Fidenz Technologies

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

We specialize in solving IT problems for Australian clients, specifically large multinational organizations. During the last 3 years, we have been focusing on the mobile space. We help clients identify problems and come up with appropriate mobile solutions, which we develop through companies like Fidenz Technologies. 

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Fidenz Technologies?

Our company is focused on understanding strategies and architecting solutions for clients, but Fidenz Technologies is responsible for actually developing those solutions. 

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Our clients are big electronics and tobacco multinational companies. Fidenz Technologies has provided developers and project management for the delivery of our code, including mobile apps, backend databases that collect data, and client dashboards. Fidenz Technologies also offers frontend design services.

On the backend, Fidenz Technologies has expertise in PHP and .NET, as well as more modern languages like Python, but we haven’t done any work in that area.

How did you come to work with Fidenz Technologies?

Fidenz Technologies found us through a mutual colleague. We decided to test them with a small project and were impressed with their delivery. We eventually gave them some of our biggest projects.

How much have you invested with Fidenz Technologies?

The cost of Fidenz Technologies’ service has been between $100,000 and $200,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with Fidenz Technologies in July or August of 2013. We don’t currently have any clients that require development work. Our last project with Fidenz Technologies was completed a year and a half ago.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Could you share any evidence that would demonstrate the productivity, quality of work, or impact of the engagement?

I normally keep a KPI [key performance indicator] register for 10 different aspects, from meeting client expectations and exceeding them to the delivery of scope, timeliness, and accuracy of code. Fidenz Technologies has generally met or exceeded our expectations for all of the projects they’ve worked on with us.

How did Fidenz Technologies perform from a project management standpoint?

Fidenz Technologies has a dedicated project manager who we’ve generally dealt with directly. We’ve been impressed with their performance.

What did you find most impressive about Fidenz Technologies?

The main thing that impresses us is Fidenz Technologies’ ability to deliver results and to do what they promise. There are multiple subcontractors willing to undertake a variety of tasks, but the results are generally not complete. Fidenz Technologies is also good at providing work on short notice. We’ve had some ridiculous deadlines, but Fidenz Technologies was willing to work on weekends and at night.

Are there any areas Fidenz Technologies could improve?

In terms of strategic design and architecting, Fidenz Technologies would need more skills. We generally handled that work on our end. 

BACKGROUND

Please describe your organization.

My company’s name is Eutech Cybernetics. We are a software product company, specializing in smart cities and workplace solutions.

What is your position?

I am the Chief Technical Officer. My role is to take care of the technology of the company and deal with technology partners.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What business challenge were you trying to address with Fidenz?

We have a lot of software developers ourselves, but we realized that mobile applications are an area where trends are consistently changing. Because of this, we wanted to bring in younger people who were willing to try out new things and follow new trends.

SOLUTION

Please describe the scope of their involvement in greater detail.

Fidenz designed the app and performed QA [quality assurance] at the end. From there, we submitted the app to the app store.

How did you come to work with Fidenz?

We have a relationship because the founder of Fidenz, Chim Him, used to work for my company.

Could you provide a sense of the size of this initiative in financial terms?

They have developed about ten applications for iOS and Android for us. I guess it's between $30,000 and $50,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

It's ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Could you share any statistics or metrics from this engagement?

The apps that Fidenz delivered have been really well designed and highly popular with our customers.

How did Fidenz perform from a project management standpoint?

They are fairly good in their estimates. We gave them a detailed report on what we wanted, and then they came up with a time estimate based on that. We had a fixed rate that was agreed upon and they use that to determine the size of the project. They overran in their time estimate only by about 10%, so we’re happy with their delivery.

What distinguishes Fidenz from other providers?

We were comfortable dealing with them because we already knew the company. As we started working with Fidenz, we realized that they are flexible and willing to go back and make changes if necessary. Their project estimates in both time and money are fair.

Is there anything Fidenz could have improved or done differently?

Although they do quality assurance, they need to do more. Sometimes, we found issues that could have been easily caught during QA. We have raised this with Fidenz and they're coming up with some different ways to ensure that their QA process is comprehensive enough.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your organization.

Our company is Iper Direkte AS. We are a small Norwegian marketing company based in Oslo.

What is your position?

I'm the CEO and cofounder.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What business challenge were you trying to address with Fidenz?

Because we are so small, we were looking for offshore possibilities to push some more development tasks overseas. Fidenz fit perfectly for this goal. Traditionally, we have done list management, list cleansing, and data matching for Norwegian companies that do marketing and B2B [business-to-business] mail, and B2C [business-to-consumer] mail. Up until recently, we haven't had much of a web presence. However, the industry has been changing in the last few years, and we felt the need to move onto the web. The difficulty however, was that the cost in Norway is quite high. In the last few years, it's been difficult to recruit people – especially engineers and developers. Currently, there are more available jobs than people.

SOLUTION

Please describe the scope of their involvement in detail.

