The challenge

One in three California teenagers had experienced serious psychological distress after COVID, while two thirds of children with depression received no treatment. The state screened more than 450 vendors for a free service that every resident aged 13 to 25 could reach from a phone. Kooth brought twenty years of clinical evidence from the UK but had no US product. It had nine weeks to prove that its model could work for young Californians.

My contribution

I served as de facto head of product across roughly 50 people at Kooth, IDEO, Blackbird, and contract developers. Working day to day with Kooth’s chief product and research officer and executive team, I translated the clinical model, state requirements, and youth research into one product strategy, roadmap, and operating rhythm. That shared structure let engineering grow from one to six squads without losing the clinical and user evidence behind the product.

• My accountability was reach: how many of the six million eligible young people would sign up, find help, and return.
• I also led the nine-week pilot that produced the clinical proof used to win the statewide contract.
• Sequenced the roadmap content-first so Soluna could serve millions before a statewide coaching workforce existed, then added live support as capacity grew.
• Pushed to build coaching inside Soluna instead of sending users to a separate UK platform, and designed both sides of the service: the youth experience and the clinical record coaches use.
• Shipped a recommendation engine tied to Soluna’s theory of change, plus AI-assisted risk flagging and clinical decision support for coaches.
• Recommended sign-up with a birth date, zip code, and email, removing insurance and parental consent as access barriers.
• Established a co-design council of young Californians and a clinical oversight group, then ran fourteen research rounds over seven months. Young people chose the night-friendly palette and the constellation structure.
• Set the testing framework and product roadmap that let engineering grow the platform from self-guided tools to text, live sessions, and video support.

The impact

A young person who needs help at eleven at night can open Soluna and reach a coach in under five minutes. Half of users say it is the first mental health support they have received, and 82–86% report feeling less alone.

More than 156,000 young people have enrolled, including 57% from under-resourced communities. Coaching expanded from text to live sessions and video. The research approach contributed to later studies in Frontiers in Psychiatry and JMIR Formative Research, giving the product a public evidence trail alongside its statewide reach.