BGO Software

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am the co-founder of proscola GmbH. We provide an education management application.

What challenge were you trying to address with BGO Software?

We had a software solution that was developed using Microsoft Access. Over time, we proved and tested the product and we were looking to modernize the system. We wanted a development partner who could bring us to a more up-to-date platform.

What was the scope of their involvement?

I’m not willing to share that many specific details about our software. We started the project with a clear set of requirements for the system’s design and operative flow. BGO Software developed each element quickly and with a high level of quality. The team conducted all of the proper testing processes to assure the app’s performance met our standards. In addition to fulfilling our requirements, the BGO team created iPhone and iPad versions of the education management platform. Because the app was to be used in a school system, they also programmed a strong layer of security protection.

What is the team composition?

We worked with a project manager, who was supported by a team of developers. BGO Software provided the appropriate amount of resources to accommodate our desired pace for the workflow. If we needed to complete a task quickly, they scaled up the development team at no extra charge.

How did you come to work with BGO Software?

Having a background in development, I was looking for a team I could really trust. From an initial search, we had a list of 15 potential partners scattered across Europe. After quickly reviewing each, we brought the list down to 10. We conducted comprehensive interviews with each and shortlisted 3 development agencies. I sent each of them the details of our project and requested that they sent in some documentation that addressed the requirements. BGO Software was not the cheapest, but the level of skill and quality reflected in their proposal was far above the other two companies.

What is the status of this engagement?

We worked on this project from December 2017–April 2018.

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

BGO Software originally quoted around six months for this project and completed a major version within a little over four months. So far, there haven’t been any negative responses. Their team exceeded our requirements and took the updated system to a new level. Throughout the engagement, the team proactively improved on our original product with additional elements and solutions. They were expensive, but we got a lot for our money. The quality of their work justified the extra costs. We’ve had many positive experiences with BGO Software and we continue to partner with them on other projects.

How did BGO Software perform from a project management standpoint?

We had a great relationship with BGO Software’s team. They were trustworthy, responsive, and detail-oriented. All of our communication was scheduled. On their end, they tracked the project using Jira and sent us consistent updates from that data. All other contact was through email. We never had to reach out to them, they always contacted us with any questions. With each task, they took the time to form a solid understanding of the requirements before starting any work. The team always thought ahead.

What did you find most impressive about them?

I really appreciated the team’s open culture. They have fun with their work and we never heard any complaints. The BGO team enjoys designing and developing and they take pride in their products.

Are there any areas they could improve?

Within the realm of design and development, I don’t see any areas for improvements. I would like to see BGO Software expand their services to include support. Their team’s industry experience, level of quality, and communication skills would make them a great candidate for a service provider. I’ve asked them, but they seem to be quite focused on their core services.

Any advice for potential customers?

Active communication is key to a successful partnership. That’s a general piece of advice for anyone working with a company in a different country. Also, if they can, I recommend clients go and visit the BGO Software team to get a feel for their culture and workflow. This also gives the BGO team a chance to put a face on the product they’re working to complete.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I'm the CEOs of Brite GmbH in Switzerland. We are developing legal software that we deliver to service providers globally.

What challenge were you trying to address with BGO Software?

As a relatively small organization, scalability is key to accommodating a variable number of customers and the development effort they require. Instead of hiring more internal staff, we engaged BGO Software as an outsourced component of our I.T. and development departments.

What was the scope of their involvement?

During our initial in-person meeting, we discussed the terms and conditions. BGO Software’s primary challenge was to quickly take over a significant portion of source code for a fully functional and productive application. As they commenced, they cultivated a thorough understanding of our business and the application’s purpose. They learned about the existing code so they could build and integrate new functionalities step by step.

We initially made a proof of concept with basic functions. Technologies include JavaScript and Angular for the frontend. The backend uses a dynamic workflow engine with a dynamic SQL database below it. They’re gradually generating specific parts of the application to be adopted as a module. 