They started with us on the first stage a year ago in January 2015. The first two months was planning and filling out documentation on our side. We tried to describe our business and problems for Fidenz. We traveled to Sri Lanka in early April 2015 and went through our plans with them. They started working full time on the project on May 1, 2015. Fidenz created a portal on our website so our clients can log on to use different services – mostly searching personal information on Norwegian people and businesses. Our company is not like yellow pages. Our directory has more information. A user can log on and search an individual's birthdate, whether they have a car or house, and what kind of house or car they are. The information available is based on the type of subscription the customer has. We did some testing, and it went into production in October. 

We went back to Sri Lanka in November to try to plan two new projects. The first provides daily updates on the server. Fidenz is developing a system to synchronize data. This way, our local servers in Oslo will only update changes, rather than run through all our data. This project should be available soon. 

The second upcoming project allows a customer to subscribe to a set of data and filter across different verticals. For example, if a user wants to find out how many women live in a particular geographical area in Norway between the ages of 42 and 50, who also own a car, and has a certain education level – they can find this person. It's a quite advanced system. We provide the data and it web-accessible.

How did you come to work with Fidenz?

An opportunity came to use companies in Sri Lanka through the Norwegian government's foreign aid agency. We signed up for a program in 2014. We met Fidenz in Colombo in December 2014 and have been working with them until today [March 2016]. 

Norway gives away a lot of money to developing countries. They have a program called the Business Matchmaking Program that matches small companies in developing countries with similar types of companies in Norway. They sign up companies on both sides and try to find matches. The government pays 80 percent of our costs in the project in the first year. We were in Sri Lanka for nine days and we presented our case to nine companies. Each company came up with a proposal of how they would solve our problem. We assessed these different companies, and Fidenz was the best. They were the smallest company, so it was surprising to the other companies. We wanted to work with someone who had more personal connections and was trustworthy.

Could you provide a sense of the size of this initiative in financial terms?

The project cost was $5,000 a month. The cost accounts for two employees from Fidenz working full time with us.

What is the status of this engagement?

It is an ongoing relationship.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What distinguishes Fidenz from other providers?

It's the value for money and personal attention. If I try to hire someone in Norway, it will cost me about $500,000. Chances are, with a Norwegian company, they would leave my company for a larger one. Fidenz wants to understand our needs and our business. They have a genuine interest in us. Because of this attention to detail, we've begun looking for ways to improve their business. In November, we founded a company together.

Is there anything Fidenz could have improved or done differently?

Communication can always be better in business. Because we are in different time zones, it is difficult to manage time. We have learned to live with that. I don't really have anything bad to say.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your organization.

We are a mobile app and website development shop.

What is your position?

I am founder and co-owner of the company.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What business challenge were you trying to address with Fidenz?

Initially, Fidenz approached us to see if we needed help with development. We were a fairly young company - about two years in at the time. We got in contact with Fidenz, initially for a small project. We really liked the work they did, their communication, and their processes. We specialize in user experience [UX] and user interface [UI], so we were looking for a good partner on the design side. We really liked how that first project went, and we’ve been working with them since.

SOLUTION

Please describe the scope of their involvement in greater detail.

Since our first project with Fidenz, we’ve worked on iOS, iPad, Android, and Web-based applications. We’ve also worked with them on WordPress, and we’re going to work with them on Ruby on Rails sites in the near future.

How did you come to work with Fidenz?

Before Fidenz, we had tried to work with a few other companies and contractors, and didn’t have the best experience. We really liked how the first project we did with Fidenz turned out. The work they did was solid, and they did it quickly. The relationship just morphed from there, and we started working together more. We started having them take on more responsibilities in terms of decision-making.

Could you provide a sense of the size of this initiative in financial terms?

Our projects with Fidenz have ranged from $10,000 to $75,000. This next project is likely to be well over $100,000.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Could you share any statistics or metrics from this engagement?

We had a client who had two big shows. This client teaches people how to interact with their horses. They had two really large horse shows and asked us to expedite both their iOS app and the Android app. It was a month and a half to two months, start to finish, on the iOS app, and then two and a half weeks on the Android app. Fidenz came through with flying colors on that. They absolutely cranked out the development side of things. Both of those apps are on their way to 10,000+ downloads.

What distinguishes Fidenz from other providers?

We haven’t worked with a ton of companies, but for us, communication is key. We try to get back to our clients and potential clients within 24 hours, and have the same expectation of those we work with. Many times, companies we’ve worked with have not met those expectations. That was a really big piece for us initially, working with Fidenz. They are very responsive. Any questions or issues we have, they will get back to us promptly within 24 hours.

As far as process goes, you have to figure out how each party works and how you can best work together, and Fidenz has been really good at that. They are very open to adjusting to requests that we have to make things flow a little bit easier. It’s very easy to work with them now. On top of just being good at what they do and responsive as well, the Fidenz team are just good guys, too.

Is there anything Fidenz could have improved or done differently?

There are always things that you can do better. In our case, we’re using an offshore developer, and the language barrier is there at times. Fidenz’s quality assurance wasn’t what we wanted initially, so we had quite a few conversations. They were very open to making sure they met our expectations. That was a problem at first, but it was solved because they were open to making sure it was done right.