Auxility

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I’m the Founder at Havas Creative Group Ukraine, a top marketing agency. Our job is to help other companies win the hearts of their audience and strengthen the communication with them. We tailor our solutions to our clients’ needs and the specifics of the industry they work in.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Auxility?

We approached the Auxility team looking for help with integrating payment processing solution for one of the non-profit projects we manage.

What were your goals for this project?

We needed to get it done as fast as possible.

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor?

Auxility managed to make a smooth integration and get the system live in 3 days. They also migrated the infrastructure to the cloud significantly lowering the maintenance costs.

Describe the project and the services they provided in detail.

Payment methods for fundraising

What was the team composition?

We communicated with couple of team members

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

They have helped us address our challenge in a timely manner. They were willing to share their expertise with others. The website was live in days accepting donations to support healthcare workers and families during COVID-19 pandemic. https://centr-dopomogy.org/

How was project management arranged and how effective was it?

Perfect! Our team was added to their Slack channel.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

They are already doing great.

Are there any areas for improvement?

We had absolutely nothing to complain about. We appreciate the work they’d done for us. Don’t be scared to hire a remote team. When working with Auxility, distance wasn’t a problem. They are responsible, dependable, and eager to make things right.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the founder of a startup that makes mobile applications. 

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Auxility?

We brought on Auxility to help with frontend development and UX/UI design of two apps. The first was a trip planning app, and the second was a golf swing analysis app. 

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Our in-house team took care of all the backend development. They were responsible for UX and frontend development. Their team came in once the travel application was partially completed and they took over running design sprints and tests. 

They worked on the golfing app with us from the beginning. This project was more technical because it required videoing capabilities within the app and integrating machine learning software. They were able to make the app usable for people despite how complicated the development was. 

What is the team composition? 

My main points of contact were our project manager and Vadym (CEO). There were also two developers, and a designer. There were probably two additional team members that helped with project management and testing. 

How did you come to work with Auxility?

I was referred to them by a colleague, and then I contacted them on UpWork. 

What is the status of this engagement?

We worked on this project from September 2019-February 2020. 

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

They were able to stay on budget and deliver the product in a timely manner. 

How did Auxility perform from a project management standpoint?

They performed extremely well. They had a formal process and were agile. Before working with them, we didn’t have any formal project management systems in place. They made sure we were on track and coordinated the project. I think that’s why it was so successful. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

They’re honest and straightforward. Their team set realistic expectations and worked within our budget and timeline. We had a great working relationship because they take ownership of the project they’re working on. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

We were resource-limited due to the small size of our startup. It took them some time to adjust to these constraints, but they did a great job. 

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

It’s important to be honest with them. They’ll be accommodating to any requests.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

Hi , I am Dan Webster and I am the Project Manager for Arts2U

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What were your goals for this project?

We are working on solving some important problem for artist to reach there audiences

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor?

I had a chance to network with one of their project leads a Toronto Tech Summit in 2018 and the relationship has built from there with sequential development as we grow.

Describe the project and the services they provided in detail.

Auxility helped us build out our admin system for out arts event listing platform. They are helping us aggregate arts content and quickly, and preparing us to onboard many producers to our system. They have access to a range of design and programing talent which helped us achieve a scalable solutions to build out business.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Auxility has delivered on time and on budget which has enabled us to meet our milestones make our funders smile.

How did your relationship with the vendor evolve?  

Our project is growing out of our offices in Montreal and is looking like a vialble solutions for artists worldwide

How did the vendor address any challenges that arose?

Auxility have been methodical in proposing teams and structures to address each phase of our project

How was project management handled?

The project lead from Auxility has worked in close communication with us at every step.

Is there anything that the vendor did well or that you would consider a strength?

Their strengths are that they have access to a range of developer talent, who practice attention to detail & follow through.

Are there any areas for improvement?

I haven’t run into any specific areas that need improvement.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the founder of an interior design company.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Auxility?

We needed help with mobile application development.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Our team gave them some briefs about which kind of applications we needed and how we wanted it to work. They guided us toward a successful result. In the end, we decided the application would be iPad-only, which would be better for our business.

