Mainmatter

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

We are a travel tech, aggregator of train journeys. I am the Head of Communications

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Mainmatter?

To prepare for a growth initiative, aiming to significantly expand the business, we were looking for an experienced partner to assess our platform, address concerns, and suggest a route forward.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Mainmatter assessed our technical platform, processes, working modes, and infrastructure. They interviewed a number of people from our team and subsequently presented a path forward. They have since actively supported us on 2 main initiatives: improving observability of our platform and improving performance and efficiency, as well as building a new B2C offering using Svelte & SvelteKit. 

They have introduced a fresh perspective throughout our collaboration and actively contribute to internal conversations around improving processes, infrastructure, working mode, etc.

What is the team composition?

We work with consultants, an engineering manager, and Mainmatter's founder.

How did you come to work with Mainmatter?

We know them through a personal connection.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in June 2023, and our engagement is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Our main result has been our overall satisfaction; we're fully satisfied with their work.

How did Mainmatter perform from a project management standpoint?

We have regular workshops in person and online. We also communicate via email. Mainmatter is able to push projects forwards independently and involves project stakeholders in their processes as needed.

Are there any employees from the service provider's team that you would like to give a shout-out to in this review?
I would like to give a shout-out to Marco (Founder & Director) himself.
What did you find most impressive about them?

Mainmatter's communication and technical expertise are very good, showing proficiency in their service delivery. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

Nothing comes to mind

Do you have any advice for future clients of theirs?

I have no particular advice.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am CEO of a software development company based in Switzerland developing firmware solutions for embedded devices for the telecommunications industry.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

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

We wanted to develop a portable web app to allow an end user the configuration of basic parameters of a wireless network at home that is managed by our central management solution.

SOLUTION

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

We worked with Simplabs in the past on another project and were very satisfied with the results. Because of the great experience with working with them, we did contract them again.

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

After an initial workshop to define the user flow wireframes of the single steps were created for review and further refinements. Since it was decided to create a progressive web app we used Ember.js as the underlying JavaScript framework since it offers great options for teams. The implementation process was monitored and we had access to prototypes to review the work at any time.

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

A project manager was assigned as the main contact window as well as two software developers and one UX-designer. Partly also a grafics designer was involved to create icons and help with the look of the app.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Since the backend development is still ongoing we could not deploy the app, yet. Nevertheless, the tester feedback was already very positive indicating a good acceptance level.

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

The project manager was easy to communicate with, we used a Slack channel from the beginning for the whole team. Besides that JIRA was used to track the tasks and issues which was very convenient.

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

They have years of experience with Ember.js and know exactly how to set up and structure such projects. They work efficiently and communicate the progress very transparently.

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

The only minor issue was that some guidance for testing and limitations of the prototypes would have reduced the amount of communication.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the founder and CEO of Asilimia, a fintech startup. We digitize informal businesses in Africa to manage their businesses better and pay their business suppliers.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with simplabs?

We needed to position ourselves as a fully-fledged enterprise solution for managing informal businesses. It would include incorporating the old and new to come up with new branding from the product perspective.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

We did a two-week sprint to go through ideation. We got to use some new tools in thinking about how to design. Additionally, we collected customer feedback to incorporate it into the product. simplabs helped organize us as a team in terms of acting as decision-makers and prototypers as well as coming up with a solution that has been contributed by both sides of the team.

We did a two-week workshop. One of the challenges was how to move a design sprint online because every one of us is in different countries and locations. simplabs coordinated the team and kept us on the same rhythm. They connected what we needed to do offline and online as well.

We were able to ideate, design, and launch a new Android application. In a week, we’ll be launching a completely new Android app. Previously, we were doing payments. Now, we started enabling the traders to do B2B work. What we’ve done now is focus on a bigger problem the traders were having which covers the service and questionnaires.

The traders used a lot of pen and paper to keep track of their business sales and expenses. They did that every single day. Now what we’re trying to do is digitize their process. They’ll use an Android app to do the same process. We’ve put that on the frontline and took the payments as an additional accessory. We did the design and prototype. The coordinating happened after we finished the workshop.

What is the team composition?

We worked with Mar (Director of Product Design). She headed the project. We had one other colleague for tech support.

How did you come to work with simplabs?

They did a similar project in Paris and we figured they’d understand what we were trying to achieve. They have a pro bono offering and accepted us into their program. After talking to Mar, we realized she understood the context we were working on as well as the technology and direction we needed to go.

How much have you invested with them?

Their work is pro bono. There wasn’t a price tag.

What is the status of this engagement?

We worked together in February 2021.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We needed to change our position for investors. We’re not necessarily what they thought we were before nor who our competitors are. Our organization needed to increase our user range. In the beginning, we just worked with traders who were doing B2B payments.

Then we left out users and were doing cash transactions. Our user base has expanded as well as our scalability. Now, we can scale to other countries within the continent just because of how well the new app works and the dynamics of it.

How did simplabs perform from a project management standpoint?

