from bottleneck to platform
Foodics is a Saudi restaurant platform across MENA — POS, back-of-house, and tens of thousands of merchants.
POS was commoditizing. Foodics needed online ordering, payments, loyalty, and ops without losing merchant simplicity.
Phoenux embedded as Foodics' design department — aligned pods, shipped a shared system, and turned design from bottleneck into growth engine.
vision
scale without sameness Foodics needed white-label online ordering that still feels brand-native. Merchants control branding, menus, and layouts; diners get fast flows across apps and kiosks — one MENA system without sameness.
challenge
high stakes Design became the bottleneck: scattered teams, inconsistent UI, rigid templates, soft conversion, and interchangeable restaurant apps.
Foodics needed a design function that could keep pace with product, sales, and category leadership.
the solution
for the merchants Phoenux embedded across product pods and owned the Online Pod — apps, kiosks, merchant config, and fulfillment. We stabilized delivery with a shared component system, clear ownership, and weekly product syncs.
Research grounded every decision: funnel analytics, MENA competitor teardowns, and local preference studies — familiar to Middle Eastern diners, not imported patterns.
With the foundation set, we moved from fixed templates to configurable widgets and redesigned ordering for speed and conversion.
Product & Design
Modularity was the unlock. Every section became a configurable widget — order-type switchers, listings, carts, promos — so a coffee shop and QSR chain share one system but look distinct.
We redesigned core diner journeys for speed: stronger hierarchy, contextual upsells, clearer carts and combo edits, kiosk AI for returning guests, and tiered loyalty that motivates repeats without cluttering checkout.
Maze usability tests validated flows before rollout — faster ordering, smoother customization, and stronger checkout confidence.
Merchant Control
We designed the merchant portal where restaurants configure apps, kiosks, menus, pricing, calories, and branding. Every app element mapped to portal controls with live preview — non-technical managers stay off support tickets.
The same system extended across Cashier, Waiter, Pay, and Banking — consistent design language, purpose-built surfaces.
Design Operations
Phoenux ran design as a self-sustaining function — three designers across pods growing to five. One weekly product sync; ideas moved to interface without handoff noise.
High-fidelity prototypes helped win enterprise deals — proving customization, scale, and brand control — while Arabic-first UX with full RTL kept the product native to MENA.
Widgets merchants mix and match — same system, distinct restaurant identities.
Clearer discovery, carts, and checkout with contextual upsells before pay.
Live preview of branding, menus, and layouts without support tickets.
Maze tests confirmed faster ordering and stronger checkout confidence.
AI recommendations for returning guests that never slow the line.
High-fidelity prototypes that helped close regional brand deals.
95%
Market share across core MENA restaurant segment
30%
Increase in average basket size
2×
Faster design-to-development after system rollout
3×
Faster prototype delivery for sales demos
outcome
Foodics' online stack gave merchants modular branding and faster ordering at 95% MENA share. App, kiosk, and portal finally ran as one system.
