About / Neville Ko

A practitioner of design, product management, and business.

Hi, I'm Nev. This isn't a standard (design) portfolio because I've worn many hats through my career from building startups, adding value to PE-backed companies, to running agile processes, (etc.) - none of which are core to design.

The goal is to explain the roles I've played so you can understand where and how I can bring value.

Why? Because careers evolve and job/client interviews are restrictive. I hope this window will let you know me better.

01/ Product Management

Building Products

The strategic "glue": As Head of Product & Experience at Distinct AI, I translate messy, abstract leadership visions into shippable products.
The Corel/Alludo years: 14+ years wearing many "hats" as a product owner, co-SCRUM master, and UX/UI designer, doing whatever it took to "ship" on lean budgets (SAFe and CSPO certified).
Hands-on background: My product management acumen comes from operational survival, startups, and years of experimentation.

02/ UX & UI Design

Designing Products

17+ years of experience: My career spans multi-million dollar, PE portfolios (CorelDRAW, WinZip, PaintShop Pro) to ambitious startups (Distinct AI, À pois).
No single playbook: I bring adaptable techniques (design systems, prototypes, heuristic evaluations) tailored to budget and goals.
Pragmatic approach: As a trained Industrial Designer (BID, MDes) from an engineering school, my focus is on practicality, operational efficiency, and bringing abstractions to market.

03/ AI Builder

Building Conversational AI & Agentic Experiences

Technical experience: My hands-on work includes building agents, skills, augmentations (official n8n creator), privacy-first data routing, and optimizing context windows and memory.
Focus:
- AI Governance for regulated industries (fintech, healthcare, legal).
- Conversational AI grounded in authoritative sources.
- AI products and augmentations that are production-ready.

04/ Business & Ops

Building Businesses & Operations

Early start: My entrepreneurial path began in university, co-founding a modelling agency (CIMA) and expanding into a digital fashion editorial magazine (Substance Magazine).
~20 years of business building: I’ve since operated across diverse ventures ranging from e-commerce clothing rentals (À pois) to AI-powered software (Distinct AI).
Business acumen: I’ve learned to write business plans, understand financial reports, build VC investment decks; all of which have impacted my approach to design and operations.