Akhter Studios

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am a digital specialist at the Evrone IT company.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Akhter Studios, and what were your goals?

It was necessary to create a web application for our IT consulting partners from scratch. Akhter Studios helped to create a roadmap, reinvent the brand (story and logo), and set up a great design and development process. We never needed to turn to other experts, and we were always advised professionally.

SOLUTION

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

We received about 5 commercial offers and in the end, we considered it the most favorable condition to trust Akhter Studios.

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

Detailed adaptation workshops: common understanding, roadmap Brand idea: new brand idea, logo, logo animation, brand design Design Sprints: Mockups Dev sprints: DevOps, Backend development, Frontend development Technologies - Python (Django), React (JS), AWS, Figma, Jira, Slack.

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

The team consisted of:

• 1 Project Manager
• 1 UX/UI designer
• 1 graphic designer
• 1 Lead developer (Full stack)
• 1 Developer (Full stack)

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

A well-designed prototype allowed us to test it on users. This allowed us to test hypotheses, and functional and business requirements, after which the product was completed.

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

Akhter Studios is very professional with a lot of useful tools that they have also incorporated into our workflow. Also, I want to note the work of their project manager, who promptly answered all questions and was in touch almost at any time of the day.

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

Their individual product approach, as well as well-structured processes of interaction and development during the entire life cycle of the project. The use of flexible project management methods greatly simplified our joint work.

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

No, nothing to add

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

Electronic Mushroom provides technologies and solutions in the entertainment industry. The main professional areas of activity are online and offline special projects, IT development, video production and design, Influence Management, gaming and cybersport.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Akhter Studios?

We are working with significant amounts of data to control projects, analyze company operations and perform financial planning. Building a stable system of data exchange and transformation requires a large set of tools that should simplify and speed up operational activities. To create some of these tools, we have called on specialists from Akhter Studios.

SOLUTION

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

We have been worked together on the project several years ago, and after finding out more about provided services, we decided to cooperate.

Describe the project in detail and walk through their service package.

• Forming an automated system of project data and indicators transformation in Google, Zapier and Podio systems, creating an interactive reporting system built on dynamic data. Data visualization.
• Using SQL and n8n technologies.
• Building a stable, scalable system of data exchange and transformations between databases.

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

• DevOps Middle Developer
• Backend Middle Developer
• Backend Senior Developer
• Product Manager

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Can you share any outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

The system has made it possible to reduce the workload of employees involved in operational activities on projects and move them to strategic tasks. The system has significantly reduced the volume of errors.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

Communication took place in Telegram with the project manager, the answers were in time, there was no problems with misunderstandings.

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

The speed of completion and comprehension of the task were impressive.

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

There are no areas for improvement within this project.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am a delivery manager at Mad Devs. We are a software development company that builds complex projects and focuses on long term engagement with our clients

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Akhter Studios?

We needed to empower our current team of developers that worked on the educational platform for the Vietnamese market. One extra developer was needed to speed up the development process and help build expertise in the sphere.

SOLUTION

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

We knew the company owner from the previous projects. After the contact, we explored the possibility to collaborate and described the project. Luckily for us, the studio has its own educational project and they had a free developer whom we interviewed and hired to empower our team

Describe the project in detail and walk through the stages of the project.

Akhter provided us with 1 python backend developer who was responsible to cover and implement several backend features together with 2 additional backend developers from our side. The first stage included a discovery phase with extensive research about the future platform and then the team started to build the project, setting up the working environment and implementing features.

Describe the recruitment process in detail.

We started the process of interviews with only one developer who was available at that time. During the interview, we were introduced to Azamat, who explained to us his previous experience, university awards, and his current achievements. He demonstrated good soft skills as well as very good knowledge of the sphere of the project. So, we decided to continue working with him.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Can you share any outcomes from the engagement that demonstrate progress or success?

With Azamat's support we were able to increase the speed of the project development and instead of 4-5 months were able to complete a project MVP in 3 months. Azamat helped the team to better understand the platform and integrated payment gateways. Also, he managed to properly document his work so that the next team members were properly and easily onboarded to the project.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

Even though the work was done remotely, Azamat managed to communicate well. He maintained hardworking even during political instability in the country. Azamat's communication was always clear, he is very good at self-management and inspired our team to develop their soft skills better. After his leave, the team continues to remember him as a good team player and calls those days as being in the Dream Team.

