Armakuni

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and position.

I am the CTO of NatureFootage

Describe what your company does in a single sentence.

NatureFootage is a natural history stock footage licensing company that combines a large curated wildlife and nature video library with AI-driven metadata, species identification, and media asset management technology to help clients quickly find and license high-quality footage. 

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What specific goals or objectives did you hire Armakuni to accomplish?

• Rebuild the legacy NatureFootage platform into a modular, AWS-native, AI-powered Media Asset Management SaaS, replacing the aging infrastructure while preserving the value of the existing clip catalog.
• Position NatureFootage for AWS Marketplace distribution and secure AWS MAP (Migration Acceleration Program) funding to support a scalable, enterprise-ready SaaS launch and drive AWS infrastructure spend growth.

SOLUTION

How did you find Armakuni?

Referral

Why did you select Armakuni over others?

• High ratings
• Great culture fit
• Good value for cost
• Referred to me

How many teammates from Armakuni were assigned to this project?

6-10 Employees

Describe the scope of work in detail. Please include a summary of key deliverables.

Scope of Work
Armakuni was engaged to rebuild NatureFootage’s legacy stock footage platform into a modular, AWS-native, AI-powered Media Asset Management (MAM) SaaS product, spanning architecture design, AI pipeline development, video processing infrastructure, and go-to-market readiness for AWS Marketplace. The scope covered everything from initial RFP strategy and funding applications through to hands-on technical architecture and implementation planning for production buildout.

Platform architecture and RFP strategy 
Armakuni developed the RFP documentation used to pursue AWS funding, first under the Migration Acceleration Program (MAP) and later repositioned toward Enterprise Business Applications (EBA) funding, framing the project around high AWS infrastructure utilization and long-term spend growth. This included a full serverless Bedrock-based architecture blueprint supporting modular, swappable AI models for species identification.

AI-powered metadata and search pipeline 
The team designed metadata generation and species identification workflows using AWS Nova models, targeting 95%+ species ID accuracy, along with hybrid semantic search (OpenSearch) integrating species-tagged video and text metadata. This included evaluating stage-by-stage model logic, gating decisions, and escalation triggers for cost-efficient vision-model usage.

Video transcoding and storage infrastructure 
Armakuni proposed a GPU-based transcoding architecture along with S3 Intelligent Tiering for master/proxy storage tiers, addressing enterprise-scale ingestion of multiple source formats (50+) and large single-file uploads (up to 10TB). This proposal underwent multiple critical review cycles covering concurrency handling, database choice (PostgreSQL vs. DynamoDB), and whether AWS Step Functions were needed for reliability.

Enterprise and marketplace readiness 
Deliverables included specifications for AWS Marketplace SaaS deployment, contributor upload workflows (Dropbox integration), and defined output resolutions/bitrates for AI ingestion versus master storage (e.g., HD 10Mbps proxies, 4K 100Mbps masters).

Ongoing technical governance 
Armakuni participated in recurring architecture reviews, responding to detailed technical critiques and providing counter-analysis on infrastructure trade-offs, ensuring designs matched NatureFootage’s real operational constraints (e.g., actual transcoding throughput, concurrency needs).

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What were the measurable outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

• The project is still in active development and not yet complete.
• Armakuni delivered a transcoding solution architecture designed to be robust, cost-effective, efficient, and fault-tolerant.
• A demo site was built to evaluate pipeline results, and testing so far has been successful.
• Website design work has exceeded expectations.
• Business logic implementation — including user registration, e-commerce functionality, and CRM integration — has gone above and beyond expectations, especially given the complexity involved.

Describe their project management. Did they deliver items on time? How did they respond to your needs?

Project management 
Seven months into this massive undertaking, Armakuni’s project management has been thorough at every step. Work is organized into clear sprints, with structured cycles of implementation, review, and feedback incorporation that keep a project of this complexity on track. Communication has been consistent, with a clear cadence that makes progress easy to follow despite the scope involved.

Timeliness 
Given the complexity of the rebuild and occasional necessary pivots (such as shifting funding strategy from MAP to EBA), delivery has remained timely throughout.