We prepared a very basic written brief with some screenshots for the design. They guided me on which parts were possible and unnecessary. They even made a very nice interface that I would never have imagined.

What is the team composition?

There was a project manager. Others also worked on the project. 

How did you come to work with Auxility?

They got in contact with me. When I started this, I didn’t know what to do or how to choose a company. I didn’t know what would make me choose a team. They explained every step and made me a timeline on how everything would go. After this, I decided to go with them.

How much have you invested with them?

We invested $10,000-$50,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in August until October 2019.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We have a very nice, functional application. It was finished completely and the work was done very professionally. The best part was that we understood the processes and what would happen in each step. The application is very intuitive and easy to use.

We haven't marketed the projects much, so we're waiting on more metrics. Right now, we're mainly using it for our own needs. Some of our competitors have bought iPads to use this application. 

How did Auxility perform from a project management standpoint?

They made us a program about how everything would work. We had never done this kind of work before and were afraid of how things would go. However, every few days, we knew what they were doing. There weren’t any delays. The team was reachable and made any changes when needed.

What did you find most impressive about them?

It was very nice for us to receive information about the services that were being provided to me. When there were problems, I was always able to reach them. They were very honest, prepared, and professional.

Are there any areas they could improve?

Everything was good. I never needed anything else.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

They are the perfect company to guide you and give you all the information you need in a very clear way. Anyone working with them is really lucky.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

We help our clients to solve nontrivial business challenges. I am part of the Data Science department where we develop robust models to optimize the business processes of our clients.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Auxility?

The project was to develop a scalable cross-platform mobile tablet application for the banking sector for the bank in Russia

What were your goals for this project?

The goal was to develop software in order to optimize a network of bank branches by identifying the most profitable closings within different cities

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor?

Recommendation of a colleague with whom I previously worked

Describe the project and the services they provided in detail.

The main functionality of the application:

• Display information on bank branches in different sections.
• Clusterization of branches according to various parameters: region, city, number of customers.
• Advanced integration with Yandex Map with custom objects drawings.
• Display of flows of profits/clients after closing a bank branch.
• Setting "local" and "global" optimization.
• Algorithm setup.

The company also provided services for cross-platform mobile development and development of a small middleware backend.

What was the team composition?

I am as the product owner, 1 project manager and 1 full stack developer

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The solution helped to identify the potential ways to increase market share and maximize the efficiency of resource usage

How was project management arranged and how effective was it?

On the project was using the Agile framework. Scrum was chosen as the project management method. Very good project management was carried out, all risks were identified before development, a well-detailed analysis was made. Everything was implemented on time. Special thanks to PM Artem Sisetskyi for professionalism, high qualification, 24/7 availability, and communication.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

They had an excellent understanding of the project requirements. I did not spend much time explaining what should be done. Fairly open and friendly communication I liked that team could make small fixes in the core algorithm of optimization (algorithm was developed on our side) by themselves. This did not stop work at some stages. Super grateful to the team for working on the weekend. Great responsibility. It was very important.

Are there any areas for improvement?

In general, I can’t remember such areas. I am very pleased with the service that the company provided, I will work with them further on other projects and recommend it to my colleagues.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

ECOntainer is an agritech startup with ambitions to take over the vertical farming market. My name is Nikita Romankin, I'm the company CEO and co-founder.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Auxility?

ECOntainer team needed to build it’s initial digital presence, as well as understand the potential of digital space for business development. We wanted to not only build a website, but also create a mobile app experience MVP/prototype. Furthermore, we are expecting to work with large amounts of data and we wanted to learn how we can efficiently use the data and establish an initial framework for future data lake solution

What were your goals for this project?

We wanted to have digital tools helping us to present the project to potential investors and clients. Based on the experience and the outcome we get working with Auxility we wanted to understand whether they're capable of managing the data the project generates in order to prolong their engagement.

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor?

Auxility was recommended to me by a former colleague who also used their services and was happy with the results.

Describe the project in detail.

