UX/UI design agency in Bordeaux since 2013
We've been in the Bordeaux metropolitan area since 2013, first in Talence, now in Bègles, with a second office in Lyon. Our job is UX research and UX, UI and service design, and that's quite enough already!
Near you, that has given us the City of Bordeaux portal, the M-ticket in the TBM app, the new graphic identity of the Université de Bordeaux website and quite a few other projects for all kinds of players in the metropolitan area: very small businesses and SMEs, startups, large groups...
When clients call on us
The projects entrusted to us around Bordeaux come from local authorities, SMEs, startups and large companies.
- Bordeaux.fr was about twenty years old when the City asked us to rethink it. We reworked the content architecture and the site structure from the ground up, then built the main templates and the journeys. For Urbasmart, which is preparing Bordeaux Métropole to process planning applications online, we went out to meet the roles concerned: 10 organisations visited, 35 individual interviews, 97 recommendations.
- Les Ateliers Duphil have been carpenters and joiners in Bordeaux for more than 100 years. We modernised their logo and visual identity, and designed their website around this new identity.
- Kocliko, a young startup that optimises the energy management of buildings, asked us for full UX and UI support on its interfaces, for professionals and tenants alike. For Sisterhome, it was a design sprint format that helped move their product forward. For Mytwiga, which helped parents prepare their teens for digital life, we rethought the app's visual identity and information architecture.
- At Cultura, among other things, we met 47 customers in four stores, including the Bègles and Mérignac stores, to build their personas. For Keolis Bordeaux Métropole, we designed the M-ticket in the TBM app, from the purchase journey through to its integration, across 64 screens. Among others, we've also worked with Thales, Cdiscount, Lectra and Floa Bank.
Why an agency close to you
We know how to run a project remotely. But being in Bègles means we can run workshops in person, and see and talk to each other somewhere other than on a video call that ends when everyone clicks "Leave". A bit of informality helps people speak openly and defuse misunderstandings, which are often unavoidable at a distance.
We're listed in the French Tech Bordeaux directory, and we designed the French Tech Central web platform for them. And the team has taught courses at ENSC Bordeaux INP, the Université de Bordeaux, Arts et Métiers, Digital Campus and Ynov.
How we organise things with you
We meet in person when it's useful
When you're in the metropolitan area, we can come to you for the project kick-off, co-design workshops, presentations of findings, sign-offs or field observation, and at other points whenever it's relevant, though not every time.
We meet your users where they are
Depending on what the project needs, interviews and tests take place remotely, in the field, at our offices in Bègles or at yours. For the Doyen Brus green space, we observed users on site and surveyed them with a questionnaire, to understand what they experience there by day and by night. We used a similar approach to investigate how people feel the heat, in a period that confronts us with it more and more.
One specialist per step, and three PhDs on the team
Understanding a need, translating it into journeys and wireframes, then giving it its graphic form: these are three disciplines, and with us each one goes to a specialist. The team also includes three PhDs in cognitive engineering. You entrust us with one step or the whole chain, and either you keep the steering or we take it on. It depends on what you need.
The City of Bordeaux came to see us every week
For the Bordeaux.fr redesign, the City's project team came to Bègles one day a week. Those days were used for direct discussions, quick iterations and design workshops organised as needed. That meant several topics were always moving forward in parallel: wireframes and art direction, desktop and mobile, institutional and informational content. The portal achieves 95% RGAA compliance and an RGESN score of 86%.
Read the Bordeaux.fr case studyOther projects in the metropolitan area
Urbasmart prepares a whole metropolis to process permits online
Read the case study
Université de Bordeaux: a serif for culture, a sans-serif for the screen
Read the case studyClient testimonials
Always very good experiences with the Akiani team. Human-factors professionals who are themselves human! Responsive, creative and full of good advice, able to adapt to any kind of project.
The Akiani team was very responsive and adaptable in meeting our needs. A real spirit of knowledge transfer and tool sharing.
Frequently asked questions
No. We're in Bordeaux and Lyon, and our clients are all over France, like Arcom or the Défenseur des droits in Paris, Safran Helicopter Engines in Tarnos, Tytl in London. With clients further away, we generally work remotely.
This is where we position ourselves, on four questions. Is design the core business, or one offering among others? Who leads the research, the UX and the UI: one specialist per step, or the same person? Does the agency work in a wide range of fields? And does it take charge of part of your project, or place people with you on a contract-staffing basis?
No. We deliver mockups ready to be integrated, with a design kit or a design system, and we involve your developers or your contractor as soon as the drafts touch on functionality that concerns them. If you don't have a technical team yet, we can recommend developers we're used to working with.
Yes, for a digital product (an app, business software, an online service), like the M-ticket in the TBM app or Tytl's tool. For a physical object, we're not the right agency. We also do service design.
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