9LivesData

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

As the founder and executive VP, I hire software engineering resources.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire 9LivesData?

9LivesData serves as the engineering team for a commercial product that large IT enterprises use to manage data between storage devices and cloud providers. They provide engineering management and services. 

What were your goals for this project?

Our goal was to hire a team rather than individual coders. We needed a firm that could handle algorithmic work and performance optimization.

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor?

I have known the founder by reputation for many years and met him in person a handful of times. I was impressed by his knowledge, accomplishments, and character. He gave me a unique proposal to build an engineering team housed at his facility in Poland. He offered his personal touch in recruiting the engineering director and in maintaining the team. He also promised to weigh in on any major architectural decisions.

Describe the project and the services they provided in detail.

9LivesData is not extra coders for hire; they serve as my engineering department. They even push back against my product managers like any good engineering team. 9LivesData designs and develops the core of our product. 9LivesData also directs another team responsible for UI design. They effectively manage the entire engineering department, including product design, recruitment, and employee retention.

What was the team composition?

Our director of engineering has been with the project from the start. We also have about 10 full-time team members. Occasionally, 9LivesData scales up to complete specific projects. The team is quite stable with relatively little turnover.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Their insights and skills create best-in-class solutions. Our product stands out from the competition in terms of performance and resilience.

How was project management arranged and how effective was it?

9LivesData behaves like any other engineering department. My employees are responsible for product management, and 9LivesData does the engineering. We meet regularly to discuss roadmaps, after which they manage all aspects of delivery. They lead scrums, manage burn-down, and compile detailed reports and time sheets. They work like any well-oiled engineering department.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

I give them money, and they give me working software—I couldn't ask for anything more.

Are there any areas for improvement?

This is a compliment in disguise: 9LivesData is extremely disciplined. They don't like to write prototype-quality code. They don't like to wing it or take shortcuts, even when we need to patch something fast. They are committed to integrated testing, build automation and rock-solid product development. Sometimes we wish they would lighten up, but we're grateful that they don't.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

Bizerba makes products for weighing in several customer environments: industrial environments, retail environments, and also food processing. Over the last 20 to 25 years, we've been working on software for our hardware devices. I'm responsible for the retail segment and all the global software development.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with 9LivesData?

We’re focusing on the modernization of our retail software suite for the back office and for devices as well. We've been working on software solutions for 20 years now and so the software suite was dated. We’re using 9LivesData to bring the existing functionality stack to a more modern software environment.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

They support our existing code for the existing devices in the field. They also support us in making proof of concepts for new technologies to be used in the new software, supporting existing functionalities that we want to put into this new world.

What is the team dynamic?

We have a mostly static team of 5 people working for us. Sometimes the people change, but it's mostly the same. It was headed by someone who left the team some weeks ago, so now we have a new team leader.

How did you come to work with 9LivesData?

Our first contact was 3 years ago. We saw that they had good skills, and particularly some technical skills we were missing at that moment. They worked on new things to bring it into our team so that we get this knowledge as well.

How much have you invested with them?

We've spent €750,000–€1 million [$934,700–$124,600].

What is the status of this engagement?

We've been working with them since June 2015. For 2018, we have plans for a team of 5 linked to us. They're now turning our strategic partner for new technologies and proof of concepts in new technologies that we then take over to make it as a released product. They've become more and more involved in the digital space.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We're happy with the work they've done. They've brought new skills into our company for some technologies. We had a good functional knowledge about what we need, but we didn't have all the right technical skills.

They brought us new angles, experiences, and skill levels. This was a big point for us. They were able to do some proof of concepts and research on how we could solve different possibilities.

How did 9LivesData perform from a project management standpoint?

We have weekly scrum reviews and planning with them about the tasks they take over, the interfaces, and about internal functionalities we are doing. They are a loose part of our scrum team so we communicate on a weekly basis.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They showed us their skills and brought up new ideas on how to build process of software to quickly modernize on our side. They have a very good deployment of how they build their software. They also had good ideas for our internal way of doing that as well. This was something we could profit on.

Are there any areas they could improve?

It was sometimes challenging for us to follow their ideas. They wanted to speed up on several things we couldn’t manage. We would have liked them to be more relaxed. We discussed back and forth for a while until we found the right speed for both sides.

The first year and a half was more or less the preparation phase. Now, we are in the real daily business phase. The last 12 months, we've found a way to synchronize better. It looks very good now, but it was challenging in 2017.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

We didn't define the teamwork or how we would organize the project in the best way at first. We had different targets at the beginning of our partnership with them. This is something that should be clarified, especially when it is a partner like us which is a hardware house that is also doing software. Set up how the team works and how the workflow should be at the beginning before work begins. Have a synchronized beat of working.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

NEC is a large Japanese IT company. I am responsible for a storage software development project.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with 9LivesData?

They have been a part of my team since the project began 15 years ago. They were initially a part of our research entity, and spun off as 9LivesData ten years ago. Most of their core members were a part of the NEC research lab, which has delivered some complex storage software architecture to my business unit.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

We have relied on 9LivesData during the development of one of the products we sell: a backup storage device. It has scaled-out architecture with multiple nodes inside a single unit, all collaborating with each other and providing large storage capacity. It offers cutting-edge features like de-duplication, compression, and automatic balancing. 9LivesData built its core architecture, and their development team has continued with enhancements. At the moment, 70–80% of our work is dedicated to this product. 

What is the team composition?

I have interfaced with multiple people, mainly the team leaders. I believe they have around 10 leads. Depending on the component in question, I directly contact the person responsible. I have also been in contact with the president of their company, Cezary Dubnicki.

How did you come to work with 9LivesData?

The architecture of our product came from the NEC research lab in the U.S. 9LivesData’s current core staff were a part of our research lab at the time. They introduced the architecture that we later developed. We initially tried to take over its development in Japan, but decided to keep them inside the project because of the complexity of that architecture. Cezary Dubnicki eventually decided to spin out and build 9LivesData.

How much have you invested with them?

We spend $5 million to $6 million on their work on a yearly basis.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with 9LivesData in late 2007 or early 2008, and have an ongoing collaboration. The product is already in the market, but we need to enhance it on a continual basis.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

9LivesData is responsible for a core portion of our product, which determines its value. No other team could handle the enhancement work on such a complex product. The value of their work is good; they bring high-level skills that no other company could. They not only develop based on our requirements, but also proactively conceptualize ideas and enhancements. We are quite happy with their output.

How did 9LivesData perform from a project management standpoint?

They have two or three in-house project managers, who are quite proactive and responsive, as well as emergency responders whom we can contact during the weekends. We mainly communicate through email and phone.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They are particularly good at handling complex software development tasks like multi-node parallel processes.

Are there any areas they could improve?

They sometimes develop too aggressively, and we’ve sometimes had quality problems as a result. 9LivesData sometimes delivers an unnecessary number features, which has required that we push them back to previous development results. However, this aggressiveness and lack of hesitation when it comes to innovative code changes is also one of their positive attributes.

Do you have any advice for future clients of theirs?

9LivesData is a bit more expensive than Indian or Chinese developers, but their overall output is cost-effective. Clients should assign them the more important components so that the team can perform at maximum capability. For lower-level work, it’s probably not necessary to hire 9LivesData.