Cloudflight

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and position.

I am an executive at porta IT Service

Describe what your company does in a single sentence.

We are one of Germany's largest family-owned furniture house chains, founded in 1965. 

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What specific goals or objectives did you hire Cloudflight Poland to accomplish?

• Iimprove efficiency and change the architecture of one of the eCommerce platforms
• Migration to SAP Composable storefront
• Fixing major and minor bugs, as well as project-wide cleanup of unwanted libraries and solutions

SOLUTION

How did you find Cloudflight Poland?

• Online Search
• Referral

Why did you select Cloudflight Poland over others?

Referred to me

How many teammates from Cloudflight Poland were assigned to this project?

2-5 Employees

Describe the scope of work in detail. Please include a summary of key deliverables.

The initial architecture was proposed and implemented by an in-house team but after joining forces, both sides decided to make some changes to it. Our main objective was to improve the performance of Möbel Boss's Spartacus and fix major memory leaks. 
Other than that, Cloudflight was involved in correcting some bugs - both major and minor, across the whole application. Cloudflight also made some substantial changes to the architecture and the overall idea of how Spartacus was implemented on the platform. 

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What were the measurable outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

We observed a significant improvement in performance, memory leaks were mostly conquered, and a lot of new features were added by the team. We were also able to perform a project-wide cleanup of unwanted libraries and solutions on the platform.   

Describe their project management. Did they deliver items on time? How did they respond to your needs?

The collaboration has been smooth. The team's project management was great and helped us manage our questions and expectations. We communicated via email and Slack. 

What was your primary form of communication with Cloudflight Poland?

• Virtual Meeting
• Email or Messaging App

What did you find most impressive or unique about this company?

Their pragmatic yet professional way to tackle problems. We always hat clear communication and both sides shared a commom understanding of priorities. 

Are there any areas for improvement or something Cloudflight Poland could have done differently?

No

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I lead customer success at Talon.One, the leading enterprise promotion engine for brands like Ticketmaster, Neiman Marcus, Mercedes-Benz, and Burger King. Our headless promotions infrastructure powers loyalty, coupon, and referral programs in high-traffic environments that need to deploy new campaigns fast without tech intervention.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire divante, and what were your goals?

We hired Divante to build an off-the-shelf integration between our platform, Talon.One, and commercetools. The goal was to create code that our customers could then implement in their AWS or Google Cloud accounts to integrate between our platforms in hours instead of days.

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor and what were the deciding factors?

We received quotes from several vendors but Divante had the best record of timeline followthrough and not creeping scope or increasing expense.

Describe the scope of work in detail, including the project steps, key deliverables, and technologies used.

Divante clearly defined each piece of work via tickets that we approved before and after development. We had weekly meetings through the development process to discuss the project and resolve any blockers.

How many people from the vendor's team worked with you, and what were their positions?

3. Our key contact was a brilliant project manager who was very clear and accurate about timelines, and excellent and following up with our team when we owed them something that was blocking work.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Can you share any measurable outcomes of the project or general feedback about the deliverables?

The time to integrate the world's leading commerce platform (commercetools) with the best-performing enterprise promotion engine (Talon.One) was reduced from 16 hours of development time to 2.

Describe their project management style, including communication tools and timeliness.

They use JIRA to describe and track the individual efforts within the project. Impressively, they also beat the original expected timeline (3 months) by several weeks.

What did you find most impressive or unique about this company?

They delivered a complex deliverable with moving requirements even faster than they originally projected. No delays, scope creep, or unexpected costs.

Are there any areas for improvement or something they could have done differently?

No.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there?

I'm the director of marketing and e-commerce for one of Europe’s largest producers of umbrellas and parasols.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with divante?

We wanted to combine all five of our systems into one backend and two frontends to simplify the management of our products and rollout processes across different countries.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

There were two parts to the engagement. For one part, they set up the product information management (PIM) system, integrated all of our products into the new system, and imported all necessary data. For the other part, they conducted research for, designed, and developed a Magento 2 e-commerce storefront. The site presents our high-quality products in an optimal manner for our customers' desired online shopping experience. They currently provide maintenance for the PIM system and will be doing some additional work on the e-commerce site in the near future.