Responsiveness 
The team has been highly responsive to our needs, incorporating detailed technical feedback quickly and adapting designs when our operational realities called for it — a strength that’s carried consistently through the engagement.

What was your primary form of communication with Armakuni?

• Virtual Meeting
• Email or Messaging App

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

A few things stand out about working with Armakuni. Their flat rate is notably competitive for an AWS Premier Tier Services Partner, especially compared to peers that charge substantially more. They bring genuine AWS depth — as a Premier Consulting Partner, they’ve navigated MAP and EBA funding programs skillfully. What’s most unique is their willingness to engage deeply with niche, technical problems specific to natural history media — species identification accuracy, video transcoding for RAW formats, semantic search — rather than offering generic cloud migration playbooks. What sets them apart is their ability to move between technical execution and business-context problem-solving — treating our niche species-identification and licensing challenges as a real business to optimize, not just a spec to build.

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

If I had to point to one area for improvement, it would be validating initial technical assumptions against our actual operational data a bit more before proposing designs — a few early proposals needed rework once compared against how our systems really run day to day. That said, this is a minor note in an otherwise strong engagement. Once we found our rhythm together, the team has been responsive, collaborative, and easy to work with.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and position.

 I am the VP of Engineering of a business services company 

Describe what your company does in a single sentence.

We're a data and insights company that provides SaaS assessment tools and benchmarking to help large enterprises measure and strengthen their internal programs and standards.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What specific goals or objectives did you hire Armakuni to accomplish?

• Augment our internal engineering team with senior full-stack talent to accelerate development of our core SaaS platform.
• Modernize and rebuild key parts of the platform while improving performance, reliability, and security.
• Deliver a large data migration and build out our data lake to support analytics and reporting.

SOLUTION

How did you find Armakuni?

Online Search

Why did you select Armakuni over others?

• High ratings
• Pricing fit our budget

How many teammates from Armakuni were assigned to this project?

6-10 Employees

Describe the scope of work in detail. Please include a summary of key deliverables.

Armakuni provided a dedicated, embedded engineering team that worked as an extension of our internal group across the full stack. The engagement is ongoing and covers new feature development, platform modernization, and data work on our core SaaS product. Key deliverables included:

• Full-stack development on our platform (React front end, PHP/Laravel back end), delivered on a steady weekly release cadence
• Rebuild core modules, including navigation, user permissions/role-based access, and benchmarking and reporting features
• Large-scale data migration across multiple years of historical data, with QA validation to ensure integrity
• Engineering support for internally-owned data lake initiative
• Performance optimization across key pages and workflows
• Security and reliability hardening (authentication, session handling, and related fixes)
• Ongoing bug resolution, test coverage, and QA support

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What were the measurable outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

• Maintained a consistent, predictable delivery velocity with a steady weekly release cadence throughout the engagement
• Delivered key milestones on schedule, including a major data migration completed without disrupting ongoing releases
• Integrated seamlessly with our internal team, effectively increasing overall engineering throughput

Describe their project management. Did they deliver items on time? How did they respond to your needs?

Communication was a real strength. We drove the project management, and the Armakuni team integrated directly with our own developers, joining daily standups and staying in close sync throughout. Delivery was reliable and on time, and they stayed highly responsive despite the time-zone difference, quickly adjusting priorities and acting on feedback.

What was your primary form of communication with Armakuni?

Virtual Meeting

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

The most impressive thing was how quickly the Armakuni team immersed themselves in our environment. They ramped fast on our domain, adopted our development standards and communication norms, and started operating like an extension of our own team rather than an outside vendor. That combination of strong technical expertise, quick ramp-up, and a genuinely product-focused, analytical mindset is what set them apart.

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

Nothing significant stands out. On the rare occasion we've had feedback, we've worked closely with their team and any necessary adjustments were made promptly.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and position.

I am the President of ArchiveIT

Describe what your company does in a single sentence.

We help companies migrate from paper to intelligent document processing

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What specific goals or objectives did you hire Armakuni to accomplish?

• To move our existing inbox into an AI classification and autofiling tool
• To extract key data from documents that allows for auto routing of documents
• To build an ongoing secure archive with private LLM capabilities

SOLUTION

How did you find Armakuni?

Referral

Why did you select Armakuni over others?