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

They provided a highly qualified person that fit our needs. A company that is very easy to communicate with. We had some negotiations about the terms of work and we managed those negotiations well.

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

I feel that the company has great developers and many good projects to work on, so all of their developers are in great demand. Sometimes I felt that they work non-stop. This usually leads to developers' burn out and we definitely do not want that. I would appreciate if they could hire more great developers to split the work.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

Our company décript specializes in analysis, development and improvement of blockchain management mechanisms.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Akhter Studio, and what were your goals?

Our company collaborated with Akhter Studio on the development of a project for a mobile version of our product ataix.com using Flutter technology. The goal was to create a professional designed website ATAIX based on flutter for android and IOS operating systems.

SOLUTION

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

We decided to collaborate with Akhter Studio based on partner recommendations.

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

Our collaboration involved 2 stages of app development:

1. creation and design of ATAIX full version based on Flutter, provided by us;
2. creation of a new functionality for ATAIX Portfolio and ATAIX Pay Alert according to our business logic.

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

At various stages of development, we collaborated with a total of 5-7 development staff from Akhter Studio, however, the main coordination of the project from the side of Akhter Studio was carried out by one person.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Our company is very please with the collaboration with Akhter Studio. Their contribution to the development of a ATAIX mobile application is very valuable to us and will serve as a basis for further improvements.

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

Akhter Studios definitely works in the style of Agile adaptive management, were and continue to be quite flexible in collaboration. To organize communication within the framework of this project, Akhter Studio created the most lightweight form of communication, by adding interested parties from our side and their side to a group chat in WatsApp, and also Akhter Studio introduced new opportunities for feedback on Google Docs, tracked the time interval of work and responded to our requests in the shortest possible time.

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

Structural application development using Flutter. In general, everything was made at a very professional level of programming.

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

All in all, we look forward to collaborate with Akhter Studio because we greatly appreciate their investment and full involvement in the development of our product. Our improvement idea is that they should pay more attention to the details of the final product.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

My name is Yerzhan Besembaev, I am a Project Manager of PowerMob at Beeline Kazakhstan.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Akhter Studio, and what were your goals?

Our company, Beeline Kazakhstan, have offered to Akhter Studio the cooperation in the developement of the mobile application - BeePower. Our collective goal was to develop a cross-platform and user-friendly mobile application.

SOLUTION

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

We have chosed Akhter Studio based on the following factors: - All specialists are available for project development - Responsible approach to work - Good reviews in the market - They have experience in developing projects for large companies

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

In this project, we went through three process stages with the Akhter Studio team, they are: planning, development and testing (QA) . In the planning stage, we have discussed all the tasks from the backlog, estimated the total number of sprints and how we will distribute the load.

Later on, we started to implement the ideas of the designers. The development stage is consisted of sprints, each of which lasted for 2 weeks. At the beginning of the sprint, each team member were assigned to the tasks in the scope of the current sprint and they were asked to report the solution of each task on the basis of daily meetings.

The last stage of the development was QA testing of the mobile application, where all possible bugs were identified, and then sent to fixing. Using the Flutter SDK gave us a lot of advantages: high speed of the development process, quick integration with all services, cost savings in terms of cross-platform development.

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

Akhter Studio provided us with 4 specialists. They are 2 flutter developers, a project manager and a QA tester. Each of the team member contributed their effort in the assesement and developement of our product and I am happy and satisfied with the service provided.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The impression about the team is very positive, we are satisfied with the provided service. Taking into account the complexity of the project, the team was able to meet the deadlines and take a responsible approach to all the work.

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

Our communication were handled through these platforms: Notion, Slack, Telegram and Google Meet. We have had reglular weekly meetings with the team in order to follow up with the tasks which have been completed. The overall communication process was smooth and the team could accomplish the project in the scope of the agreed time.

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

I was very impressed with the professionalism and dedication of the team members of Akhter Studio. They could accomplish all tasks within the scope of this project.