We used Slack for communication. Our teams also used a tool for prototyping as well as one for a vision board. Mar used Google Calendar. We were ahead of schedule. She made recommendations for apps to use for the customer survey as well. Mar patiently brought us from not knowing what we were doing to being able to coordinate with the team and finish the project. She’s good with project management.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They’re very patient. We had a bit of conflict in schedules between the company and timelines for the project. Mar helped us find a middle ground where we were still able to do the work that we needed to do in the office. She was fast with our topic. Mar had a lot of use cases, examples, and was able to translate and break down everything we needed to do. We were able to learn a lot.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, I’m 100% happy with how everything worked. There’s nothing I’d have them improve. Mar handled the project very well. They gave us all the time we needed.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Their services are really needed. As a startup, we tend to not think UX design is important. We tend to focus more on the code being the infrastructure. They’re worth every minute and every cent just to be able to bring what the market wants and what the company building the solution thinks the market wants into a product that’s user-centric and fully focused on the users.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m a counsel at a law firm.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with simplabs?

We needed help with a digital product workshop. As a lawyer, I don’t understand much about digital product or development.

I was looking for a professional IT firm that would help me test 2–3 ideas, determine feasibility, and provide feedback.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

simplabs conducted a two-day digital product workshop. They provided a general overview of how digital products work. We went through all of the tools I had in mind and looked at them from different user angles. 

By the end, they delivered a wireframe, which is the first step to implementation — it laid out functionalities.

What is the team composition?

I worked with the CEO and someone who does design.

How did you come to work with simplabs?

An acquaintance knew the design person and had worked with her previously. They said she did fantastic work.

I met with the design person, and she introduced me to the CEO.

How much have you invested with them?

My company spent $4,000–$5,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We worked together in September 2020.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

simplabs is very good on a technical level, especially the CEO. The design person was fantastic — she was amazing at delivery. I felt I got the answers I needed. The workshop was done very professionally, and it was multimedia. They were able to do a lot with a projector.

How did simplabs perform from a project management standpoint?

simplabs had a good team, and they were competent in their field. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

The level of preparation and professionalism was impressive. There was a good feel to the workshop from start to finish. The workshop was very engaging, and I enjoyed the two days a lot.

We discovered something we shouldn’t do, which is good to know. The other idea is materializing; in fact, we might even implement the idea with simplabs. We’ve stayed in touch. The holdup is on my side — decision-making takes a tremendous amount of time.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, there’s nothing they could do better.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Tell them what you want, and they’re a great facilitator. Be strong on implementation.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

Cardstack is a small software startup, working on ambitious technology in terms of new app developing tools. I’m the lead developer.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with simplabs?

We were working with R&D and experimental technologies, so we needed more experienced and senior people. We needed to augment our team with their expertise. We already had a few people who knew what they were doing, but we needed more.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Because we were working with experimental technology, and weren’t just trying to push out an app, we needed experienced developers. They brought people of that caliber—people who could think abstractly and solve more than one thing at a time. They worked with JavaScript, TypeScript. Node.js Ember.js, PostgreSQL, and Git as our infrastructure.

What is the team composition?

We worked with 3 people.

How did you come to work with simplabs?

We met them through networking communicates. We were using the same tools, and we knew them through those groups. We talked with them at conferences and stuff like that. They had experienced technologists, so we were confident about hiring them.

What is the status of this engagement?

We worked together for about eight months, from January–August 2019.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Because of the experimental and early nature, our feedback would come from our internal team that continues to work on top of what simplabs developed. Overall, feedback has been positive because we continue to use their work as a foundation. I’m pretty happy with them. To the extent we’ve needed to continue to evolve with our products, we’ve been able to do that. So, that’s a sign of good software. They laid a solid foundation.

How did simplabs perform from a project management standpoint?

They were very organized—they had clear priorities and followed good agile best practices. On a weekly basis, we set goals and had accountability meetings. Generally, we talked through lots of daily videos, standups with everybody on the team, and some remote pairing when needed. We used video chat, screen sharing, and Slack. We also reviewed code through GitHub.

What did you find most impressive about them?

The level of technical maturity. In web development, it can be hard to find people with enough experience and skill to do original engineering work without going through a playbook. They could think and system engineering and good architecture.

Are there any areas they could improve?

Nothing comes to mind right now.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Hire them for the project that is strategic, high value, and high leverage. I think they’re a high-quality choice, so they’re probably not going to be the cheapest option. So, use them for the projects that are a strategic fit to minimize risk. Use them for projects where you’re willing to trust their technical judgments. They don’t need to be micromanaged, so it’s a waste if you’re going to oversee everything they do. Let them take responsibility for the project and lead it.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the CTO of Experteer, a career service for high-end level positions. People come to us looking to make a change in their career and we help them with that.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with simplabs?

We required an external development for a purely implementation project.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

The most recent project was a proof of concept of our search engine backend. We job content, open positions we serve, a traditional job portal, and a search engine in the backend. They were involved in an A/B test for Google API and Google Cloud to benchmark this product against our own. They also synchronized our job content data pool with Google products and implemented the search API integration into our VEP product.

What is the team composition?

There were three people working with us.

