Beta Acid

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the co-founder and CEO of Io, a fintech startup providing a digital app experience connected to a credit card. We’ve been building our product for about a year, going through two funding rounds, and we’ve already launched a beta version.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Beta Acid?

We hired Beta Acid to help us build our product.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Beta Acid has provided us with React Native development to help us build a consumer-facing iOS app. When they joined, we had already developed a lot of the product’s infrastructure, so their main task was building the frontend UX almost from scratch.

We’ve also built a lot of the finance backend on Go, and although we’ve built most of that part in-house, we’ve also had support from Beta Acid’s team. Additionally, they provide us with overall project management support to keep everything moving forward smoothly.

Our product is built on users' data connections to their existing financial accounts, such as bank accounts, credit cards, mortgage accounts, and investment accounts. We bring together that data through data aggregation integrations. Using and analyzing that data on the backend, we provide users with useful information about their accounts on the frontend, like how much they can spend going forward and how it will impact their savings. We provide that information for free, so we monetize by providing loans when they need them, as well as with guidance regarding those loans.

What is the team composition?

We work with a frontend React Native developer, a backend Go developer, and a project manager who keeps the development cadence and manages the sprints. Additionally, Ryan (CEO) and Nikki (COO) are regularly involved in our check-ins to ensure we’re getting everything we need.

How did you come to work with Beta Acid?

When we were looking for help with our engineering and development needs, we connected with different companies. Some of them were headhunting firms offering pure resource placement, and others, like Beta Acid, looked for resources and offered a subcontracting model. We looked at both models and decided to work with Beta Acid due to their flexibility. We really liked their model because we could go faster or slower as needed without having employee commitments.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent over $100,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in January 2022, and our engagement is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement? 

Our initial engagement revolved around building the product, so our main metrics were building certain functionality within the required timelines. Throughout the engagement, Beta Acid has consistently hit deadlines and met our goals; that’s how we’ve measured the success of their involvement. Now, we’re in the user testing phase, so the metrics for this stage are yet to come. 

How did Beta Acid perform from a project management standpoint?

Beta Acid has excelled at meeting deadlines and staying within budget. We use GitHub and a secondary project management tool to manage the project. Additionally, their team is connected to our Slack channel for regular communication, and we have Zoom meetings to review and share work. We also use email for billing.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Beta Acid doesn’t just want to sell their development services. They’ve taken the time to understand what we’re trying to achieve with our product and the problems it aims to solve. Thanks to this approach, they don’t simply build the functionality required, but they also consider how those features will add up to the UX. Overall, we’re very happy with our engagement, and we will continue to work together for as long as we require.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, not really. If anything, it would be great if they added more resources to their team with knowledge of different backend languages like Go. Still, no development company will be knowledgeable about every programming language.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Beta Acid is ready to go and meet your needs, so ensure that you’re ready, too. Know what you’re trying to need so that you can give them the right direction.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m a product manager at a real estate technology company.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Beta Acid?

We needed their expertise in software development and testing.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Beta Acid helps our in-house development team build a real estate marketplace for our customers. They generate full-stack solutions and assist our engineers in testing and deploying those prior to our product launch.

What is the team composition?

We work with seven resources from Beta Acid, including their product manager, two engineers, two founders, and a key development engineer.

How did you come to work with Beta Acid?

They were a referral.

What is the status of this engagement?’

Our ongoing engagement with Beta Acid started in August 2021.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?

Before engaging Beta Acid, we’ve dealt with staffing issues and haven’t thought we’ll meet our projected timelines. They’ve helped us overcome those challenges by working proactively with our team to hit our roadmap goals.

How did Beta Acid perform from a project management standpoint?

We rely on Jira for project management and communicate via Slack and Google Hangouts. Beta Acid is a team of great communicators and collaborators — I can’t say enough good things about their project management skills.

What did you find most impressive about them?

When other vendors take longer to adapt to their client’s processes and comprehend their infrastructure, Beta Acid works within quick turnaround times to provide us with quality results.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Communicate your project goals as early and clearly as possible.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the senior VP of Le Pain Quotidien and we’re a restaurant company in the US. We have locations in Miami, Philadelphia, and the New York region.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Beta Acid?