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

I was very impressed with the professionalism and dedication to job of the young team members of Akhter Studio. They could accomplish all tasks within the scope of this project.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

Vlad Ponomarenko, the Head of IT department and Product Manager of the transportation and logistics company Spark.kz

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Akhter Studio, and what were your goals?

We wanted to provide our clients with the ability to track the movement of their shipments in a mobile application. We needed to implement an application for Android and iOS in a very short time and for a reasonable price, which we could realize with Akhter Studio.

SOLUTION

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

When choosing a vendor, we made an accent on the budget and the deadline of the project. From all the companies we looked at, only Akhter Studio could give us a good offer.

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

We have handled the backend part and the design of the application along with the QA testing. Akhter Studio was responsible for the frontend side of coding and for the integration of frontend with the backend. The mobile application was written in Flutter.

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

Akhter Studio provided us with these specialists: 1. Mobile Lead 2. Flutter mobile developer 3. Project manager

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We were surprised that the application testing process did not take long time. There were so few bugs that only after 2 iterations of testing, we were able to release the application to the marketplace.

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

Before transferring the tasks to the team, we have had a group call several times to discuss the details. Later, all the communication were handled through the group chat in Telegram platform.

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

Our company launched the application for the first time and our organization made a lot of mistakes. We delayed deadlines, made mistakes in design and delayed the development of the backend code. We were lucky that Akhter Studio was open to cooperation and guided us really well in the design implementation.

We were very impressed with the service and support they gave us. they could understand our situation and patiently waited for us to finish our part of the code and hand over the endpoints.

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

We have not found something that we would like to improve in Akhter Studio.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I'm the CTO of GoodPlace, the first online apart-hotel in Kazakhstan with smart-booking.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Akhter Studio, and what were your goals?

Improvement of the existing product including the development of new features related to smart apartments booking, real estate control, etc. The goals were to fix the previous issues with UX and business logic and adjust it to the changes occurred in the company since 2021.

SOLUTION

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

We had conversations with several teams with experience in Python/Django and Angular frameworks in Almaty. However, we found that Akhter Studio developers had the best prior experience and expertise in those stacks. Their experience with booking platforms functionality was really important for us.

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

First, we had to fix the existing issues with functionality. Then, our request was to create a new functionality with the booking of online hotel apartments. It included significant changes in frontend, backend of the platform. Moreover, we had to adjust the system to the several timezones in Kazakhstan.

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

2 Python/Django developers, 1 Angular developer, Technical support specialist and a project manager.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The deliverables resolved the problems of our customers and allowed us to have more sales for the most profitable apartments.

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

The project management style included work in the Notion task tracker, communication with our stakeholders and me.

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

Their company was able to provide us with the best solution: to write a micro-service that took the whole booking logic and fixed the previous issues we had before.

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

I would like to have more direct access to developers in some questions. However, their team lead (one of the Python guys) had a quick response rate. And probably this is part of the Akhter Studio's policy so it's more the work style.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

EMD Labs Startup House, CEO & Founder

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Akhter Studio?

Back in April 2021, we were in a rush hour at one of our special B2B projects going down in a crunch mode deeper and deeper every hour. We've been looking for a Webdev Engineering and QA group, that could jump in a battle and join us working on the dev backlog immediately. The main goal for us was to deliver the best product we could, and that's being low on internal human resources and having a limited time for the delivery of only 2 weeks. We've signed Akhter Studio in a role of Dev Outsource Provider, in order to synchronize our business capabilities with the new challenges we're facing while growing and scaling our startups.

SOLUTION

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

We've got a good recommendation for Akhter Studio from our production partners em.studio

Describe the project in detail and walk through the stages of the project.

The Scope of Services WEB QA Smoke/Manual Testing, UX Scenarios Testing, Load Testing Assistance WEB Front-End React UI Development

Describe the recruitment process in detail.

Project Staff WEB QA 1 QA Specialist, dedicated and assigned for the project for 2 weeks WEB Front-End 1 Front-End Engineer for 20 hours

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Can you share any outcomes from the engagement that demonstrate progress or success?