What is the team composition?

We have one central project manager for PIM as well as for the Magento project. Then there is a separate DEV lead for each system supported by backend and frontend developers as well as testers. Especially at the start of the project, we had additional resources from the design team and business analysis. These guys are activated when needed.

How did you come to work with divante?

We met the general manager of their German operations a few years ago. We discussed our needs, did a scoping workshop, and liked the quality of their work as well as the reasonable cost.

How much have you invested with them?
 
We've spent between €500,000–€1,000,000 (approximately $592,000–$1,184,000 USD) with them.

What is the status of this engagement?

We've been working together since January 2020.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The first storefront that went live was Knirps in November 2020. Since the launch, product sales doubled and also the average order value increased. The frontend template they created for the site brings out the unique features of the different products in a modern way while still embracing our brand identity. From our perspective, they have done very well.

How did divante perform from a project management standpoint?

They've generally been good. We had a less-than-ideal experience when the team leader on the Magento project changed, but our work is running smoothly now. We communicate daily and have recurring weekly meetings.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They work well as part of our team, treating the project as if it’s their own. We work closely together.

Are there any areas they could improve?

The connection between the PIM and Magento system could’ve been done better. 

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Speak with the project team early on. 

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the CIO of a large pharmacy e-commerce company with a chain of physical stores in Poland.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with divante?

We wanted to create a mobile application where patients can see the availability of certain medicine and prescriptions in selected pharmacies. The divante team is helping us with this challenge.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

divante started by conducting interviews with our customers to see whether an app would meet their needs and to establish how the main flow of the interface should be. Based on that, their team then came up with a high-level mockup and a proof of concept that they eventually turned into an MVP. They’ve also redeveloped our website from scratch in conjunction with the app, using Pimcore for the backend and Vue.js for the frontend.

The key feature of the app is the ability to search for medicine from all of our pharmacies by manual searching or by scanning the barcode on the medicine’s packaging. Users can check on the map which pharmacies nearest them had the product available. They can then book those products through the app, which links to the system of a particular store. A notification will arrive informing the user when their medicine is ready to be collected or picked up.

What is the team composition?

We’ve worked with around 4–8 people.

How did you come to work with divante?

I’ve known divante from a previous project. They contacted me to see if we had any new needs or opportunities for them to work with us.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve invested around $500,000–$1,000,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started in May 2019 and launched the app in April 2020. divante is still working on leveling up and maintaining the app and website.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The launched app has gone from having zero users to now having 1,500–1,600 registered accounts, with 5,000 product reservations being done monthly. 

How did divante perform from a project management standpoint?

Their agile project management is really good, and they go through the development in iterations. divante is very transparent in terms of budgeting and the cost of each phase of the project. I have no objections; they are very professional.

We use a combination of Slack, Jira, and regular conference calls to communicate

What did you find most impressive about them?

Their agility distinguishes them from other providers. They have the ability to work in a truly agile way. 

Another impressive thing about divante is their technical skills which supplemented their initial UX, customer, and technology research. They’ve been a one-stop shop for all our e-commerce needs. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

It’s been a very successful project and I’ve been very satisfied, so I really cannot find anything negative to say about their services.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Start with a proof of concept and do some basic customer research before going full-scale with divante. 

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the digital and marketing director for an industrial solutions company.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Divante?

We had selected our CMS and e-commerce solution, and we needed skilled developers who could partner with us and help us develop them.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

They help us develop our customer-facing platforms where we build things for the customer including web shops, websites, or configurators. They host the entire platform as well. They do development, bug fixing, and surveillance of all the systems.

What is the team composition?

We work with 8-15 people depending on the number of projects that we have. We have a core team with a technical lead developer, a project manager, a frontend developer, a QA person, and right now, we have a second backend developer. We have two UX experts involved from time to time with us.

How did you come to work with Divante?

