borrow, liquidity provision, and flash loan from platforms like Uniswap, Compound, and Aave among others) into a single transaction flow just like stacking cubes. This single, atomic transaction workflow architecture broke the existing limitations of the industry, establishing the true framework for strategy composition and formally operationalizing the concept of Composable UX within decentralized finance for the very first time.

As a strategy-driven design product, it shaped early composable decentralized finance experiences, pioneering a completely new track for Web3 aggregators and defining the interaction thinking framework for the space. More importantly, it proved that design can operationalize the visualization of financial Lego's underlying logic, allowing user interactions to seamlessly transition from exhausting, isolated transactions to holistic strategy design.

To date, the platform has driven over $50 billion in transaction volume, demonstrating highly efficient on-chain capital flows. The product secured seed funding in 2021 from Tier-1 VC firms, including Multicoin Capital, Binance Labs, DeFiance Capital, 1kx, SevenX Ventures, BTC12 Capital, and Aave founder Stani Kulechov. Reflecting these design breakthroughs, the team was invited to present these achievements at the EthCC blockchain conferences in both 2022 and 2023.

Highlights

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