Designing a business insights tool with natural language data queries.

Overview

FireflyBI was pioneering a new data processing and business insights platform used by organisations with complex, fragmented data source.

I conceptualised a ‘chat’ interface for non-technical users to ‘talk to data’. We named it Firefly Lumi – a riff on the idea of illuminating data in new ways.

Challenge

Firefly Lumi was conceived before ChatGPT or other chat-based AI tools existed, so there was no good reference in the market to use at the time.

The primary challenge was to find an intuitive approach to querying insights across a complex data set and get simple, understandable insights back which could then be used to build reports or refine.

Solution

• Architected a series a typical request/response playbacks

• Designed a chat-based UI for data interaction with simple ‘ask to start’

• Designed framework for history and ‘pick up where you left off’

• Designed support mechanics for collaboration, integrations, and reporting

Results

• Secure additional funding

• Gain feedback from current clients

• Inform their roadmap for the next year

• Maintain a position of market innovation