bromin7, Inc.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the founder and CEO of Member.buzz.

What challenge were you trying to address with bromin7, Inc.?

We hired bromin7, Inc. to be an outsourced development company, building platform improvements for our products.

What was the scope of their involvement?

So far, they’ve been working our WYSIWYG HTML editor, specifically copy paste and drag and drop functionality. The team is also going to make a physical card reader for our product as well.

As we increase our budget, bromin7, Inc. will start to take on more projects. So far, all of their work has been web-based, but we’d like to get them on some mobile app projects.

What is the team composition?

So far, we’ve worked with one main developer and one project manager. bromin7, Inc. has a bigger team, but those are the two teammates with whom I interact.

How did you come to work with bromin7, Inc.?

One of our offices is in a WeWork location, so we posted the job on the WeWork forum. Sergey (Founder & Managing Director) responded to the post.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent about $15,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

Our engagement began in February 2020, and it’s ongoing.

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

Our product is quite complicated and has a lot of different features and functionalities, but bromin7, Inc.’s development team has been able to get up to speed and understand how everything works.

We’ve had a lot of trouble with other developers coming on board and not being able to contribute quickly, but this team has been able to do exactly that while adding value.

How did bromin7, Inc. perform from a project management standpoint?

We use Jira and Team Foundation Server (TFS), and bromin7, Inc. has been able to use these tools because they already had experience with them. The team definitely has an in-built experience of how to manage a technical project.

What did you find most impressive about them?

It can be really hard to find good developers who know what they’re talking about, but the developers at bromin7, Inc. produce high-quality work. They’re less expensive than onshoring, still not the cheapest, but they are definitely worth the money.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, I have no suggestions. One of our challenges is that we don’t have an unlimited budget. If we did, we probably would be able to have more communication and touchpoints.

With our limited budget, we’re focusing on having them deliver work as opposed to doing meetings. Ideally, we would have more communication, but it’s not necessarily their fault.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

When hiring developers, it’s very important to clearly communicate your expectations and what you’re looking for because it can be complicated to get exactly what you want. bromin7, Inc. has been able to read between the lines, figuring out what needs to be done to deliver good work.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the CEO and founder of Wabu. We have a mobile app that helps people walk together. We're a safety tool for college students and a social tool for senior citizens to decrease isolation.

What challenge were you trying to address with bromin7, Inc.?

My co-founder and I split, which left our technology unsupported. At the time, we had a few projects that were only partially finished. We went through a series of programmers and dev shops that didn’t work out. We decided to change our approach and found bromin7, Inc.

What was the scope of their involvement?

bromin7, Inc. develops our iOS app, which has a Firebase backend. Their team directs projects from QA, maintenance, bug fixing, and pure development. Their team first stabilized the code, so that we wouldn’t lose existing users. Once they rebuilt the backend to make the app better and faster, their team started to work on a series of sprints to rewrite a third of the features. A third of the features will exist as they stand. Then, their team will scale the app on the frontend and backend.

What is the team composition?

We work with around 3–4 people from bromin7, Inc. We communicate with Sergey (CEO and Founder, bromin7, Inc.) who manages the design project. He works with the designer directly and comes to me for feedback. On the development side of the project, we work with Artem (Chief Architect, bromin7, Inc.). He works with a series of coders, one of whom works on our project full-time.

How did you come to work with bromin7, Inc.?

We changed our approach to finding a partner because we made a few superficial mistakes. We found bromin7, Inc. through our WeWork community. I made a post about looking to hire full-time coders for our project. They responded and explained that they’re a boutique shop but would love to partner with us in the long run. I messaged them a month and a half later. Sergey came to our WeWork and understood our business. He was professional and gave us a list of old clients who we called. They had similar experiences with bad dev shops but shared that Bromin7, Inc. solved their challenges thoroughly.  

How much have you invested with them?

We spend almost $10,000 a month for their services.

What is the status of this engagement?

Bromin7, Inc started with us in November 2019 and their work’s ongoing. Our first contract’s for six months but our engagement’s a long-term commitment.