As we get further into development, BGO Software has taken on operational tasks and delivered software to our customers. We’re now moving into bug fixating, optimization and streamlining the product. They’ll focus on specific pieces of code going forward. We plan to have them develop all the foreseeable new features for the coming years and incorporate them into our existing dynamic modules. 

What is the team composition? 

We work with a team of four resources from BGO Software including a frontend developer, backend developer, and project manager. A QA resource checks and quality-grades all the developers' work before it gets deployed to customers. Having this full-fledged team was very beneficial for a customer like us. Comparable service providers usually only allocate one developer, whose skill level is often inconsistent. 

How did you come to work with BGO Software?

I’d been looking for a partner for a long time with little success until I found BGO Software through a reference. They’d worked with large Swiss corporations I’d heard of. I contacted past clients to inquire about the team’s methodology and if they planned to continue the partnership. Based on their answers, I reached out to BGO Software. We agreed to set up a month-long trial period to assess the quality of their services and get to know each other. 

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together this year. Our project is still ongoing, and we plan to extend our engagement conceivably into 2019. 

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

BGO Software rewrote the code to entirely recalibrate and enhance our existing dashboards. They've developed external components to integrate within our software. They did an especially good job with the KPI dashboard that visualizes the data customers enter into our application’s database. 

We've seen a very high level of interest from prospective consumers since we launched the new version of our software with expanded functionality. Our existing users have expressed overall satisfaction, as well. On a project basis, we plan to steadily extend our partnership going forward. It will be a much larger effort as we enter 2019. 

How did BGO Software perform from a project management standpoint?

Along with our scheduled weekly calls, I have a point of contact for any unexpected problems I encounter. They’ll prioritize my question and respond with either an appropriate answer or a timeframe for resolution. Speaking with the same person regardless of the type of issue at hand simplifies our correspondence and avoids disturbing the developers in their day-to-day work.

From a task point of view, BGO Software is very transparent. I have access to their Jira account and use it to track progress based on our weekly project meetings. They use this tool to document all their work neatly.  I can easily follow along with each phase and ensure all the tasks we assign are executed.  I appreciated that we could meet in person on a few occasions. They had other clients located nearby in Basel. Having face-to-face interactions helped us pinpoint how to engage as best as possible. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

The quality and personalized level of service BGO Software delivers is notably special. I appreciate their team’s consistent engagement, from the CEO down to individual developers. They’re always thinking two steps ahead. Many comparable firms only complete the exact work requested. BGO Software not only delivered on our full specifications but also optimized and improved them along the way based on expert knowledge. 

Having been in the industry for many years, this has been a totally unique experience for me. The entire team is doing a tremendous job. BGO Software's offices have a state-of-the-art environment. They offer extraordinary support both externally and internally. BGO Software produces high-quality products, and they're great communicators. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

BGO Software operates and maintains our existing applications on a global basis, which demands a rapid pace. The speed of delivery could improve, but that relates more to our internal processes based on what we need to accomplish. We work together as a very solid team and consistently seek to improve our collaboration's efficiency. We've gotten faster over time, but I'd like to get up a few gears higher. 

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the co-founder of INVISR, a software development company.

What challenge were you trying to address with BGO Software?

We needed help with development.

What was the scope of their involvement?

They’ve helped us with multiple projects that incorporate the latest and greatest web technologies.

What is the team composition?

We typically work with between 5–10 resources depending on the project. It’s been across the board from a project management and development standpoint.

How did you come to work with BGO Software?

One of our co-founders had worked on a project with BGO’s owner that went well.

How much have you invested in them?

We’ve spent around $150,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with them at the beginning of 2017 and the relationship is ongoing.

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

They’ve helped tremendously from both an efficiency and bandwidth standpoint.

How did BGO Software perform from a project management standpoint?

