Accelerator Marketplace
Bringing partner value into the product in a way users could actually use.
The Accelerator Marketplace was an in-suite model for helping Maximo customers discover and activate partner and IBM-built solution content - things that could solve specific industry or operational needs faster than starting from scratch.
I helped define and shape the experience for a new accelerator marketplace and partner ecosystem in IBM Maximo, turning a loosely defined strategic opportunity into something much more concrete and usable.
The challenge
The starting point was not “build a marketplace.” The real question was how to help customers get to value faster by making relevant solutions easier to find, understand, and adopt.
That meant defining the model itself, not just its interface: what an accelerator actually was, what sort of problems it solved, how users should discover one, and how the experience could feel like a natural part of the suite rather than something bolted on.
My role
I helped frame the discovery, shape the concept model, define the information architecture, and develop the early experience direction through prototyping and validation. A key part of the work was also identifying the right path commercially and technically - including how to lean on existing marketplace infrastructure where sensible, rather than building an entirely separate commerce model from scratch.
This is one of those projects where design had to work at multiple levels at once. Part of it was UX craft. Part of it was product strategy. Part of it was helping the organization decide what exactly it was trying to sell, how that value should be packaged, and how ecosystem participation should work in practice.
What made this hard
The hardest design work sat upstream of the interface, in defining the thing itself and making it viable across product, business, and ecosystem needs.
“Luke is a highly respected leader. Easy to work with, and yet authoritative. His teams output has always been thoughtful and high quality. With his involvement, I was always confident that we would get excellence.”
Tristan O.
Product Leader, Industry and APM Portfolio, IBM Asset Lifecycle Management
Result
The result was a clearer model for surfacing partner value inside the product, a more reusable pattern for future platform work, and a better route for customers to discover and adopt targeted solutions. It also helped reduce design effort later because the right shared patterns were put in place early rather than reinvented product by product.
Selected outcomes
Helped influence a multi-million-dollar acquisition decision
Helped drive creation of a dedicated accelerators team
Contributed to a reusable model later extended across products
Supported onboarding of partner content into the suite