We looked for possible partners all over Europe. We had a smaller agency helping us out before but they weren’t good. Divante was recommended by several sources. We had conversations with other potential agencies but we found Divante to be the best fit.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in October 2018, and the work is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

They understand our business and meet our needs. I’m really pleased with them. The tech lead is very good at understanding our needs and translating them into code. They’re usually very quick, but it always depends on what kind of developer you get. Some are super good and others aren’t as quick. Overall, their quality of service is really high.

How did Divante perform from a project management standpoint?

We have weekly meetings with them. We use email and Slack to communicate, and we talk over the phone when needed. They’re very good at meeting deadlines. Even if they get delayed, they notify us early on.

What did you find most impressive about them?

I like the agile way we’re able to work with them. We liked the speed at which we could work with them. They have a good business understanding on their end. For them to understand what we mean and what we need is important. We have such a strong dialogue.

Are there any areas they could improve?

In the beginning, we started to change a little bit of the team and they introduced new people into the team. It turned out well, but I would prefer to have a consistent team throughout. They don’t do it too often, but it happens.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Make sure they have an understanding of your business early on. Make sure you have a person to talk to that understands you so you don’t struggle every time to explain your business needs each time.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the director of digital at W.EG. CEE, a business unit of the German Würth Group, which is a world market leader in the trade of assembly and fastening material. W.EG. is the Würth Group’s Electrical Wholesale unit, which is one of the leading electrical wholesalers on the European market. 

We are 17 companies in Europe and they are distributed between Central Europe, Eastern Europe, Italy, and Spain. We have 5,500 people working for our business unit.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Divante?

Many of our companies had been acquired during the last four years — we acquired 7–8 companies. A few years ago, we identified for our unit that one of the most important topics is product information management (PIM) system. We needed to digitize our products and catalogs. We needed a solution that would meet the requirements of all of our companies. 

The challenges here are we have companies in various countries and various languages and sizes of companies. We have a huge amount of items because we’re selling items from international suppliers and the average company has an assortment between 500,000-1 million items. 

The challenge is to collect those items and then to import those items to the PIM system and prepare them to be published on our various channels like e-commerce or printing material. With the challenges of different countries, different sizes of companies, and the number of our products, we needed a PIM system.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

The basis of our PIM system is Pimcore, an existing open-source solution. Divante is one of the implementation partners. We used this PIM system as the basis for our project. 

Based on Pimcore, we built our PIM system for the various companies. We added quite a lot of additional functionalities because our industry has a few very specific requirements, especially when it comes to the import of products and catalogs that we receive from our suppliers. There are different size formats and we needed to create the tools within PIM to easily import all the different formats. 

It was important for us to have a solution in October 2018 to go live and import the data and having basic functionalities for our internal job. From there, we have a roadmap for various projects to add functionalities and features, so that is what we’re continuing to work on with them. We’re continually streamlining the process, improving the software, and upgrading it with them. 

What is the team composition?

There have been 8–10 people involved, including a project manager, a technical architect, and developers.

How did you come to work with Divante?

During the demos, they were able to show that they have experience in our business because they’d worked with customers similar to us. They knew the language we were speaking. They’re a company in Central Eastern Europe where most of our companies are based so, from a geographical point of view, that made sense. 

The people from Divante have good language skills and the company has quite a few years of experience in the PIM and e-commerce market. They have around 250 people that are working for them and we felt quite comfortable with them.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent €420,000 (approximately $506,500 USD). 

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in October 2017 and the work is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The most important thing was that we’re able to import and handle this huge amount of around one million items. From a performance point of view, there haven’t been any issues with their product. 

One of our most important goals was to be able to import the various file types and we can now map those import definitions on our own. We don’t need the support of technical teams. All of our companies are now live with e-commerce, which means the products are enriched and we have all the data we need. We now have various pictures of our items that are sent to our various e-commerce platforms and the technical documents are available. 

We’re happy with the work that’s been done. The product has made us quite autonomous and we can do the job on our own. We’re able to handle all of the items from various suppliers which was our main goal — they helped us reach it.