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

We released an update a week ago, and our users were happy to see that the app got itself together. Users have sent us e-mails discussing how happy they are that the app is working as they want it to. We need a few sales to come through to provide metrics because we switched to an enterprise sales model, which changed the data completely. Since we work with universities, data comes in at the end of the semester rather than the beginning.

How did bromin7, Inc. perform from a project management standpoint?

We have conversations on a daily basis and their team works quickly. They’re professional, completing projects on time. Their communication is tremendous. It’s hard for a coder to give project timelines and costs accurately but their team makes exact estimates.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They’re committed and exceed our expectations. Their team actually tests products to make sure they function as needed. When their team said that they would stabilize the app, I was skeptical because we worked with coders who made the same claim but couldn't execute the project. Their team said the work would take a month and their team executed the project in a month.  

Are there any areas they could improve?

No way, they’re great.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Ask them questions. Their team has experience with other projects for enterprises that predates working at Bromin7, Inc. They have extensive knowledge, so ask for their feedback. While you know your company better than anyone else, their team usually has good advice and feedback.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the founder of MC-Cubed. We’re a mobile application development company and think tank that does the design, logistics, and planning behind an app.

What challenge were you trying to address with bromin7, Inc.?

bromin7, Inc. is one of the developers we consistently work with to implement our designs.

What was the scope of their involvement?

We’re currently working with bromin7, Inc. to develop an app called Platonic, a friendship-based meetup app. bromin7, Inc. is building the iOS version using Swift and XCode while our internal team is building the Android side. 

They’ve redesigned the appearance and created features that allow users to create events, leave comments, and make groups. Their team also makes great suggestions about how things should work from a developer’s point of view. bromin7, Inc. has been a pleasure to work with so far.

What is the team composition?

We work with six people, including a project manager that funnels his team’s work into ours.

How did you come to work with bromin7, Inc.?

We collected quotes from about 20 companies. bromin7, Inc. seemed like the most excited and resourceful team of the bunch, especially considering our needs at the time. They also offer nice scalability: some months, we need 300 hours of labor, while for others, we require only 40 hours. bromin7, Inc. has that adaptiveness built in.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent about $70,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

The collaboration started in September 2019 and is ongoing.

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

Our app is still in beta. bromin7, Inc. has done everything we’ve asked for so far. Now they’re troubleshooting their issues and relaying them to us, offering solutions and suggestions to improve the design based on what our clients have said. Whenever we go through each update and give them a list of bugs to fix, they’re adamant about fixing them right away. It’s a very complementary relationship.

How did bromin7, Inc. perform from a project management standpoint?

They’re super thorough. We use Trello, which is a great visual way for us to collaborate as we go through development. It ensures that everyone’s on the same page.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Their enthusiasm for the project is something I really like. It’s more of a partnership instead of us telling bromin7, Inc. what we need and what they should build. They’re willing to get involved in the process and give feedback based on their experience.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, everything’s been great so far. Even the fact that most of their developers are based in Russia hasn’t been an issue.

Any advice for potential customers?

I recommend constant communication. We have biweekly meetings and connect through Slack almost every day. The project manager is super available if we ever have any questions or changes we need to make. bromin7, Inc. has been a great partner in this project.

Please describe your company and your position there.

I’m the CEO of a B2B Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) company that provides customer loyalty and referral solutions for the automotive and cannabis industries.

For what projects/services did your company hire bromin7?

bromin7 helped us design and develop the first version of our product.

What were your goals for this project?

We needed to get our software product built and bromin7 helped us do that. Sergey (CEO, bromin7) and his team took our ideas and goals and created native mobile apps and a web app.

How did you select this vendor?

I posted our project needs on several networking sites, looking for referrals and agency responses. I received 24 responses and interviewed eight or nine agencies before selecting bromin7.

Describe the project in detail.

