JatApp

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

We are a Latvian startup developing an application which can track the locations of a user’s family members using GPS. Our ambitions are directed towards guaranteeing people’s safety and security on a 24/7 basis. I am the COO of the company, responsible for operations control, monetization strategies, as well as internal flows and business model development.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with JatApp?

We were building a mobile app for iOS and Android, along with a website. JatApp was brought in at the very early stages of the project.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

JatApp started the development on both our apps simultaneously, in order to save time and enable the monitoring of the user experience on Android and iOS at the same time. We created detailed specifications internally, listing all the development phases. We initially made a prototype and worked on technical specs and design at the same time.

GPS location tracking is the main functionality of the application. For example, when a user exceeds a set limit, their friends or parents will receive a notification. It needed to be accurate and run smoothly. It also has chat integration.

What is the team dynamic?

We worked with 2 iOS and 2 Android developers, a project manager, a designer, and QA testers from JatApp’s side. We only interacted with the project manager through chat; he communicated directly with the developers.

How did you come to work with JatApp?

We consider the app to be complex, and have spent a lot of time choosing the right people to build it, since accuracy was important to us. We met JatApp at a technical conference, and also spoke with other startups in order get feedback on their approach to software development.

We decided to go ahead with JatApp because they were project-oriented, and always adjusted to new solutions and functionality tricks during project discussions. We looked at 3 development companies in total during the conference.

How much have you invested with them?

[Confidential] We have been working with JatApp for almost 2 years, which is indicative of how much we’ve spent.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with JatApp at the end of 2015. The project has been completed, and the app is available on Google Play and the Apple Store. We have decided to adopt a white-label monetization approach, and continue to work on improvements and new functionalities.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

JatApp was able to address all our desires from a technology standpoint. All its metrics are perfect, as is the design and app logic they created for us. We are not a tech-savvy team, and we needed some recommendations on elements like backend architecture.

We initially targeted families and kids, but later decided to expand the audience to colleagues and friends. This required a drastic change in interface, but we were able to do it, and saw the impact on installs almost right away. This change was done at JatApp’s insistence, and has allowed us to attract more users.

How did JatApp perform from a project management standpoint?

They brought a set of tools which we used during the development process for sharing code. These included Crashlytics for code and bug sharing, as well as Slack and Skype for direct communication. The project was divided into milestones for our convenience, and we tracked builds from our sides. We always had a chance to communicate improvement suggestions with the project manager.

During the course of the project, we found that we needed to add more functionalities and features. Since the specifications had been agreed to and were static, we communicated additions with the project manager, who showed flexibility. His English level made the communication easy.

What did you find most impressive about them?

It was important for us to choose the right company, since we were hesitant in the beginning about taking an outsourced approach. A native solution selection would guarantee the perfect performance of the UI/UX, making the app simple to use and professional-looking. JatApp was our only partner in this project—their designers worked on our logo and the design of our website and application.

The quality of the final application speaks to the success and productivity of our collaboration with JatApp. They’ve also helped us with business analysis when we adopted a white label approach. It had not been in our plans from the beginning, but we are working on monetizing it this way.

Are there any areas they could improve?

We are a meticulous and perfectionist group, and therefore believe there is always something to improve and optimize. Maintaining the same standards within JatApp would be ideal. We always want to reduce the budget as much as possible, as well.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the director of operations for an educational platform that started a few years ago. We’re trying to create a user-friendly platform that will provide any messaging services needed by students to simplify their work together. From the students’ side, our platform allows them to find the right tutor in order to assist with their education issue. From the tutors’ side, the platform lets them find clients who are looking for their knowledge, allowing them to earn money in a transparent way. Our company has 30 or more employees. Our head office is located in Valletta, Malta.

I’m also in charge of communicating with our development team and the project manager at JatApp. Overall, I’m involved in 90% of our corporation’s contractor dealings. 

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with JatApp?

We needed to find the right development company but had no prior experience working with the development teams. Basically, this was our first digital project. We found different development companies in Europe while looking for a team to develop our product from scratch. We talked to so many people who are providing the same services, so finding the firm that could propose the right design solution was a challenge. We needed to love their vision for our product’s user experience [UX].

