Supercharge

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the former digital services director at an independent creative agency based in London. 

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Supercharge?

Our agency had come up with an app idea. We needed to partner with a development company who could build it for us as we led the project creatively.

In London, people had been living in fear of the frequent knife assaults. Since one can’t call the police preemptively, we wanted a way to stop attacks from occurring. By creating a digital neighborhood watch, we aimed to give the community its power back. 

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

After detailing our app and its intended functionalities, we leaned on Supercharge’s expertise to keep the development simple and effective. Since this was a joint venture, we didn’t have a set budget from a third-party client.  We worked together to create the user journey. Supercharge transformed our TopLine designs into an app for iOS and Android. Since this development, we’ve brought them on for UX/UI design and a campaign-based web application.
 
Our neighborhood watch app includes geolocation, anonymous tags, and a Google Map API. Users can quickly drop an anonymous location pin when they feel endangered. Any other users within the search radius will receive a notification so they can get to a safe place. These pins are displayed in a heat map that shows the severity. If no one else reacts to a pin after an hour, it fades away. While our app isn’t endorsed by the police, it could be useful for them in the future.
 
What is the team composition? 

We worked with three people. When we got closer to launching to the App Store, we worked more hands-on with the developers. 

How did you come to work with Supercharge?

We found Supercharge through a recommendation from a satisfied former client. 

How much have you invested with them?

We spent around $50,000–$199,999.

What is the status of this engagement?

We worked together from April 2015–August 2018.
 

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

I’ve had great feedback from friends about the app Supercharge helped us develop. Everybody thinks it’s a great idea; it just hasn’t launched yet. 

How did Supercharge perform from a project management standpoint?

When we started the engagement, Supercharge assigned us a really nice project manager who we spoke to daily. We communicate via phone, email, and face-to-face. They were flexible about making changes. During our later projects, the project manager worked with our dev team in Budapest, and we held a Google Hangout. 

Adam (Managing Director, Supercharge) worked with us closely from day one. He attended all our meetings and was easy to contact. He was so amenable to our idea it felt like he wanted to build it as much as we did. We’ve never had any problems.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Supercharge was extremely easy to work with. I recommend them, and I’d use them again. The timezone difference posed no issues. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

I believe they under-scoped what they charged us on the first project. There seemed to be quite a significant jump in the cost for the second one because they were no longer trying to win that business. Adam is very honest. He apologized about the issue, but that could have been communicated earlier. I understand why he did it, though. 

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

We supply telecommunication equipment across the globe and are one of the biggest companies in our industry. My key responsibilities include IT and digital services for the company as well as prototype and operational support system development.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Supercharge?

We hired them to produce some of our prototypes and demos. Their greatest involvement precedes an event we hold each year.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

They develop user interfaces to help users navigate several dimensions of data and understand a variety of business tasks. I engage them mainly to support our big annual conference, which has a broad audience. We deliver a short value proposition and illustration of how our products help solve different use cases and demonstrate their value. Supercharge supports those efforts. Last year, they did about four demos with us. The stakeholders vary from project to project.

What is the team composition?

I interact with a primary point of contact and a few other individuals on their team.

How did you come to work with Supercharge?

We have a development unit in Budapest and engaged Supercharge initially to do some smaller projects for us. We considered working with other companies in other countries, but Supercharge offers a very good return on investment.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in 2006 and work with them on a daily basis. Our engagement is most intense from December–February each year.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Through the demos we develop with them, we generate a lot of leads. They’re an important part of our success.

How did Supercharge perform from a project management standpoint?

Project management is one of their strengths. Because our timelines are very intense from December—February each year, we have an iterative process to make sure deadlines are met. They’re very responsive and willing to accept changes to the project's structure. Though there is a lot of pressure in the process, they stay on track.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They're very flexible and responsive. The return on our investment is good, and they give us useful ideas for improvements.

Are there any areas they could improve?

I can’t think of anything they should improve.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Work with them. Start with a small project and make sure it delivers good value, then see what else they can provide. It’s important to have clear requirements and know what you want to accomplish from the beginning.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I work for a mobile financial services firm that serves customers in over 20 countries in Europe.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Supercharge?

We were looking for someone to develop a mobile banking application.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Supercharge has been our partner since the beginning. Their team built the first version of the app from scratch as well as the platform's huge backend. They made native mobile apps for both iOS and Android devices. Our in-house designers provided the UI designs and collaborated with Supercharge’s developers to create the great customer experience we currently have in our app.

What is the team composition?

The size of the team has changed depending on our needs. We’ve had a maximum of 14 developers working on our project: seven for iOS and seven for Android. A project manager also coordinates the work on their side.

How did you come to work with Supercharge?

One of our partners recommended them.

What is the status of this engagement?

We worked with Supercharge from January–December 2015, and the app was launched at the end of that year. We continue working with them to improve the app’s UI/UX and add more features.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Our customers have been impressed with the app. Most mobile banking apps in Europe are old-fashioned, but our app is quite appealing. We have Supercharge to thank for that.

How did Supercharge perform from a project management standpoint?

Aside from daily scrum meetings, we meet every second week in Budapest.

What did you find most impressive about them?

We're impressed with their project management, flexibility, and quality output.

Are there any areas they could improve?

I don’t have any complaints about Supercharge; that's why we’ve continued collaborating with them.

Do you have any advice for future clients of theirs?

I think that clients will be satisfied with their work.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I'm the VP of products and technology at Kodak Alaris, a direct to consumer business helping customers preserve memories through printed photo products.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Supercharge?