We exceeded the budget but it was because, during the implementation stage, we added additional requirements that weren’t foreseen in the initial budget.

How did Divante perform from a project management standpoint?

We work in an agile approach. We have weekly meetings where they show us the progress. For smaller things, we also have daily meetings. We’re always able to see how things are moving in the direction where we want them to go.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They’re doing really well and we like that we have direct contact together. We can talk directly with the developers and explain our business and requirements to them. Everything is documented and the communication is direct. We’ve really been able to reach our goals at the end of the day and create nice solutions.

Are there any areas they could improve?

At the beginning, it wasn’t that clear how the project methodology was working. They weren’t able to explain it very well to us. During the project, we started to understand why a few processes were important and we had a very open discussion and the initial difficulties were resolved.  

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

It’s very important that you are clear what the goal is and what you want to do. Also make sure to have the right people involved in the project.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

We are an e-commerce platform for pastime activities like canoeing. I am a sales executive and a co-founder of the company.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Divante?

We needed help with the technical execution of our product. The other co-founders and I have business degrees but we didn’t have expertise in terms of technical execution.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Divante provided UX design for our web platform. We had an idea and business model in place, but the technical execution was Divante’s responsibility. We had an initial Skype call, during which we explained our product’s goal and the mission of the company. Divante gave us a big list of questions to give them a sense of how we functioned and how we planned to build our product.

We have a straightforward design. There were plans in place for everything, including basic wireframes and mapping the customer's journey through the website. We knew what we wanted, so Divante simply executed what we told them in a professional manner.

Divante also put together a prototype for the customers we were trying to approach.

How did you come to work with Divante?

We found Divante through a referral from a local company in Finland. They had used Divante in the past, and recommended them as a way of getting very good quality at half the price. Local options are very expensive. We also researched a number of other companies, but Divante was the perfect fit for us at that point.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with Divante in January 2017. The work finished in mid-February.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Could you share any evidence that would demonstrate the productivity, quality of work, or the impact of the engagement?

We haven’t seen a lot of feedback yet. Another company is executing the software development, and Divante’s work has helped them a lot. It’s much easier to go forward since we’ve put together some good plans.

Divante delivered very good quality and acted professionally. They knew how to lead the process, especially since we were a startup made up of recent graduates. Everything was new to us, so it was great to work with professionals like Divante. They told us how everything would work, and made it easy.

How did Divante perform from a project management standpoint?

I have no complaints. We communicated through email, Google Hangouts and Skype calls, and everything was well-organized.

What did you find most impressive about Divante?

I appreciate their professionalism and the way in which Divante can lead the customer. When buying a heavily technical service, it’s important to know what we want to get out of it, but it’s sometimes impossible to know what the whole process will include. Working with professionals allowed us to highlight important elements, as well as setup realistic timetables and budgets.

Are there any areas Divante could improve?

No. We got what we wanted, so we’re satisfied.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

TIM S.A. is one of the biggest distributors of electro-technical goods in Poland. The company has been present in the market for over 25 years and combines great tradition with new e-commerce technologies, selling through our online shop (TIM.pl) and mobile version (mTIM). TIM, as the first company in this industry in Poland, decided to launch the online version of its store for individuals and B2B [business-to-business] buyers without the necessity of registration or logging in. In 2016, TIM.pl qualified for the finals of the Imagine Excellence Awards for The Best B2B User Experience. This is the official award given to the best online stores by Magento Inc., a provider of the leading online sales platform, used by over 250 thousand companies around the world.

I am the director of development & technology at TIM S.A.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Divante?

Given the changes in the world of today’s B2B distribution, we decided to follow market trends and diversify our selling channels. First, we built a small e-shop with cables (also with Divante), then decided to have a complete transformation from offline to online commerce.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

We decided to build an e-commerce interface from scratch. Divante started with research, including competitor analysis, survey research, trend analysis, and industry reports. At that stage, they created personas that reflected the user groups we needed to design for. Afterward, we moved to the design phase. Divante ran the implementation and tests (functional integration, safety, and performance tests). Divante also helped us with choosing which technology to use, and we went with Magento.