• High ratings
• Pricing fit our budget
• Referred to me

How many teammates from Armakuni were assigned to this project?

2-5 Employees

Describe the scope of work in detail. Please include a summary of key deliverables.

Armakuni was tasked as reviewing our current SAAS system that served as an enterprise ECM. Our goal was to take our existing intake engine and put it on steroids where inbound documents would go through an ai classification, auto index, and auto routing function.  The system would learn over time from a clients data set, and make document filing, indexing, a thing of the past.   We have completed these deliverables.  We are now working on bring the project into production.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What were the measurable outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

We were able to take a multi page pdf with multiple different documents in it, and parse it out to the document level.  Classify, index, and route to appropriate S3 buckets.

Describe their project management. Did they deliver items on time? How did they respond to your needs?

Yes,  the team was very attentive, attended all meetings ( even I fell short here ) and delivered everything on time.  They were very responsive to my questions and concerns along the way.

What was your primary form of communication with Armakuni?

Virtual Meeting

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

What I fould most impressive is how the team is so cohesive.  From our project manager Pryanka to the developers and different folks that have been called in on the project have all been great.  Our meetings were set 8am PST, and there was never an issue of time, or latency in calls.  All very professional.

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

Cant think of any.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the director of data and analytics for Scale AI, a marketing company that combines media, creativity, technology, and data to deliver business results. We offer agile and collaborative solutions instead of traditional agency services.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Armakuni?

We wanted to upgrade our media mix modeling platform, create some new models, and improve the application overall.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Armakuni has moved our architecture from AWS Lambda, API Gateway, and S3 to DocumentDB and Amplify. The team has also rewritten our model and built two new ones. Armakuni has moved us into the most up-to-date React.js frameworks.

The new models include upgrades from PyMC3 to PyMC5, simplified Docker files, better feature engineering, and DAG/Airflow integration. The team has reduced our codebase by 80%.

What is the team composition?

We work with five teammates from Armakuni.

How did you come to work with Armakuni?

We found them through our AWS account manager; he referred them to us. We chose Armakuni over other options because they had AWS certification and support.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with them in July 2024, and our engagement is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Our clients have become more loyal and use the models to make budgeting and media contribution decisions. We’ve delivered insights 90% faster and doubled our client base while working with Armakuni.

How did Armakuni perform from a project management standpoint?

Armakuni didn’t deliver on time at the start, but they have done so as they get more familiar with our system. We communicate via Slack and Google Meet.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Tejas, one of their data scientists, is great. He can do data engineering and data science and communicate well. Armakuni goes above and beyond to deliver and copes with mistakes instead of hiding them.

Are there any areas they could improve?

They originally assigned us too many resources that we didn’t need. One of the data scientists had to be taken off the project because she was too slow and did poor work.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and position.

 I am the EVP or Technology of a software company 

Describe what your company does in a single sentence.

We’re transforming traditional visitor management experiences with integrated solutions that reduce risk, enhance workplace interactions, and adapt to the evolving needs of modern organizations.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What specific goals or objectives did you hire Armakuni to accomplish?

• We partnered with Armakuni to implement an AI-powered solution using AWS Bedrock, requiring expertise in prompt engineering, model selection, and Python development.

SOLUTION

How did you find Armakuni?

Referral

Why did you select Armakuni over others?

• Pricing fit our budget
• Good value for cost
• Referred to me

How many teammates from Armakuni were assigned to this project?

2-5 Employees

Describe the scope of work in detail. Please include a summary of key deliverables.

We partnered with this development contractor to implement an AI-powered solution using AWS Bedrock, requiring expertise in prompt engineering, model selection, and Python development. The project involved building a sophisticated AI system and ensuring our internal team could maintain and expand it post-delivery.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What were the measurable outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

Technical Expertise: Their deep knowledge of AI technologies, particularly AWS Bedrock and advanced prompt engineering techniques, was evident throughout the project. They stayed current with rapidly evolving AI tools and best practices.

Communication: The project managers and developers were remarkably thoughtful when working through technical questions with our team. Complex AI concepts were explained clearly, and no question was too basic or too advanced for thorough discussion.

