12 Tech

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am the CTO and a principal consultant in charge of all the projects of a tech business solutions firm. My responsibilities are primarily twofold: I make sure that we pick the right technologies for use within our company as well as our customers.

What challenge were you trying to address with 12 Tech?

We needed some expertise in using Google’s AI platform for a call center project.

What was the scope of their involvement?

We partnered with Tech 12 to create a chatbot for a federal customer. They centered around the automation of the bot, working with JavaScript and Google Call Center AI to facilitate the conversation end of the bot. We did the rest. The project included programming of the bot, voice response, logic, and database access. Finally, we came up with a prototype system of the bot that permitted the federal agency to field inquiries and pass them along to a live agent.

However, the bot didn’t stop there. It actually listened to conversations and made distinctions between the agent and the client. The bot automatically determined the context of the conversation and brought it to the agent to help satisfy that particular client’s need.

They also helped us with other projects. I can’t say much about it, but it involved website design and development. I was impressed by how quickly they were able to respond and provide us with the right people to get the work done.

What is the team composition?

We worked with their principal consultant and another senior-level person. We also worked indirectly with some of their developers. It was probably four people over the course of the whole engagement. 

How did you come to work with Tech 12?

We put a request on Upwork because we were having trouble finding people with the right talent for this project. Fortunately, Tech 12 had experience with Google Call Center AI, which was primarily the reason we decided to hire them. 

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working in March 2020. However, we had to put the project on hold in August 2020, but we expect to start again soon.  

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

We measure success by completeness, timeliness, and quality, and Tech 12 matched up to that. 

How did Tech 12 perform from a project management standpoint?

We used our own tool management platform. Apart from that, we communicated via Google Meets, email, texting, and Signal. As far as deadlines, they were always on time. We never had an issue understanding what we needed to do and by when. Everybody was on the same page. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

They were professional and knowledgeable in their domain. The quality of their work was outstanding. Working with Tech 12 was always a pleasant and enjoyable experience. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

We don’t have any complaints. We felt very satisfied and got everything we wanted.

Any advice for potential customers?

The Tech 12 team is very proactive. If they need something, they will contact clients. Having thorough communication is the only way to meet schedules, and Tech 12 exceeds at that.

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am CEO of an AI startup in the Greater Boston Area. We are a team of 5 people with a strong background in data science.

For what projects/services did your company hire 12 Tech?

Our technology was developed over the last 6 months by our internal data science team. We had customers who wanted to use our models and decided a cloud-based product was the best approach. We didnt have the skills in-house to move our work into the cloud.

What were your goals for this project?

We wanted our customers to be able to call our AI models from their back-end processes through a series of APIs. This required us to build an AWS architecture and APIs that would cover the training, deployment and inference of our models.

How did you select 12 Tech?

My team submitted a project proposal to Upwork to find freelance help. 12 Tech responded with a clear proposal to meet our needs and had good success with other clients found on Upwork. After speaking with Syed, we were impressed, and hired 12 Tech.

Describe the project in detail.

We wanted our customers to be able to call our AI models from their back-end processes through a series of APIs. This required us to build an AWS architecture and APIs that would cover the training, deployment and inference of our models. 12 Tech took care of this process.

What was the team composition?

We were assigned a project manager and developer help as required. Our project was conducted remotely with regular catch up meetings on Zoom and day-to-day interactions over Slack. 12 Tech were prompt to respond to any questions and queries and delivered as promised.

Can you share any outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

Our project was a success. 12 Tech gave us a structure and process that enables us to provide access to our models to customers through AWS hosted APIs.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

Excellent as described above

What did you find most impressive about this company?

An ability to work with folks from a different technical background and translate our work into a cloud based product.

Are there any areas for improvement?

Some additional help working through the long-term cost impacts of decisions made about our cloud infrastructure now, would be helpful for long-term business planning.

Please describe your company and your position there.

I'm the Managing Director of a boutique marketing and branding agency that serves health-tech companies

For what projects/services did your company hire 12 Tech, and what were your goals?

We've been working with 12 Tech to update and create new webpages for our clients. In some cases, we wanted to optimize the performance of the pages and streamline the UX. In other cases, we asked 12 Tech to create new pages.

How did you select 12 Tech and what were the deciding factors?

We conducted a broad search for smaller, more nimble development agencies to help us with our projects. I asked each agency to answer a set of 3 technical questions. We worked with a technical consultant to evaluate the responses. 12 Tech had the most thorough, technically sound responses, as well as a collaborate, open communication style.

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

We've done a range of projects with 12 Tech so far. Each involves a kick-off of sorts, in which we explain our needs, goals, timeline, and budget. Syed, the head of 12 Tech, does an initial assessment of our needs and then assigns us a developer and/or web designer, depending on the project.

Updates are provided to us on a regular basis, sometimes multiple times a day, which is very helpful in keeping our clients up to date. Draft web pages are usually created on a staging server, so we're able to see and provide feedback before that code is pushed to production. For web design work, the designer works in Adobe XD and we're able to provide feedback asynchronously.

Both are processes that are efficient and effective. What's also particularly effective is that Syed oversees the developers and web designers, and he typically reviews the workplan before they get started and reviews the work before it gets sent to us for review. The developers and designers are very skilled, but it's very helpful to have a senior-level person guide the workplan and quality of work.

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

We've worked closely with Syed, the head of 12 Tech, as well as a some of the developers and web designers.

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

In one project, website performance was much improved. For other projects, we received very positive feedback from our clients on the UX and design.

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

Communication is done through Upwork, which has been working well for us. The 12 Tech team is very responsive and amiable. Do keep in mind that the developers and web designers are in Pakistan and so they're about half a day ahead if you're in the US.

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

High-quality technical help and support, very responsive communication, great project management, professionalism is very high

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

Nothing comes to mind