Finout case study
Go to desktop to view this case study
The case study uses detailed product visuals designed for a larger screen.
Back to portfolioFinout · 2022 to 2023
Turning cloud cost chaos into one clear picture
A cloud cost management platform that helps FinOps, engineering and finance understand spend from the same source of truth.
- Role
- Focus
- Product design, UX research, visual design
- Design scope
- Core product workflowsCustomer and stakeholder researchProduct marketing and visual assetsEarly design-system foundations and Storybook implementation
Research and framing
The problem was not a lack of data. It was the work required to understand it.
Teams moved between provider dashboards, exports and spreadsheets before they could answer a basic cost question.
I mapped that fragmented workflow and connected it to four recurring needs: visibility, alignment, efficiency and accuracy. That reframed the opportunity from another dashboard into one investigation model, with two connected jobs: understand the spend, then establish who owns it.
Fragmented visibility
Manual reconciliation
Investigation was complex and slow
No clear cost ownership
MegaBill
One bill for every cloud, service and team
A useful overview had to preserve the path into the details without flattening every provider into a generic dashboard.
I designed MegaBill as the first half of that model: one cross-provider starting point with flexible grouping and a consistent route from total spend to the resource behind a change.
Group cloud spend and drill from the total cost to the resources behind it.
Select a highlighted row to open the next configured dimension.
| Service | Total | Previous period | Change | Percentage |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| AWS Services | $72,800 | $70,200 | ▲ 3.7% | 77% |
| Google Cloud Services | $14,600 | $15,100 | ▼ 3.3% | 15% |
| Kubernetes | $4,700 | $4,300 | ▲ 9.3% | 5% |
| Snowflake | $2,700 | $2,500 | ▲ 8.0% | 3% |
Virtual Tags
Turning untagged cost into accountable spend
MegaBill made spend visible, but incomplete provider metadata still prevented teams from understanding ownership.
My work on Virtual Tags began by turning existing metadata into business dimensions such as product, environment and owner. I shaped an ordered rule model for matched and unmatched costs, then extended it through Split Cost so shared costs could be distributed without making the allocation harder to understand or validate.
Create virtual tag
Set tag rules
Rules are evaluated from top to bottom.
Set default value
Write down free text or choose from a list.
What the system enables
One path from fragmented cost data to accountable spend
FinOps, engineering and finance could begin with the same cross-provider view instead of reconciling separate dashboards and exports.
Grouping, breadcrumbs and contextual details preserved the path from a change in spend to the resource behind it.
Virtual Tags let FinOps teams convert existing metadata into business context and define what should happen when that context was missing.
Reflection
Clarity came from preserving the path through the data
Cloud cost data became useful when people could understand how a number was constructed and who was responsible for it.
Across both workflows, I used progressive disclosure as the organizing principle: begin with one clear picture, preserve context through every level, then turn what people discovered into accountable action.