Alain Somphone

Defining Karma’s Digital Soul

A Strategic Visionfor Luxury EV

Karma Automotive designs and builds unique cars — the kind you want to show off to your friends, foes, and first-love.

The Karma owner’s portal open on a laptop beside the companion phone app, both showing a black Karma Revero on a desert road with 189 miles of total range.

00 / Overview

The challenge, the goal, and the role

The Challenge

Digital Transformation for Karma Luxury EV. This project aims to explore how a luxury brand could translate its unique identity and design into a market-differentiating digital ecosystem, and to define Karma Automotive’s digital future.

Goal

Create a strategic vision and product concept to inform and guide leadership.

The Role

UX/UI, Visual Design, Creative & Art Direction

Karma design org chart: VP of Design above a Design Director, who leads two designers — one of them me.

01 / Strategic Vision & Business Alignment

Stakeholder Goals and Competitive Landscape

My process centered on strategic clarity. Each design decision supported Karma’s distinct market position.

A cluster of speech bubbles holding the questions I put to stakeholders: what is the overarching goal, who are the primary users, what does success look like, what are the user’s needs, what problems are they trying to solve, are people aware of Karma as a luxury EV, and what are the key success metrics.

1. Business Alignment: Competing on Brand

I interviewed key stakeholders to understand the core business goal: how could digital become a competitive advantage?

Insight: Karma couldn’t win by out-featuring Tesla or out-spending Mercedes. Our strength and opportunity was to compete on brand feel and exclusivity, creating a high-touch digital experience mass-market luxury brands couldn’t replicate at scale.

2. Competitive Landscape: Finding the “Digital Artisan” Role

I analyzed competitor digital experiences to understand user patterns and identify gaps Karma could fill.

  • Tesla: Set the standard for utility, but its minimalist focus resulted in a sterile luxury experience.
  • Mercedes-Benz: Strong in-car visuals, but its “Mercedes me” app was a fragmented, unreliable afterthought.
  • BMW: Driver-focused, but its digital presence was conservative, lacking emotion.

Insight: Karma had a unique opportunity to be the “Digital Artisan.” Competitors focused on utility, visuals, or driver function, but none offered a cohesive, emotionally resonant digital experience matching the vehicle’s craftsmanship.

Screens from four competitor connected-car apps — BMW i Remote, Mercedes me, Tesla, and Remote S for Tesla — laid out for comparison.

3. Defining “Digital Luxury”: High-End Fashion Insights

To define Karma’s unique digital aesthetic, I looked beyond automotive to high-end fashion, synthesizing research into a mood board.

Insight: Digital luxury involves Effortless Elegance, Curated Storytelling, and an Impeccable Sense of Craft. Every interaction had to feel intentionally designed and exclusive, like a bespoke garment.

Mood board of luxury watch and jewellery sites — Vacheron Constantin, Audemars Piguet, Panerai, A. Lange & Söhne, Prada, Chanel, Versace — collected for their restraint and their storytelling.
Second mood board pairing minimal app interfaces with high-end fashion photography: street style, handbags, a Tiffany gift box.

The North Star

The “Digital Concierge” Concept

My research and design principles converged on one core concept: the Karma app should feel like a personal digital concierge. It’s a high-touch service that anticipates needs and enhances the owner’s lifestyle, not just a remote control.

I created “The Connoisseur” persona, valuing artistry and unique experiences. A storyboard outlined their ideal journey, showing how the “Digital Concierge” would:

  • Prepare the vehicle for a scenic drive, suggesting curated playlists.
  • Provide access to exclusive Karma events and partnerships (e.g., gallery openings, boutique hotels).
  • Give suggestions for the next dining experience via the Michelin Guide and other reservations app.
Storyboard following the Connoisseur through a day with the car: leaving the hotel, a road trip, a detour, a drive-thru stop, finding the car again, and re-charging.

02 / Product Architecture & Ecosystem Design

Information Architecture, Wireframes, and Dashboard Structures

With the strategic vision defined, I translated these concepts into design artifacts.

Information architecture diagram branching from My Karma into Car Controls, Journeys, Experiences, and Profile, with vehicle status, curated drives, Karma events, and account settings hanging off them.

Information Architecture

The IA was simple and shallow, reflecting “Serene Technology” principle. Key functions are accessible within two taps. The structure prioritized lifestyle enhancement (e.g., “Journeys,” “Experiences”) alongside core vehicle controls.

Wireframes

Low-fidelity wireframes focused on heroing the vehicle. I explored compositions presenting the car as sculpture, using generous negative space and a minimalist UI. This supported “Sculptural Minimalism.”

Four low-fidelity phone wireframes: charge overview, trip statistics, charging detail with a charge limit selector, and remote lock and climate controls.
App flow wiring the wireframes together, from splash and login through the dashboard out to trip stats, controls, climate, and vehicle location.
Desktop owner’s portal wireframe beside a navigation study exploring five ways to surface the primary menu.

03 / Precision & Craft

High-Fidelity Execution & Digital Craft

Created a moodboard of different themes I wanted to use to guide the designs. The visual language used backgrounds, elegant serif typography, and accent lighting.

Three named visual themes side by side — Flow, Line, and Diamond Life — each a grid of reference imagery with a short description of its character.
Mobile app concept v1 in a light treatment: charge state at 63 percent, tyre pressures, cabin temperature, and vehicle location.
Mobile app concept v2 in a dark treatment: Karma Concierge login, an energy-flow dashboard, a diagnostics dial at 73 percent, and service scheduling.
Four states of the owner’s dashboard concept, annotated to show the owner’s own Karma, remote temperature adjustment, and an alert for a potential battery fault.

04 / Executive Impact & Reflection

Business Outcomes, Leadership Alignment, and Strategic Takeaways

Outcome & Impact: The strategic vision and prototype were presented to Karma’s leadership team. The project demonstrated a clear path for differentiating Karma in the luxury EV market. Digital design became a core brand component.

The concepts sparked conversations about the role of digital in Karma’s customer journey. They provided a vision to align stakeholders and plan future roadmaps.

Personal Reflection: While this exploratory project was ultimately paused due to a shift in business priorities, it was a pivotal exercise in vision-led design. It strengthened my ability to move beyond screen-level thinking to translate abstract brand values into a compelling, strategic product concept. It taught me the importance of crafting a strong narrative to bring stakeholders on a journey and to illustrate not just what a product could be, but why it matters.