How did you come to work with Divante?

We started working on this project with another agency that failed in their work on the user experience. Divante had great mock-ups, and they surprised us with a wide knowledge of e-commerce. That’s why we decided to work with them.

How much have you invested with Divante?

The project cost over $500,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

The project began in March 2012 and ended in July 2013.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Could you share any evidence that would demonstrate the productivity, quality of work, or the impact of the engagement?

After the implementation of TIM.pl, we achieved most of our business goals: business diversity, new customers, and improved business effectiveness. It was also a financial success. In 2015 we noted 67% increase in sales through the online channel and over 130,000,000 EUR [US$139,834,500] in revenue, including 87,000,000 EUR [US$93,581,550] revenue from online channels.

What did you find most impressive about Divante?

Divante surprised us with their broad knowledge of e-commerce. They have great experience in the technologies they work on. Divante also has a strong team of customer experience specialists - designers, researchers, marketers, and analysts, who are very passionate about their work.

Are there any areas Divante could improve?

Divante focuses most on the technological aspects of their work, but they should be more business-oriented. It would be great if they could deliver new human resources to the project faster because it takes too long to make changes that arise from current needs.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

T-Mobile is an international provider of telecommunication services owned by Telecom Deutschland. The group has over 130 million customers worldwide. It’s also one of the largest mobile networks in Poland, providing a full range of telecommunications services to individual and institutional clients.

I am the process management specialist.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Divante?

T-Mobile in Germany was operating a successful ElectronicBeats site, and in order to keep up with market demand, T-Mobile in Poland needed a way to quickly recreate the site for our users.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Divante designed the whole layout for ElecontricBeats.pl. They created and implemented the service on the PimCore platform.

How did you come to work with Divante?

Divante was recommended by another company that was satisfied with their services.

How much have you invested with Divante?

The project cost between $50,000 and $100,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

The project started in December 2015 with creative workshops. We started designing the service in January. ElectronicBeats.pl was released on April 22nd, 2016.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Could you share any evidence that would demonstrate the productivity, quality of work, or the impact of the engagement?

Divante reduced our time to market and satisfied the needs of our users much faster. Their work led to a more prosperous client base and ultimately increased revenue. The website is increasingly generating traffic on a daily basis. From April till August 2016, the website was visited by nearly 340,000 unique users.

What did you find most impressive about Divante?

Divante gave us full support regarding technical issues (including consultancy). Divante has a lot of experience and wide knowledge about the technologies they work on.

Are there any areas Divante could improve?

It may not be connected to Divante directly, but we’d put more stress on SEO [search engine optimization]. Cooperation with an SEO company only started at the end of Divante’s implementation process. Now, we need to catch up.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

Ringier Axel Springer Polska (RASP) is among the biggest press publishers in Poland. Our portfolio includes 3 dailies, 2 weeklies, and some magazines. RASP publishes books and special magazines as well. Literia.pl is an e-commerce site for selling all publications published by RASP. I am responsible for the literia.pl site as a product owner.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Divante? 

Our main goal was to relaunch the literia.pl site.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Divante was brought in to build the new literia.pl e-shop from scratch. The previous version of Literia.pl was also made by Divante. Their services included the development of the full purchasing path, intuitive user interface, and new UX. They also did the implementation of subscriptions and collections of books, implementation of user panel, and new graphics, and logotype. The logotype was prepared by RASP in the end, though. Literia.pl was developed using the Magento e-shop engine.

What is the status of this engagement?

We began in March 2015 and launched the website in December 2015. The project is still under development using Agile methodology, and new functionalities are added month by month. 

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Could you share any evidence that would demonstrate the productivity, quality of work, or the impact of the engagement?

Our incomes have doubled in comparison to the previous year.

Are there any areas Divante could improve?

I wasn’t involved in the first step of the project, and the database of subscriptions was projected incorrectly. Therefore, my experience in building publishing systems in other projects could not have been used, so Divante had to make it without experience accessible only to the industry experts. Taking into account their lack of industry knowledge, the project was quite fine.