The Component Incubation & Promotion Pipeline

How does an experimental idea become a canonical design system component? Mature teams use a staged Incubation Pipeline (often modeled after Node.js or TC39 stages):

• Stage 1 (Local / Experimental): A feature squad prototypes the component inside their own product repo, using official design tokens.
• Stage 2 (Candidate / Lab): If other squads request the component, it moves to the design system's @system/lab package. The API is tested in production with early adopters.
• Stage 3 (Promoted / Core): After rigorous accessibility testing, cross-browser validation, and documentation sign-off, the component graduates to the core @system/react package.
• Stage 4 (Deprecated): When an improved pattern emerges, the older component is scheduled for deprecation.