They’re great. They’ve done an excellent job when it comes to hitting deadlines. We haven’t experienced any communication problems due to language barriers. We use Jira, Salesforce, and Slack to communicate.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They’re very collaborative, willing to get creative with their ideas, and able to understand where we need to go from a business perspective. They feel like an extension of our team.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, I think they’re great.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Utilize them as a real partner and not just as an offshore development team. Have them involved in the project from the beginning.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

We do software development for an emergency response services company, working primarily with the oil and gas industries. The Coast Guard is one of our major clients. I am the vice president.

What challenge were you trying to address with BGO?

We were looking to take our current application, IP software, and migrate it from Silverlight to HTML5. Our application is an emergency response incident management system for hurricanes, floods, fires, oil spills, and things like that. We were looking for contracted assistance to get us started, and we needed development staff augmentation.

What was the scope of their involvement?

We had a full Silverlight application, and they provided expertise in HTML5, ASP.NET, and architecture initial setup. They’ve been developing various parts of the application in 1-2-month phases. We give them parts of our existing application to be redeveloped in HTML5.

What is the team dynamic?

They've provided a project manager, developers, QA people, and UI graphics developers as needed. It’s been a smooth process.

How did you come to work with them?

We were committed to continue using Telerik’s control set and ASP.NET realm. We looked at their highest-level partners, and BGO was one of three we sent a request for proposal to. They won the job from there.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in January 2015, and the work is ongoing.

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

We're still in development. We’ve been using as many pieces off the existing application as we can and redeveloping a new HTML5 frontend for it. They're helping us have a version ready that doesn't require the use of Silverlight.

They also are engaged in a separate mobile application project, of which Phase 1 is complete, and they've been involved in a Xamarin mobile application development project.

How did they perform from a project management standpoint?

My primary point of contact has been Dimitar [Project Manager, BGO Software]. He’s excellent. There’s always concern when working with an offshore company, but there haven’t been any language barriers. They’ve been there to support us virtually the whole time. We use their project management software for communication, bug tracking, and project scoping.

They’re 8 hours ahead of us, so some of their developers apparently adjusted their schedules to be more accommodating to troubleshooting question/answers that we might have in the morning that come in late in their day. So, that hasn’t been an issue at all.

What did you find most impressive about them?

The fact we’ve been working with them for 2 ½ years speaks for itself.

Are there any areas they could improve?

The only issue would be in estimating the hours it might take to complete a task, but we don't always provide specific enough details to fully scope out the work, so it's not all their responsibility.

Do you have any advice for future clients who may start working with BGO?

They have a good deal of technical expertise. If a U.S. company is looking to interact with them, they should have someone technical on the U.S. side to serve as sort of a liaison.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

We are part of a national health agency and we regulate medical trials.

What challenge were you trying to address with BGO Software?

We needed a new system developed.

What was the scope of their involvement?

It is essentially a regulatory piece of software, which is a web-based system that allows us to manage our workflow. It is quite complex when it comes to the business logic, as it sits on top of a large SQL Server database. The software is developed based on Microsoft Stack.

What is the team dynamic?

We worked with a different number of developers, depending on the size of the work. Their expertise is based around ASP.NET framework, and we work with no more than ten people at most. We tend to work with the same developers.

How did you come to work with BGO Software?

I had worked with BGO previously in another role and that was how we approached them.

What is the status of this engagement?

We began working with BGO Software in 2013.

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

We have had a lot of user feedback, which is always extremely good. We have a help desk which allows us to monitor the level of things after release, which has been really positive. We always do post-implementation reviews and they are always very positive.

How did BGO Software perform from a project management standpoint?

We communicated through Skype and we are in touch daily. We used JIRA as a project management tool, as well. Even though they are based in Bulgaria, there was no language barrier whatsoever, as their English is excellent.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Their flexibility and passion for delivery are really impressive. They always go the extra mile, more so than another contractor would. BGO have always delivered admirable flexibility, where it is almost like a partnership, and their need to succeed is as great as ours.