Knowledge Transfer Excellence: They worked closely with our technical team to ensure complete codebase handover. The training sessions were comprehensive, and our team now feels confident maintaining and extending the solution independently.

Optimization Mindset: Every aspect of the solution was optimized for performance, cost-efficiency, and maintainability. This attention to detail has resulted in lower operational costs and better system performance.

Describe their project management. Did they deliver items on time? How did they respond to your needs?

The flexibility with scheduling was a game-changer for our distributed team. Working across multiple timezones can be challenging, but they consistently accommodated our team's varying schedules, including early morning and late evening calls when needed. This level of accommodation kept our project moving without delays.

Their project management skills were exceptional - they proactively ensured they always had the information needed to keep the project on schedule, demonstrating remarkable patience with our often unpredictable schedules. They consistently found ways to work around these constraints while maintaining momentum and meeting all deadlines.

What was your primary form of communication with Armakuni?

• Virtual Meeting
• Email or Messaging App

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

The depth of knowledge in emerging AI technology is truly impressive. They demonstrated exceptional expertise across the entire AI stack - from AWS Bedrock implementation to advanced prompt engineering techniques and strategic model selection. What sets them apart is their ability to stay current with rapidly evolving AI tools and best practices.

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

Honestly, it's difficult to find fault with their work. I was expecting that the timezone issue was going to be tough but their flexibility really put that worry to rest.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and position.

I am the CEO of Let's Talk Productions

Describe what your company does in a single sentence.

We help Independent Filmmakers and TV Show Producers reach new audiences.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What specific goals or objectives did you hire Armakuni to accomplish?

• Create A Scalable Live Streaming Solution
• Save Development Time and Hours

SOLUTION

How did you find Armakuni?

Referral

Why did you select Armakuni over others?

• Pricing fit our budget
• Good value for cost
• Referred to me

How many teammates from Armakuni were assigned to this project?

6-10 Employees

Describe the scope of work in detail. Please include a summary of key deliverables.

My company was looking at developing an in-house solution for live streaming using AWS.  We are a small staff of 2 developers working on multiple internal projects.  We considered building a live stream platform in house but it would require time away from what we were already working on to build a scalable solution that would handle high volumes of traffic.  We also needed for this application to have the ability to grow with us as our needs and requirements grew.  We reached out to Armakuni for the development of the live streaming portal.  They worked with us from concept to creation.  They were very professional and communicated with us the entire time.  We are very pleased withe the outcome.  

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What were the measurable outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

1. Features and functionality matching the project specification.
2. Timeline to complet.
3. Successful UAT
4. Performance testing (in progress)

Describe their project management. Did they deliver items on time? How did they respond to your needs?

Armakuni was very flexible with accommodating my scheduling needs.  They were responsive and attentive to questions I had and addressed each concern I had whether it was design or functionality.  The project was completed faster than expected.

What was your primary form of communication with Armakuni?

• Virtual Meeting
• Email or Messaging App

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

Their communication and regular updates on the project.  I value that most in a vendor.

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

I was very impressed they handled the project.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and position.

I am the Product Manager of an advertising company 

Describe what your company does in a single sentence.

An experiential data and media company, empowering brands to connect with targeted audiences through data-driven insights, creative advertising, and curated experiences.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What specific goals or objectives did you hire Armakuni to accomplish?

• Stable DevOps Infrastructure
• Automated CI/CD Pipelines

SOLUTION

How did you find Armakuni?

Referral

Why did you select Armakuni over others?

Referred to me

How many teammates from Armakuni were assigned to this project?

2-5 Employees

Describe the scope of work in detail. Please include a summary of key deliverables.

AWS Cloud Consulting & Services

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What were the measurable outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

Stable DevOps Infrastructure, Cost Optimization & CI/CD Pipelines.

Describe their project management. Did they deliver items on time? How did they respond to your needs?

The team is also super transparent with updates, work logs and estimations and makes managing the team a breeze. Armakuni has been instrumental in helping us achieve our business initiatives through the development of CI/CD pipelines, architecture enhancements, performance and cost optimizations, which ultimately increased team efficiency immensely over the past year. I highly recommend their services as Armakuni's work culture stands out above any team I’ve worked with in my career.