We engaged with Beta Acid to help us build our mobile app capabilities.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Beta Acid is developing our entire mobile app offering from scratch. The main feature of this app is food delivery, and users would have the option to have their food delivered, or picked up in any of our locations. In addition, this Native app is compatible with both iOS and Android.

In terms of the documentation, there are components to it that we’re responsible for, and we supply them with a number of information regarding pictures, fonts, and color schemes. Moreover, we work through some of the payment and delivery processes, app store optimization, and the integration of other third-party processing systems.

What is the team composition?

I would say they have at least half a dozen people working on this project.

How did you come to work with Beta Acid?

They initially did some work with one of our sister companies, so we were able to use some of the infrastructures they started there for the development of this app.

How much have you invested with them?

So far, we’ve probably spent somewhere between $75,000–$100,000 USD.

What is the status of this engagement?

The partnership started in November 2020 and it’s still ongoing, as there are still some more phases they’re working on.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?

We’re starting to see a significant rise in our sales and to our Native app, even though we haven’t done a lot of marketing yet. Just this past week we’ve had north of 1,100 unique customers come through the app. 

Beta Acid is instrumental in making sure that the credit card processing and the app are functioning well. The feedback from colleagues has also been very good.

How did Beta Acid perform from a project management standpoint?

They’ve been fantastic. I’m very satisfied with what we’ve been able to do. We use a ton of communication pathways including Slack, email, and phone calls — all of which have been very effective.

What did you find most impressive about them?

For me, what distinguishes them is the quality of their work and their engagement at all levels. They’re very committed to our success, and we’re very impressed with their solution-minded and proactive approach.

Are there any areas they could improve?

I honestly don’t know if there’s anything they could do better. That’s how much I enjoy working with them.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

I recommend identifying and being upfront with the challenges you’re trying to address, and allow Beta Acid the opportunity to provide you with solutions — this is going to enable you to achieve the success you’re looking for.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the founder and CEO of Melt Shop, a restaurant chain.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Beta Acid?

We needed help with improving our digital experience and establishing an online ordering system.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Beta Acid developed a web and mobile app for us. The team went through the discovery phase independently and did some research, which eventually led to a proposal. We gave them a few design guidelines, but the UI/UX design was handled entirely by the Beta Acid team. 

Once they got our approval, they went ahead and developed the apps for us. Both the web app and mobile app allow users to order from our restaurants. The mobile app is available on Android and iOS. They continue to provide support for the apps.

What is the team composition?

We primarily work with Ryan (Principal), who manages the project. We’ve also worked with a few UI/UX designers and app developers.

How did you come to work with Beta Acid?

One of our partner restaurants was already working with them, so we thought they would be a good fit.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent $500,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

The project started in June 2020 and is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement? 

Beta Acid is a great team. They’ve created good-looking apps that represent our brand well. Furthermore, it’s very easy to navigate. We’ve definitely acquired new customers and retained more existing customers.

How did Beta Acid perform from a project management standpoint?

Their project management is fantastic. Our communication is mainly through Zoom.

What did you find most impressive about them?

The team has created a flawless UX design. We’ve built a solid relationship with them.

Are there any areas they could improve?

They overlooked some elements during the development process.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Be transparent and communicate well. Make sure your requirements are clear.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am a co-founder and Principal at Service Physics - a strategy, management, and Operations consulting company based in NYC

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Beta Acid, and what were your goals?

We needed to bring our operations consulting practice to life with a custom native app. We had many tools built with excel, etc, that were clunky and did not give a great brand experience to our clients. We are working with Beta Acid on a roadmap to build these tools into our custom native app that will help us build our community of practice and overall brand awareness

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor and what were the deciding factors?

I selected Beta Acid based on previous experience working with them. I knew they would deliver 1st time quality and work with us on the roadmap to fit our budget

Describe the scope of work in detail, including the project steps, key deliverables, and technologies used.

We had excel data collection tools that we wanted to package in a user friendly mobile app that could be used on-site in client operations. We worked with Beta Acid to scope the effort and cost and create a roadmap for our apps on react native/node.js. Project steps were to scope/budget, dial in roadmap, define detailed requirements, design and dev.

How many resources from the vendor's team worked with you, and what were their positions?

