A Journey with a Genius

15 years ago, I left my first corporate job. It had been exhausting but it gave me the momentum to consider a new life while staying in Japan. I knew I needed a radical shift, though I couldn’t yet define it. What I did know was that I was obsessed with finding a better way to learn Japanese on iPad. This led me to meet with Oliver Reichenstein.

He looked at my prototype and was brutally honest: “This is crappy. Work for me. You’ll learn. It’ll improve your chances of making something people want.”

Oliver had several projects in motion, but one stood out: iA Writer. The iPad version had just launched and was gaining momentum. Praise poured in, even from high-profile users who felt the app gave them something they hadn’t realized they needed: a better way to write.

Oliver hadn’t just built an app; he’d created a writing experience. Features like Focus Mode, Markdown, and the visible cursor have since been widely copied. The macOS version was originally planned first, but with the iPad buzz, Oliver pivoted. It was the right move.

When I joined, I thought I was too late. But Oliver showed me the next phase: a more ambitious Mac version. He had mockups and a strong layout vision but they weren’t developer-ready. My job was to go from 0 to 1: break everything down and make it buildable. The plan was 3 months. It took 8. No investors. No loans. Just the company's cash flow.

Delays came from many directions. First, Oliver’s obsession with quality. He had a rare instinct for when something was ready. We trashed countless prototypes and rebuilt the app from scratch more than once.

Then came the Fukushima disaster. Just before we were to preview the app at SXSW 2011, the earthquake hit. The team evacuated. Everything paused. We had to regroup while still pushing out iPad updates, handling client work, and building the Mac release.

Technically, iA Writer wasn’t a typical word processor. It was a total rethink. The early codebase was clever but unstable. We had to fix basic but critical bugs like disappearing text or keystrokes not registering.

The delay gave us time to perfect two things: a tight 1-minute promo video that told a story, and a bold price point. While most apps were free or 99 cents, Oliver priced iA Writer at $20. A risk but it worked.

When we submitted to the App Store, we were exhausted. Then it happened: live Twitter reactions. What people loved, hated, or found surprising. I stayed up all night, wired, watching it unfold like mission control during Apollo 13.

After launch, Oliver gave the team a compliment: “Perfect launch.” To me: “Marc-Alexandre Cartiant… aka Oliver Reichenstein.” But we both knew there could only be one Oliver at iA and that was him.

That marked the end of my short but intense journey with a genius.

Now in 2025, iA Writer is a finalist for a major Apple Design Award. Well deserved: https://ia.net/topics/apple-design-award-2025