All was good, the deliverables were done at a time, and the overall quality of all services was excellent. We've solved all problems on the QA side of things and closed all critical issues in the Client UI's for the final build.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

Guys know how companies are run at all scales, and it's seen that they implement best practices in their pipeline. Akhter Studio understands what IT Startups need in terms of services, timings, and pricing and deliver that with ease.

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

It was our first experience in work with people from Kazakhstan and we had doubts about quality because we did not consider Kazakhstan as a good country for IT outsourcing. However, we removed all our doubts after we saw how guys work. Also, we understood how easily we can work between Russia and Kazakhstan in terms of laws and payments.

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

What we really see could let Akhter Studio be even more productive — is a kind of digitalized single room solution for customers and partners, where the core commercial and development process would be automatically synchronized and provisioned with templates scenarios by some RPA system or even AI.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am a CEO an "CORE 24/7" LLP. We develop DevOps instruments to help individuals, teams and companies to improve the developers process. Also we provide DevOps consulting and service on all over CIS region

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Akhter Studio, and what were your goals?

Our website was very outdated and we were looking to build something more complex than a WordPress site. We wanted the site to serve end customers as well, so we connected with Akhter Studio.

SOLUTION

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

The previous company we worked with was solely located in India, which created some language barriers and time zone challenges. When we started looking for a new partner, we wanted a local company so we could go to their office and communicate freely with them.

Although a part of Akhter Studio’s team is located in Russia, their local points of contact were just across town. We looked at several different options nearby, but at the end of the day, Akhter Studio was the team we wanted to work with.

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

Our website was very outdated and we were looking to build something more complex than a WordPress site. Akhter Studio overhauled the site, making it more user-friendly and less prone to bugs. We sat down with Admet (CEO) and discussed the project. From that point, he worked with the rest of the team to redesign and develop the site.

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

Our main point of contact was a project manager left in the middle of our project. We were reassigned another manager from there. Also, there were 3–4 developers working and 1 UI/UX designer on the project — one might’ve been handling certain pages while another might’ve been doing the contact form.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Customers liked the new site and portal. Conversion increased by 35%.

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

Generally, they were very professional. Admet maintained organization, kept everyone up to date, and coordinated everything. We worked in sprints, so we set weekly goals and they focused on immediate deliverables. Then, as they completed each task, we would move on to the next one.

They had some general systems in place to track each task. Because there were so many different aspects of this project, they had to be very detail-oriented. They did a very good job of keeping things on track and providing us with updates. They were transparent about the cost and often gave us several different solutions to choose from to keep the price low.

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

The quality of their work speaks for itself. It’s almost a given that we’re going to have good quality work, and it’s in their nature to want to help and make suggestions. Akhter Studio listens very well and always tries to find something to do.

They can also work autonomously. Rather than having me guide them in the right direction, they’ll come up with their own suggestions and even challenge me. It’s nice to have a team like that.

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

They need to improve the CI / CD processes, this will allow better and faster deploy of updates

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

"Seedstars" -a group of companies that operate in the field of startups in the global marketplace, puts its improvement in people's lives through technology and entrepreneurship development, connecting stakeholders and investing in high-performing startups.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Akhter Studio, and what were your goals?

to create an info-educational platform. - interface design, product architechture design, development of the functional scope of the stage, QA- testing

SOLUTION

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

our company found them through a referral. This project was such a high priority, we needed a high result oriented executor to develop this platform.

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

During initiation of the project Akhter Studio, were involved in design of technical specification and gathering of stakeholder requirements. As the project was launched they provided constant feedback on the progress and were accomodating to the changes we were making on the go. They provided us with confluence account which they used to track progress and assign tasks within their team. We had full access to all technical documentation and current tasks at any given time.

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

interface designer, back-end developer, front-end developer

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The project was submitted on time. The Akhter Studio was very flexible in terms of change management. All issues rised by stakeholders were dealt with in due time.

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

the product management was great, they regularly met with deadlines. We kept in touch through Telegram and whatsapp

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

It has been easy to communicate with their team. We can easily reach out to anyone in their team.

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

The communication process and stakeholder management could be handled better by hiring a sales specialist or dedicated project manager in order to bridge understanding of technical specialists and businessmen.