Are there any areas they could improve?

They could invest more time in the quality system, but that is a minor thing.

I have always been really impressed by the quality of service we’ve had. Any issues I have ever had are always minor; they are vastly outweighed by how positive BGO are with development and how much they want to help. They are very committed to producing high-quality work and working with you.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

Intuito Websites is a solo operation where I make websites and do stateside project management for larger websites.

What challenge were you trying to address with BGO Software?

BGO Software has helped me with two projects where clients approached me with a project that was too large for me.

What was the scope of their involvement?

One project that we’ve been working on for a couple of years is a learning management system. It’s a web application that manages multiple schools in the real estate industry. Anybody that has expertise can set up a certification school in any given state and they can use the system that we’re making to manage the students and certify them as realtors or get a continuing education certification.

The app is PHP with MySQL. It was a project that was very complicated from the beginning. BGO did a great job of implementing it. There was quite a bit of scope change throughout the project. There was a lot of flexibility needed. Projects can fail with all those changes or there can be tension because of it. BGO was very flexible and we were able to work in a positive way.

What is the team dynamic?

The transition of working with their team was very smooth. Their project manager, Dimitar, is my primary contact. I run everything through him and their team is in the background. I visited them earlier this year and met some of the developers. The number of developers varied with different projects. Most recently, there have been four people working on the project including three developers and a tester. In the beginning of the project, there were two people working on it full-time. There have probably been five or six people involved in total.

How did you come to work with BGO Software?

I was talking to someone about my project and they had a client who had used BGO. My client had called me up thinking that I could take on the project myself. He had a previous iteration of it which was a mess, so I explained that I could help him manage it and find someone to work on it. I wouldn’t have gone out of my way to look for an overseas developer if they hadn’t been brought to my attention. Once I connected with BGO, I was really confident because of their portfolio and my discussions with them that they would be a good choice. The price difference was very significant compared to local developers.

How much have you invested with them?

We spent $150,000 on the project.

What is the status of this engagement?

We’ve been working on the project for two years. There were delays that were not related to software development. The project was much larger than my client realized. They host the app on their servers. We don’t have a maintenance contract yet, but we will be doing that to have them continue to support the product.

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

The client is happy. The software product is finished, but we haven’t launched it to the market yet. My client has another client at one of the schools he manages in the state of Texas. Texas changed their requirements to allow certification for online courses for realtors. Because of that, we had a fairly complex additional project to accommodate all those changes. My client’s old system wouldn’t have accommodated all these new systems, so his business would be nothing without this product. We haven’t seen monetary results yet, but it’s projected to make a huge difference for his business.

How did BGO Software perform from a project management standpoint?

There were typical barriers with working with someone in a different time zone. There are advantages and disadvantages. When they’re in Eastern Europe, they can do work overnight and it’s done when I get up in the morning. On the other hand, if it’s early afternoon and I need something addressed immediately, it’s probably not going to happen. Dimitar has been extremely available to me even staying up late to get things done. A few times, I’ve had to tell him to go to bed.

We communicated mostly through Skype and email. If there was something that needed a lot of work, we talked every morning for a couple of weeks.

What did you find most impressive about them?

The level of service is outstanding. I’m friends with Dimitar beyond our work. They brought me over to meet them recently because we’d done so much work together. There’s a high level of personal engagement.

Are there any areas they could improve?

We had some struggles with the scope document that I wrote. There were gaps and they weren’t always filled in the way I thought they should be filled. It was minor things like, where should a certain button go. As the relationship progressed, that improved.

Do you have any advice for potential clients?

I would say the client needs to be well-scoped. Know what you want before you get into a larger project. They will do what you ask them to do. Their English is very good. I enjoyed the foreign language interaction. You feel like you’re being exposed to another culture and that’s fun. It’s fun to get to know people on the other side of the world. It’s a great experience for me.