We worked with 6 folks, a principal architect, 2 UX/UI designers, and back-end and front-end engineer + a project manager who shepherded us along the way and kept us on schedule and within budget

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Can you share any measurable outcomes of the project or general feedback about the deliverables?

We launched the first version of our app within a month. It was amazing how little feedback we needed to give the team on the designs and how perfectly it worked with the first launch. Since then we've been able to incrementally add features and polish the design as our budget allows.

This app isn't meant to have a huge download base or generate a ton of reviews - it's to give our consulting practice a polished edge with our client engagements - it does exactly that! our clients are always surprised and impressed that we have an app and can make a tedious operational task much easier and even more fun!

Describe their project management style, including communication tools and timeliness.

Project management style is one of their strengths for sure - they communicate just the right amount (i.e A LOT), always come with a plan and agenda, and meetings with the team are super productive, driving decisions in a very collaborative and effective way. Their timeline and budget estimates are usually spot on. I have never worked with an agency with this level of capability on both the technical and client services sides.

What did you find most impressive or unique about this company?

Impressive and unique is the level of partnership in product design and the quality delivered. They understood our needs (and budget), suggested/recommended improvement ideas to make it even better for users, and immediately delivered against them. We didn't have to go iteration after iteration to get to the result we had envisioned - it just came together perfectly and the v1 app was flawless. That never happens.

Are there any areas for improvement or something they could have done differently?

The are not the cheapest, but you get what you pay for! In other words, you could spend less money, but waste your time bashing your head against a wall of technical folks who don't understand your business and users. Or you could work with Beta Acid and it all just comes together quickly with first time quality.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the co-founder and CEO of Sesame. We’re a digital food and beverage delivery marketplace for the restaurant industry.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Beta Acid?

We were looking for an outsourced development company to build and manage our entire backend engineering requirements as well as other development deliverables that we had.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Beta Acid started with getting involved with our business validation. Then, they assisted us in creating our development strategy. After that, they’ve built our entire data model and our integrations. Following that, they’ve built the API that we’re using to connect our frontend product. They’re also fully involved in a collaborative fashion with other agencies we work with as well as our internal team.

As an example, we’ve partnered with another agency to build our wireframes and prototypes, and Beta Acid has been very involved in that process. They’ve ensured that the other agency’s ideas are feasible. Along with that, we’ve provided a lot of foundational documentation that has allowed them to see what we want to accomplish. Their tech stack includes NodeJS, GraphQL, ReactJS, and React Native.

They also do a lot of custom work such as working with off-the-shelf products like Clubhouse and Entercom. They also manage customer support and chatbot integrations with Google and Instagram. The team’s recent work involves building a web app that can generate orders. The orders on the app go through APIs and a middleware integrator before being transferred to a restaurant’s POS system. They’ve been building that structure for months, and they’re currently testing it.

What is the team composition?

We’re working with 7–8 people from Beta Acid including Ryan (Principal), a project manager, backend engineer, integration specialist, and full-stack engineers.

How did you come to work with Beta Acid?

We had an RFP process and many development shops bid during the process. During that time, Beta Acid was referred by a friend who had already worked with them. In the end, Beta Acid won.

What is the status of this engagement?

Our ongoing partnership began in August 2020.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement? 

We’ve had a very successful test run with the web app that Beta Acid has built. Before our testing efforts, they’ve told me that there are a lot of moving parts so we might need to wait for weeks to get things right. Despite the project being complicated, our testing efforts have proven the team’s capabilities.

Thanks to their solutions-oriented approach, we’ve successfully solved the hurdles we’ve faced along the way. We also like that they’re always open and willing to explore anything. More importantly, they’ll run through brick walls to make things happen.

How did Beta Acid perform from a project management standpoint?

They have an excellent project management process. We use Slack, Zoom, email, and Clubhouse to communicate, and we have weekly meetings and constant check-ins.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They act more like an internal agency than an outsourced development shop. They’re also not crazy about their working hours. On top of that, we feel that they’re invested in our project, and they act like owners when they're building our requirements.

They’re reasonably priced, and the quality of their work is high. If we’re going to hire another reputable agency, we’d be required to pay them 30%–50% more than what we pay Beta Acid.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, I can’t think of anything because they’ve been phenomenal.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

They’re very cool people. They’re also real and honest when problems come up. Above all, they ensure that they take care of things that you need.