What was the scope of their involvement?
We modified our architecture with the added capability of delivering real-time data we collect in the plant to support staff. Employees included within the envelope of secure users can access data on safe operations of the plant and environmental protection through a mobile app to help the operational staff produce power. Our team’s engineers built a RESTful-based API and used JSON to transfer information back and forth from the web service.
I brought BairesDev on to help us build the frontend of a mobile app that consumes data sent from our web service. We’re developing it to support both Android and iOS. There is a relatively small amount of native code for each platform. The bulk of the app runs on a progressive web app (PWA) with a common code baseline for both platforms
We started with a discovery kickoff that lasted two weeks. When they came to our offices, we sat down together to hash out the project. I provided exact requirements. We discussed the functionality and mapped each feature back to the scoping document I had created. After we broke the project down, we entered each aspect into Jira.
Our biggest technical challenge was deploying push notifications built using Firebase under the iOS platform. Apple is very particular and restrictive about how they allow companies to send users notifications to their devices.
What is the team composition?
The team includes a lead developer, a supporting developer, a scrum master, a UX designer, and a QA person. I also interact with a business development manager on a regular basis and speak with other marketing resources periodically as well.
How did you come to work with BairesDev?
I conducted various Google searches and asked my contacts in the industry which kinds of resources they had used to build mobile apps. For a while, I couldn’t find any companies that fit the bill for us until the CEO of BairesDev sent me a very timely email.
Another company contacted me and I found two other potential candidates around the same time. During a two-month evaluation process, I wrote out scoping document to send to the four vendors. I held various phone conversations with each one and quickly eliminated two.
Based on our discussions and their references, BairesDev was clearly the most experienced in the areas that I wanted to build the frontend to address. They were more competent than the other companies and had already built an enterprise-scale mobile app. I wanted to leverage the expertise that they brought to the table and liked their overall approach.
How much have you invested with them?
We’ve spent $125,000-$150,000 so far.
What is the status of this engagement?
We started working together in February 2019, and the work is ongoing. Our current plan is to continue using BairesDev for version two of our mobile app. We are already in negotiations about a follow-on project with another group in our organization that I’ll be helping to facilitate. We hope to kick that off sometime this fall.
BairesDev’s performance met expectations across the board. The team distinguishes themselves by their commitment to hiring high-quality resources.