HexOcean

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the chief product and technology officer of Common Sense Media, a nonprofit that provides guidance and resources to help families navigate the digital world safely. We also have an AI safety institute that promotes child-focused standards and evaluation for AI systems.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What specific goals or objectives did you hire HexOcean to accomplish for your organization?

We hired HexOcean to develop an editorial reviews backend for a partnership deal.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

HexOcean builds an editorial workflow platform from scratch. The platform takes a feed of videos from a large social media company, presents them to our reviewers, and helps curate the under-13 experience for the social media company globally. HexOcean builds the platform's frontend and backend based on our requirements.

What is the team composition?

We work with 2–5 teammates from HexOcean.

How did you come to work with HexOcean?

HexOcean was referred to me. I chose them over other options because their pricing fit our budget, they were a great cultural fit, they offered good value for the cost, and their company values aligned with ours.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with HexOcean in January 2023, and our engagement is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

HexOcean delivers a platform that we can use to deliver on a partnership deal that we have. We wouldn't be able to service the deal without the platform they build and continue to maintain. Feedback from our product and business teams working with HexOcean is very positive.

How did HexOcean perform from a project management standpoint?

HexOcean's project management is great. The team delivers on time. We communicate via virtual meetings, emails, and messaging apps.

What did you find most impressive about them?

HexOcean has great people who can not just build things but also architect the solution well. They're world-class. The team is great to work with, follows through on deliverables, and is all-around great engineers. HexOcean spends time understanding our business requirements, not just the technical requirements, which is a differentiator.

Are there any areas they could improve?

I don't think there's anything they can improve on.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I'm the CEO of WinMyVote, an online marketplace connecting candidates, voters, and advocacy groups. We level the playing field in election campaigning and give voters all the tools necessary to organize, manage, and share their vote.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What specific goals or objectives did you hire HexOcean to accomplish for your business?

I wanted a solid foundation (technical and ethical) on which to build a platform that would last decades and grow in complexity, scope, and size.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

HexOcean has created a complete solution: a service we can provide to users and sell to candidates and groups that can quickly (and cost-effectively) increase in complexity, size, and scope. The team has built a website with state-of-the-art features giving voters, political candidates, and advocacy groups access to data and services that would normally cost millions of dollars. Now, candidates and groups can interact with millions of voters directly for a fraction of the cost they'd normally spend.

What is the team composition?

We work with 6-10 teammates from HexOcean.

How did you come to work with HexOcean?

We found them on LinkedIn and chose them because they were a great culture fit.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with them in January 2016, and our engagement is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We have a working site that provides services to multiple customers. Our cost savings have been significant, not because of the hourly or project rate but because of the comprehensiveness of the solution. Many non-technical people are unaware of the steps involved in making a database website work, and HexOcean makes it work. We've saved around 50% of our budget. 

Moreover, our site fluctuates in usage based on election cycles. We've seen spikes into the hundreds of thousands of users. Our business model is selling services to candidates, and candidates base their decisions (our platform's value) on the number of users (voters) on the platform. More users mean more candidates, aka customers. We've scaled to hundreds of thousands of users and hundreds of candidates.

How did HexOcean perform from a project management standpoint?

HexOcean delivers on time. We communicate via virtual meetings, emails, and messaging apps.

What did you find most impressive about them?

HexOcean's team is thorough, comprehensive, and professional.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, there aren't any. I've worked with many outsourced solutions over the last 20 years. I now tell people they should invest in doing it themselves, in-house, unless they can get HexOcean.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the founder and CEO of Braintrust, a talent marketplace that also provides an AI recruiter and a back office automation suite.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with HexOcean?

We needed help building our main software stack to support our business.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

HexOcean has helped us build our main software stack to support our business. The team has been responsible for all the front- and backend development, DevOps, and security work.

What is the team composition?

We’ve worked with more than 10 members of HexOcean’s team. Daniel and Matt (Founders) are exceptional. But anyone they brought onto the team was just as high quality. They have a rare combination of technical excellence and ability to retain talent. 

How did you come to work with HexOcean?

Someone referred HexOcean to us. We chose them over other options because they were a great culture fit, offered good value for the cost, and had aligned company values.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent around $1 million.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in October 2018, and the engagement is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

HexOcean’s work has helped us improve all of our business KPIs, including revenue and profitability.

How did HexOcean perform from a project management standpoint?

HexOcean’s project management has been perfect. We communicate via email and messaging apps.

What did you find most impressive about them?

HexOcean’s responsiveness, quality, ease of communication, and professionalism have been impressive.

Are there any areas they could improve?

I don’t think there’s anything they can improve on.