Laika is a collaborative enterprise project management tool designed by Ostre as a concept entry for the Vaadin Design Competition. The goal was to envision a modern, scalable, and elegant platform that simplifies team coordination, project tracking, and real-time collaboration — all built using the Vaadin Collaboration Kit. With an emphasis on usability, system clarity, and intelligent automation, Laika reflects how design can drive productivity in enterprise tools.
Year
2023
Client
Laika
Problem
Enterprise project management tools are often bloated, inflexible, or visually overwhelming. Teams struggle with fragmented communication, unclear priorities, and lack of transparency across projects. Many platforms cater either to enterprise IT departments or startup-scale task lists, but few serve the hybrid needs of agile, cross-functional teams within large organizations.
For the competition, we set out to solve this — to rethink project management around collaboration, clarity, and control.
Outcome
Although Laika is a concept project, it demonstrates Ostre’s ability to design high-functioning enterprise-grade tools with a human touch. We created a full UX and UI system optimized for clarity and speed, with features including:
Task creation and live tracking
Real-time team collaboration and chat
AI-powered chatbot suggestions and reporting
Scalable layout logic for both individual contributors and managers
Flexible dark/light modes for accessibility and user preference
Laika was awarded 2nd place out of 125 international submissions in the Vaadin Design Competition — a recognition of both its functional elegance and its forward-thinking approach to enterprise UX.