During several months Auxility team provided resources and consulting for us to build out our mobile application prototype for investor presentations, as well as assessment of Big Data solutions for our business. The engagement included Discovery/Assessment Phase, which helped building out a roadmap for current and future digital solutions in mobile application and big data spaces. Auxility team had several meetings with us to establish process framework and manage engagement expectations, as well as agree on deliverables, such as powerpoint presentations of roadmap, mobile application prototype and website. Having defined the collaboration framework, Auxility began performing the analysis and delivery in an agile fashion, providing regular updates and engaging us in calibration sessions.

What was the team composition?

The team consisted of a project manager, 2 mobile app developers and a data scientist. Project manager was always in touch hoping streaming communication and giving regular updates on project progress, while developers and data scientist were focusing on their scope of work previously defined.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Auxility delivered all the agreed artifacts and mobile application prototype that we used to successfully perform partner, investor and client presentations and go into the second phase of product and business development. In future, we’re planning to incorporate built solutions for our full commercial launch.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

Timely communication and fast delivery were key for us and Auxility did not disappoint. Convenient communication tools, fast responses and agile ability to adjust to changing requirements. We were surprised that Auxility was so proactive and managed our expectations well, which allowed us to remove some of the management overhead usually typical of such projects.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

High level of expertise packaged in a small agency. Auxility offered a very dedicated and personal approach. We really felt supported throughout the project. Even afterwards, we received top-notch digital consulting and development services. The overall quality was great: from initial communication to project management to code.

Are there any areas for improvement?

Not really, we were very happy with the results and will work more with them in future.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the VP of strategy and business operations for a children’s clothing delivery service. We work with parents to put together outfits and will send it to them in a box. The customer then decides what they want to keep and sends the rest back.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Auxility?

We were collecting a ton of information on customer preferences and behavior, like why products were returned or kept, but we hadn’t leveraged any of that data. We also had several stylists who were producing conversational data through direct interactions with customers. For example, they knew when events like family pictures or vacations were coming up, but we weren’t able to use this information.

We brought in Auxility to understand correlations across customer preferences. With their data analysis, we hoped to improve product recommendations, predict transaction frequency in the future, and streamline the shopping process for stylists.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

The team sat down with us at a kickoff meeting, and while we gave them an in-depth walkthrough of our business, they asked many questions and began requirements gathering. They then came back to us with an outline of information and data sets. We had a couple of follow-up meetings, and then they presented their recommendations using PowerPoint.

What is the team composition?

We worked with four people, including the team leader. He delegated responsibilities and led requirements gathering.

How did you come to work with Auxility?

They were recommended to me by a professor at a data analytics conference. At the time, we weren’t really sure what we needed and were exploring several options.

What is the status of this engagement?

 We worked together from May – July 2019.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We were really excited about the work they produced, and were looking forward to implementing their recommendations. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to see how they could impact our business because of extenuating circumstances outside of our engagement. However, they provided interesting insights that I’ll be able to bring with me to other things in the future. Our team was extremely pleased with the level of effort and the deliverables that they presented to us.

How did Auxility perform from a project management standpoint?

We appreciated that the project leader frequently checked timelines and expectations. In addition to communicating through Slack, we used Google Sheets and had access to a working document. There, we could comment and ask questions, which assured us that they were on top of everything.

What did you find most impressive about them?

I loved how passionate they were about our work. They definitely had done their homework before meeting with us because they came into our kickoff meeting with really thoughtful questions and were curious about our business model. I didn't have any expectations, but I was pleasantly surprised by our conversation and their ideas.

Additionally, I'm really pleased with their communication. They were helpful because they outlined what they needed from us in order for our engagement to be successful. From the beginning, we knew exactly what data points we needed provide them.

Are there any areas they could improve?

Although we would have liked to know more about how the work was delegated within the team, there’s nothing I suggest they improve.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

When working with any consulting firm, it’s really important for the client to be upfront on their expectations. You can't expect someone to come in and solve all your problems—you have to do some of the work too. You need to frame the problem and then provide the data that they need. Make sure that you have the time and resources to support them, and ensure that you can meet their data requests.