What was your primary form of communication with Armakuni?

• In-Person Meeting
• Virtual Meeting
• Email or Messaging App

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

Working with the Armakuni team over the last year has been a wonderful experience. Everyone there has a culture of honesty, reliability and dedication. You can see the Armakuni values shine consistently through each team member, as we don’t feel like just another client, they are a true part of our team. 

Any time we have had any issue they have always been there to resolve quickly and literally have never let us down. Additionally, the Armakuni team has provided both technical and product consulting on AI & automation initiatives keeping us ahead of the curve in terms of technology and optimal architecture. 

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

N/A

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and position.

 I am the SVP Software and Infrastructure of a consumer products & services company 

Describe what your company does in a single sentence.

We provide an ecosystem of hardware and software to help everyone cook like a pro, regardless of skill level, with technology that enables everyone to enjoy perfectly cooked food, every time.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What specific goals or objectives did you hire Armakuni to accomplish?

• Deliver an AI powered solution that can be integrated into our ecosystem for importing recipes

SOLUTION

How did you find Armakuni?

Referral

Why did you select Armakuni over others?

Referred to me

How many teammates from Armakuni were assigned to this project?

2-5 Employees

Describe the scope of work in detail. Please include a summary of key deliverables.

Armakuni delivered an AI-powered recipe extraction system — pulling structured recipes from social media videos, web URLs, documents, and images into our JSON schema via AWS Bedrock. 

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What were the measurable outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

Met all project deliverables

Describe their project management. Did they deliver items on time? How did they respond to your needs?

The team was professional throughout, staying open and responsive to mid-project changes as new requirements and hurdles came up, and resolving technical issues promptly. 

What was your primary form of communication with Armakuni?

• Virtual Meeting
• Email or Messaging App

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

They have the technical competence to understand the issue and come up with an effective solution that aligns with the business. Their IaC-driven approach made the solution easy to deploy and maintain, and the work was implemented exactly to our expectations. 

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

More testing to identify issues early themselves.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and position.

 I am the Head of Customer Success & Strategy of an information technology company 

Describe what your company does in a single sentence.

We help researchers find funding, collaborators, and talent through our web-based platform.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What specific goals or objectives did you hire Armakuni to accomplish?

• Automate Hub creation and design the UI

SOLUTION

How did you find Armakuni?

CEO

Why did you select Armakuni over others?

Other

How many teammates from Armakuni were assigned to this project?

2-5 Employees

Describe the scope of work in detail. Please include a summary of key deliverables.

We are working on our second project with Armakuni after a successful POC. They automated the creation of our newest product called Hubs. They were very quickly able to give us a way to create Hubs through a form and through bulk upload using the information we specified.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What were the measurable outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

Generate multiple Hubs within an hour.

Describe their project management. Did they deliver items on time? How did they respond to your needs?

Project management was one of the biggest strengths of Armakuni. We were given detailed project plans, shown when key milestones were achieved, and everything was well managed and kept on track. They were very responsive to our needs.

What was your primary form of communication with Armakuni?

• Virtual Meeting
• Email or Messaging App

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

They were very professional, highly skilled, and detail-oriented.

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

I cannot think of anything in particular that I would want them to improve or do differently. We've been very pleased with them.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and position.

 I am the CEO of an IT company 

Describe what your company does in a single sentence.

Research collaboration software 

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What specific goals or objectives did you hire Armakuni to accomplish?

• Expedite creation of new software product

SOLUTION

How did you find Armakuni?

Referral

Why did you select Armakuni over others?

• High ratings
• Pricing fit our budget
• Great culture fit
• Good value for cost
• Company values aligned

How many teammates from Armakuni were assigned to this project?

6-10 Employees

Describe the scope of work in detail. Please include a summary of key deliverables.

Armakuni helped us leverage AI and AWS tools to create a next generation researcher Hub and Spoke network.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What were the measurable outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

Met all project milestones ahead of schedule 

Describe their project management. Did they deliver items on time? How did they respond to your needs?

Consistently met deadlines.

What was your primary form of communication with Armakuni?

Virtual Meeting

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

They asked excellent questions in our discovery sessions and created a SOW with minute details included.

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

No. They're great to work with.