Angela Salud Chua

Angela Salud Chua has been designing apps since 2008, starting in Manila, Philippines, back when the App Store was still in its infancy. Her visual design work grew into user experience design at a time when apps were still figuring out how to productize, scale and keep people coming back.

She started out inside her clients’ teams, taking products from first sketch to launch day. That work grew into Toffeenut Design Studio, her independent product design and strategy studio, which she built into an agency, a fractional design partner and an embedded team, depending on what each client needed. In time, the studio shifted and became the design core of DigiValet. Over 20 years, she has worked with brands like Aman, Bvlgari, Wynn Resorts, Samsung, Salesforce, Stanford Medicine, Noteshelf, Tastemade, uHoo and MetroMart, among others, and the work picked up an Apple Editors’ Choice, a CES Innovation Awards honor, and Awwwards and CSSDA recognition, among others, along the way.

Today she is Head of Product Design at DigiValet, the experience platform behind in-room technology at luxury hotels, branded residences, workspaces, senior living and health-tech properties around the world. She runs the product function end to end: strategy, design, and the bar every detail has to clear.

Most of that work is quiet by design, and so is Angela. She’d rather let the products do the talking than be the loudest voice online. Quiet isn’t the same as agreeable, though: in the room, she’s the one asking why, and holding the line when a shortcut would cost the people using the product.

Angela also holds a UX Analyst certification from Human Factors International.