A student team addresses online retail problem at Shopee Challenge
March 18, 2021
Team PuiPui emerged as second runner-up (Student Category) in the Shopee Product and Design Challenge 2021.
Team PuiPui, comprising an interdisciplinary team of students, emerged as second runner-up at the inaugural Shopee Product and Design Challenge 2021 held from 3 December 2020 to 16 January 2021, with NUS Faculty of Science as an official partner. Team PuiPui was one of over 700 participating teams, who clinched the Student category prize in the finals.
They devised a solution to a perennial problem of online apparel purchases – with no fitting rooms on e-commerce platforms, online shoppers often face inconsistent sizing for clothes from different suppliers. After extensive preliminary research, the team presented its problem statement: a UI/UX feature that utilises the mobile phone camera to accurately gauge shopers’ measurements, enabling the consumer to find the right size of apparel in the latest Shopee sale.
Team PuiPui comprised of GUAN Wei (Pharmaceutical Science), TAN Jia Siang Cliff (School of Business and the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences), LOOI Kai Wen (School of Computing and Faculty of Engineering) and TAN Qiuyi Charmaine (School of Business).

From left, Cliff, Kai Wen, Guan Wei and Charmaine.
Guan Wei leveraged research methodologies from his pharmaceutical science studies to review market intelligence, which he then simplified for the competition. Charmaine and Cliff interviewed consumers, managed project timelines and contextualised the problem statement. With his coding skills, Kai Wen developed the solution using UI/UX principles and paradigms.
Guan Wei said that, “We were pitted against formidable teams, but we learnt from our opponents, which drove us to raise the bar for ourselves.”
Team PuiPui found Shopee’s UI/UX workshop very useful in imparting skills and knowledge on product management and application of UI/UX features. Participants were encouraged to adopt a data- and evidence-based approach to UI/UX feature development.
The competition, targeting talented product & design professionals and students, seeks their ideas to create useful features and functionalities for the Shopee app.