Michael Chiu
See the work

If it feels good,let’s build it.

Product · Design · Engineering

Michael Chiu

Product Lead, Design Engineer

  • HKG
  • LDN
  • TOR

I'm a product lead and design engineer at Viggle AI. I lead a small team, help decide what's worth building, and design and code alongside them. Previously, I worked on Candy Crush and Hungry Shark, games played by over 200 million people every month.

Work: 8 case studies

About

Born and raised in Hong Kong, I spent eleven years in London before moving to Toronto. I studied philosophy before getting into games, where I spent seven years building experiences that make people want to keep coming back.

In my free time, I build things I wish existed. Some solve a practical problem; others are an excuse to follow my curiosity. I also love analogue photography and finding somewhere good to eat.

Download PDF ↗

Michael Chiu

Product Lead

Design Engineer

michaelchiu.iomichaelchiu9@gmail.comToronto, Canada · London, UK

Designing and building AI products, after seven years on Candy Crush and Hungry Shark, two franchises with over 4 billion downloads.

PDF ↗

Viggle AI

a16z

Sep 2026 – Now

Product Lead, Apps · Design Engineer

Promoted to Product Lead after one month

  • Lead a team of 4 across engineering, design and marketing, owning iOS and Android product and growth, shipping weekly.
  • Leading the app overhaul: a sprawl of AI tools merged into one SwiftUI Create flow and credit system, built for fast first generations and repeat use.
  • Built two products solo in code: Viggle Stories (AI characters that chat and star in generated video) and a pipeline that turns a prompt into a playable hypercasual game.

Sago Mini

Spin Master

Mar – Sep 2026

Senior Product Designer, Superfonik & Piknik

  • Redesigned the core loop, meta progression, rewards and first onboarding of Superfonik, a phonics game for ages 2–6.

King

Microsoft, Xbox Game Studios

2023 – 2026

UX Designer, Candy Crush Saga

  • Led UX for Quantum, Candy Crush's first core-mechanic change in 12 years, shipped to 200M+ MAU. Players learned it by playing: sandbox tutorials and progressive hints retrained decade-old habits.
  • Redesigned gameplay onboarding for 1M+ daily new players, lifting D1–D7 retention 5% and early revenue 3%.
  • Designed the AI-assisted authoring platform behind 20,000+ Candy Crush levels, raising designer efficiency 25%.
  • Led King's enterprise AI rollout, taking ChatGPT from pilot to 95% adoption in 60 days.
  • Rebuilt late-game progression into a milestone journey that rewards mastery, growing high-spender revenue 2.5%.

Ubisoft London

2020 – 2023

UX Designer, Hungry Shark World & Primal

  • Designed a modular shop and season pass for rapid live-ops testing, lifting ARPU 18%, conversion 6% and cutting campaign setup time 40%.
  • Solved a retention cliff with an infinitely replayable endgame mode that kept players engaged past core progression.

Shipping solo

Glutty
Billboard-style daily chart of restaurant trends in 5 major cities
Bluehour
Agentic pro-photo editor that pair-edits with you
Rolls
Social camera app with custom-trained film simulation
Shallwed
Agentic wedding-site builder
Dual cursor
Two independent cursors for macOS

Tools

AI
Claude Code, Codex, ComfyUI, n8n, MCP servers, agentic workflows
Code
SwiftUI, React, React Native, Next.js, Three.js, TypeScript, Postgres
Design
Claude Design, Figma, Unity, prototyping, design systems, user research, A/B testing

Education

MA
User Experience Design · University of the Arts London
BA
Philosophy · King's College London
Languages
English, Chinese, Cantonese
1,270 contributions in the past year, on GitHub.

Experience

  • Viggle AI (a16z)

    Product Lead, Apps

    Design Engineer

    Sep 2026–Now

  • Sago Mini (Spin Master)

    Senior Product Designer, Superfonik & Piknik

    Mar–Sep 2026

  • King (Microsoft, Xbox Game Studios)

    UX Designer, Candy Crush Saga

    2023–2026

  • Ubisoft London

    UX Designer, Hungry Shark World & Primal

    2020–2023