We engaged Supercharge to rebuild our Android app from scratch.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Supercharge rebuilt our app using a modular SDK approach, allowing us to reuse the code across other applications. Our in-house team provided some designs, but Supercharge collaborated with us on additional design and UI/UX work. They also worked closely with our backend team to integrate our APIs, incorporating features that allow users the flexibility of ordering prints at one of our kiosk locations.

What is the team composition?

We've worked with about ten people on their team, including a product manager, a technical lead, a senior account contact, and a couple of their engineers.

How did you come to work with Supercharge?

I had previously worked with our account lead many years ago at another company, so I reached out to them during our RFP process.

What is the status of this engagement?

We've been working together since January 2018 and expect the platform to launch over the next few weeks (October 2018).

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Supercharge delivered a fast and reliable platform, meeting all of our requirements. It's easily been the best initial deliverable I've ever received from a vendor. Even though we're in the process of fixing some minor issues during the QA process, the quality is already extremely high and the app has a lot more capacity compared to our previous version.

How did Supercharge perform from a project management standpoint?

Their communication is great. We generally hold calls with them multiple times a week and they're very proactive about staying in contact with us as things come up or as they need additional information. Even though they're located in London, they've managed to visit my office in San Francisco a few times in a relatively short timeframe.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They're experts in Android development; they clearly have a lot of experience in the Fintech space and know the ins and outs of Android technology. They also offered a lot of great creative suggestions regarding the design of our UX throughout development.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No. I've been satisfied with everything they've done thus far.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and position.

I am the Engineering Manager of Vitality Drive International

Describe what your company does in a single sentence.

Vitality Drive International, part of Discovery Ltd, develops and manages global driving-behavior programs that improve driver safety and reward good driving.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

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

• * Rebuild our Vitality Drive app platform so that we can onboard new insurers at several times the previous speed.
• * Modernize our tech stack to make it more maintainable, extensible, and future-proof.
• * Introduce Kotlin Multiplatform to enable significant code sharing across iOS and Android, driving major cost savings.
• * Encapsulate our business logic, network logic, and IP into a reusable SDK, making it easy for other developers to integrate our capabilities.
• * Support the onboarding of multiple insurers globally while continuously developing innovative features

SOLUTION

How did you find Supercharge?

Referral

Why did you select Supercharge over others?

• High ratings
• Referred to me
• Company values aligned

How many teammates from Supercharge were assigned to this project?

6-10 Employees

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

Supercharge worked closely with our internal team to deliver a full rebuild of the Vitality Drive International mobile platform. The scope included: Core Platform Rebuild: Re-architecting the app for scalability and performance to support rapid onboarding of new insurance partners.Tech Modernisation: Migrating to a modern, extensible stack, introducing Kotlin Multiplatform (KMM) for significant code sharing and long-term maintainability.SDK Development: Encapsulating our business logic, network logic, and proprietary IP into a well-documented SDK, enabling other developers and partners to integrate our capabilities with ease.Feature Delivery: Designing and implementing innovative features that showcase our driver-behaviour programme, with ongoing support for enhancements and new releases.Global Insurer Onboarding: Supporting the onboarding of multiple insurance companies across different markets, ensuring each implementation met local requirements and timelines.Key deliverables included: A rebuilt Vitality Drive International app (iOS & Android) on a modernised tech stack.A reusable SDK packaging our IP and business logic.A scalable framework for onboarding new insurers globally.Continuous feature development and innovation for end-users

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

• Dramatically faster onboarding: Reduced insurer onboarding time from around 3 months to 2–3 days, assuming prerequisites are in place.
• Cost savings through code sharing: Achieved around 60–70% shared codebase across iOS and Android using Kotlin Multiplatform, significantly reducing duplicate development costs.
• Improved maintainability & velocity: Shortened release cycles from 1–2 weeks to daily builds in some cases, enabled by the modernized, extensible tech stack.
• Global scalability: Onboarded three new insurance partners across multiple markets within the year. The rebuilt platform is scalable, with capacity to support a much higher onboarding rate as needed.
• Innovation throughput: Delivered new user-facing features at a higher release cadence, including streamlined registration journeys, complex entity-relationship and user configuration support, run-time configuration, driving score and historical performance presentation, a rewards mall, CMS & localisation integration for global deployments, and complex telematics integrations.
• Stability & quality: Reduced production issues and hotfixes by a significant margin through improved architecture and SDK encapsulation.
• Data & analytics enablement: Implemented comprehensive analytics, with every page and key action tracked, and support for custom event tracking, providing insights that directly inform product design and feature development.

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

Supercharge meets their commitments with reliability and professionalism. When scope is stable, they deliver on time, and when requirements shift, as they often do our environment, they adapt seamlessly and keep the project progressing without losing momentum. They bring an always-can-do attitude, approaching challenges with creativity and pragmatism. Their team pushes us to stay on our toes by championing the latest technologies and industry best practices, while at the same time developing with wisdom and balance. This combination of dependability, adaptability, and thought leadership makes them an invaluable partner.

What was your primary form of communication with Supercharge?

• Virtual Meeting
• Email or Messaging App

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

What stands out most about Supercharge is the combination of their mindset and expertise. They bring an always-can-do attitude, handling shifting requirements with ease while keeping momentum high. At the same time, they continually push us toward the latest technologies and industry best practices, challenging us to think bigger and stay current. What makes this unique is that they balance this forward-thinking drive with real wisdom - knowing when to innovate boldly and when to take a pragmatic path. That mix of positivity, adaptability, and thoughtful technical leadership is rare and invaluable.

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

Their pricing is on the higher side compared to some alternatives, but we’ve found the value, quality, and speed they bring to be well worth the investment. Beyond that, any improvements are more about fine-tuning ways of working as requirements evolve, rather than gaps in their delivery.