Cities have users. We call them citizens.
They have features. We call them public services.
They have friction. We call it bureaucracy.
They have churn. We call it migration.
They have NPS. We call it elections.
But nobody manages them as products.
Nobody owns the experience.
That is the biggest bug that exists.
I started at Waze.
That's where I first understood that a city can have users. That traffic isn't an infrastructure problem — it's a design problem.
From there: telco, government healthtech, global fiscal compliance, international digital trust services, and CivicTech.
Different industries. Same pattern.
The citizen was the user. The city was the product. And nobody was managing it as one.
No real metrics. No experience ownership. Just bureaucracy disguised as management.
Today I run GomiGuide, an Urban Discovery Platform in Quito, and work on crypto infrastructure with Tether Group. But the question remains the same:
Why do we manage so poorly the product we all live in?
17 years. Eight industries. One conclusion:
Cities need CX, strategy, and product methodology. Not more bureaucracy.
That is Cities as a Product.
I'm Xavier Flores. Product Executive, Ecuadorian founder, and the guy who can't walk through a city without seeing its bugs.
If you've spent years in product and feel your judgment is worth more than what you're being paid —
you're probably right.
I work with product managers and leaders who want to execute better, move into senior leadership, or build something of their own.
This is called The Product Game.