Once we selected the vendor, we had a kick-off meeting to introduce stakeholders, review the project, and to establish communication channels and file transferring software. After that, my product manager met in person with their project manager once every two weeks to review progress. bromin7 designed the UI/UX for our apps in addition to building them.

What was the team composition?

Working in a project-based model, there were three full-time developers, a senior backend developer/architect, a senior iOS developer, a senior Android developer, a UI/UX designer, and a QA team assigned to the team. We also had access to their managing director as needed.

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

After nine months of development, we had an operational first iteration of our software product.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

Sergey and his project manager were highly communicative and always available. Project updates were held on time and were very efficient. They used Basecamp to manage our project to which my team had full access.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

Their ability to understand the complicated functionalities of our product and build them out was what impressed me the most. I also valued their communication and transparency.

Are there any areas for improvement?

They were very flexible and adjusted to some of the changes that we needed to make before the deadline. Some iterations were buggy but the team was always quick to fix them.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am the Chief Operating Officer at Prosumer Health, a startup company developing an AI-driven [artificial intelligence], individualized mobile health platform to help individuals manage their health and healthcare.

What challenge were you trying to address with bromin7?

The platform scope includes five different disease conditions—namely diabetes, hypertension, obesity, asthma, and COPD [Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease]—with ways to manage those conditions. We needed a partner who could help us develop an app for both Android and iOS devices.

What was the scope of their involvement?

They’re doing all the design work for the app. Users are assigned a health coach and have daily tasks and goals to track. The system will eventually be compatible with different mobile devices, such as glucose meters, and have a series of surveys and questionnaires to measure symptoms. Our goal is for the auxiliary devices to upload the information directly to the system, but we currently rely on daily data submissions from the users.

Data is uploaded into our HIPAA [Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act] compliant artificial intelligence prognostic and diagnostic functionality. Ultimately, the system will populate the users’ medical history automatically, but that will appear in a later iteration. The app also checks for counterindications for user medications, and allows health coaches to interface them. Users have 24/7 access to the coaching network, and get regular reminders from the app and their coach. If something urgent, like a new symptom, manifests, they can submit a questionnaire, and the diagnostics will triage and recommend next steps.

What is the team dynamic?

Sergey [Managing Director & Co-Founder, bromin7] is our primary contact, and we have a lot of back and forth with him via phone and email. We occasionally work with his project lead, but Sergey provides the most hands-on input. He manages the schedule and deliveries on his side, as well as a large group of offshore software developers in Russia.

How did you come to work with bromin7?

My cofounder discovered them. We originally had another team who was going to develop the software, but things didn’t work out and we had to scramble to find someone else. We didn’t have high expectations, but we were thrilled in our first meeting with them.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve invested $112,000 so far. Their costs are very reasonable.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in April 2017. Sergey has been very accommodating, and we have split the project into four stages. This allows us to acquire new sources of funding and complete the design. We’ve just finished the second stage. Even after the development is finished, we hope they continue to process our updates and subsequent versions of the software.

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

My whole team is happy with the current results, and I am thrilled. Sergey helped us formulate our pitch to new customers, complete with screenshots of how the app functions, and its capabilities. It helps us give a better sense of flow.

How did bromin7 perform from a project management standpoint?

I’m a project manager myself, and I give him top marks here. Software development is complicated; the key is making the design work right away. Sergey’s team worked with us not only in terms of development, but dug deep into the detailed requirements. They wanted to understand everything about the product and our customer. They actively came to us whenever they didn’t like the output, and took steps to change those elements. We didn’t expect them to be so interactive or proactive, and were blown away by their responsiveness and initiative. They’re integrated members of our team, and any time I send out emails to my management about developments in the field, I include Sergey.

What did you find most impressive about them?

The app isn’t finished yet, but Sergey has come through on every single commitment. He’s very engaging, and has the customers’ interests in mind. He’s delivered an incredible value to me, and I couldn’t be more pleased.

They care about the project, and getting it right the first time. They’re totally transparent, and report everything to us. Even though we don’t have a formal, legal partnership with them, we consider them our partners.