How did you come to work with simplabs?

The founder of the company is a former freelancer we know.

What is the status of this engagement?

We worked with them from April 2016–January 2019.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

It is hard to give metrics because these projects don’t directly connect to investment returns. As far as our gained experience and what we have learned, it was very valuable.

How did simplabs perform from a project management standpoint?

Marco (Founder/Director, simplabs) is a very experienced developer. They were totally prepared for the workload, which was important for us. They were also very professional. It was fun to work with them because they asked the right questions, were pragmatic, and didn’t spend excessive time/resources to charge us more money.

What did you find most impressive about them?

The knowledge they possess in the areas they work (Ember.js, Ruby on Rails, code quality, architecture) is very professional. They quickly understood the complexity of our application and could leverage the marketplace in a rare way.

Are there any areas they could improve?

Nothing comes to mind. One could always know more about other technologies, but that isn’t something I would say was missing.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Be prepared to onboard external or remote developers quickly, which can be challenging depending on the company. In the beginning, do quicker feedback cycles. Also, having a dedicated in-house person to take care of that in a more intensive way will lessen the burden.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

TIMIFY is an online scheduling platform for SMB's as well as Enterprises. The products are fully Cloud and Web- or Mobile-based. I started as the product manager for the web application and are now heading all product operations.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire simplabs?

We hired simplabs to build our core web application (basically a calendar) in ember.js. It was a time of transition from a version 2.0 product to the version 3.0 product. Simplabs was hired to build an international and localized product.

What were your goals for this project?

Version 3.0 of the product brought many new features and especially made the product internationally scalable by using Braintree as an integrated payment provider.

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor?

One of the developers at this time was connected in the Munich IT scene. Simplabs offered a good fit as they were in Munich and were able to offer a quick solution to our demands.

Describe the project and the services they provided in detail.

As the designs were mostly final, simplabs offered frontend coding and review, helped to apply guidelines for the whole project and took care of additional freelance developers.

What was the team composition?

The team consisted of 2 ember developers as the base in Munich. Another remote ember developer and a CSS developer. The size changed as we added up to 3 additional freelancers which were monitored when it came to code review and deployments by simplabs.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Can you share any information that demonstrates the impact that this project has had on your business?

Version 3.0 is still running today for a certain number of clients and build the base for a successful Start-Up company.

How was project management arranged and how effective was it?

We worked with GitHub issues and milestones. Remote communication was handled via Slack. As some part of the team was German we were able to speak in our native languages most of the time. But while some members were English speaking issues tracking and later calls were all handled in English.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

They were able to break up a big project into many pieces and deliver step by step what we needed.

Are there any areas for improvement?

As we had a monthly contract sometimes the tracking or estimation for features could've been clearer.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the head of web development at Vepro, a company that develops healthcare software.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with simplabs?

We were interested in using an open authorization (OAuth) mechanism with Ruby on Rails (Rails) and Ember.js. 

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

For the first step, I had a workshop with Marco (Founder & Director, simplabs). He taught me how to use OAuth with Rails and Ember.js. It was hands-on, and we developed the code in their office. Together, we created a prototype using a simple Rails and Ember.js project so the Ember.js client could authenticate with the Rails backend. We created an add-on for Ember.js to use as an authenticator.

What is the team composition?

I only worked with Marco.

How did you come to work with simplabs?

I met him at an Ember conference in Portland, Oregon. There aren’t many companies working with Ember.js. I talked with their team at the conference and remembered him for future reference. When I contacted him, he offered what we were interested in.

How much have you invested with them?

I invested €2,400 (approximately $2,600 USD).

What is the status of this engagement?

We worked together in May 2018 for two days.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We tested the solution with several clients, and it worked. We didn’t end up implementing it later on, it’s still waiting to be used, but that’s not the fault of simplabs. The prototype worked within our set schedule. We only booked the two days and got the prototype running within this timeframe.

How did simplabs perform from a project management standpoint?

He was a nice man, and everything worked out. I received a certificate that says I attended the workshop.

What did you find most impressive about them?

It’s hard to find people who work with Ember.js. Their team is developing a special add-on as a standard login authentication tool for Ember.js. They were the perfect fit for us, extending our authentication offerings with OAuth. I don’t know anyone else I could’ve asked.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, I was very happy with them. They’re not the cheapest service, but they’re good.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

Simplabs was very responsive and created a custom option for our needs. They went above and beyond working in the Elixir/Phoenix and Ember ecosystems. Would highly recommend!

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire simplabs?

Software development

What were your goals for this project?

Shipping product

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor?

Highly recommended within ember community

Describe the project and the services they provided in detail.

Built a lot of elixir and ember functionality within our app

What was the team composition?

Mostly Marco, with some other team members

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Can you share any information that demonstrates the impact that this project has had on your business?

Got us much closer to shipping

How was project management arranged and how effective was it?

Incredible efficiently

What did you find most impressive about this company?

The quality of code is impressive

Are there any areas for improvement?

Dance - Marco needs to work on his moves. Other than that, the code was outstanding, set a bar for our employees.