☻ José Esteves

Design & Creative Direction

Works — About

☻ JE — Works — About

CNN Business Arabic

Evolving beyond launch and embracing new challenges

Creative Direction — Design System — Product Design — UI and UX Design

Beyond the MVP

In late 2022, CNN Business Arabic partnered with 10up to launch its platform. By early 2023, the mission had evolved. Adopting a product-first mindset and working closely with the agency, the network set out to transform a traditional editorial site into a dynamic, story-driven experience, one centered on video and podcast content, designed for how audiences consume news today, far beyond the original article-first approach.

I led the design vision and strategic direction, focusing on how these emerging formats could shape the platform and redefining the content layout within a fully responsive, future-ready framework.

Upgrading the design system

During onsite design workshops, the client’s vision became clear: the platform needed to embody the immediacy of a live TV broadcast, featuring real-time stock updates, a scrolling news ticker highlighting top and secondary stories, and a dynamic hero slideshow spotlighting breaking news and priority content. The team was already preparing for major regional events such as COP28 later that year.

Our challenge was to evolve the experience by introducing new components that support these formats and bring a sense of freshness, all while preserving the platform’s existing structure.

Rather than rebuilding from scratch, we focused on upgrading, injecting the rhythm and energy of live news into the site.

Content that scales,blocks that adapt.

Built from day one on a modular content block system, the platform needed to respond to shifting editorial priorities. We revisited the content architecture across the homepage, landing pages, and archives.

To guide this process, we created content maps, low-fidelity wireframes that sparked collaborative dialogue with the editorial team. These maps helped us explore how existing blocks could flexibly accommodate new content types and combine into varied layouts, empowering editors to deliver richer stories with greater control.

This wasn’t about reinventing the system, but refining it, ensuring the platform keeps pace with the newsroom’s evolving rhythm.