We already had some designs in mind, but they certainly weren’t perfect. There was a lot of space for improvement. We needed someone to handle the development of our web platform and backend, as well as the creation of the design concept and the admin panel. Those were our top priorities. Now, we are working on an iOS and Android application. 

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

First, they created the prototype. We hadn’t planned that part because we didn’t know it had to be done. So, we got in touch with our future project manager and focused more on the visual aspect of our project. Once the prototyping stage was done, JatApp created the design concept, which took quite some time. Our business wasn’t ready for a change, but we had to be more flexible. At that point, we wanted the best. The CEO of our company and I had to adapt and rely on JatApp’s opinions about the design and business logic of the future product.

We successfully went through the business analysis and eventually created both a user-friendly product as well as a profitable business model. After we created the prototype and design, JatApp developed the product. Content developers were working on the website, and we had our admin panel developed. We then moved to quality assurance [QA] testing. We received reports that our product is bug-free. Once we were fairly satisfied with the results of our bug testing, we started discussing the development of our mobile applications.

How did you come to work with JatApp?

We found JatApp through a web search for mobile app development studios. We went to their website and contacted them through a form. We spent time talking to a lot of other companies before settling on five with whom to discuss technical points of the project. From that selection, we chose JatApp.

How much have you invested with them?

We have spent between $120,000 and $130,000 so far.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started our partnership with JatApp in the fall of 2016, and we’re still working on the product. 

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We are following some metrics for our first users. For us, the main indicator of quality is getting good feedback from our users. The people who are using the product at this point are more than satisfied with its functionality. Additionally, the number of unique users that use the product every day and the number of repeat users have been growing every day. Our customers continue to recommend our product to others.

We were very strict about the QA testing. We expected each new build of the product to be bug-free. We did not let our developers continue to the next stage of work unless we were 100% satisfied with the existing part. After the first release of the product, we had only a few crashes.

The quality of the code is fair. I’m not a developer myself, but based on my impression of how the product works, I’ve noticed no delays or crashes, which is a good sign. I’m very satisfied with the way JatApp developed our product.

How did JatApp perform from a project management standpoint?

Having a project manager is essential for this kind of project. The project manager on JatApp’s side is always in touch with my colleagues and me. We created a Slack channel where we receive progress updates and exchange messages at any time, on any day. Our service manager made sure that the developers share suggestions with us. I always know what to expect from the next milestone. I like their approach.

From a financial point of view, we always know how much we’ll be charged for the next milestone and what functionality to expect. They have the perfect project management approach.

What did you find most impressive about them?

We’ve appreciated having regular communication with the team and the project manager. The designer was also very helpful. The web developers stayed in touch with us on Slack. We had access to our team 24/7. If we didn’t like something or had questions, I could write to them directly and receive feedback within a few hours. That allowed me to provide reports about the progress to my boss. Without that rapid communication from JatApp, my role wouldn’t be possible.

Also, their developers were extremely helpful. We had no prior experience with development at all since our focus is on the business part. The people from JatApp took care of everything, even things like creating a task force for unit resources and setting up a server account. Those minor things would have taken me so long. I’m not sure if they charged us for those items or not, but they’ve made a very, very positive impression.

Are there any areas they could improve?

They have incredible pricing and perform reliably, so there’s nothing that they should improve. Everything has gone smoothly. 

BACKGROUND

Please describe your organization.

We are a mobile solutions company.

What is your position?

I am the Chief Executive Officer of the company.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What business challenge were you trying to address with JatApp?

I had a great idea for an app. After researching the market, I found only one possible competitor for it, so I started looking for a company that would help me with the development process, including market research, the app development itself, and future maintenance.

SOLUTION

Please describe the scope of their involvement in greater detail.

JatApp used PHP and MySQL for the backend portion of the app, and Java for the frontend. We used Bitbucket for tracking the source code.

How did you come to work with JatApp?

I was looking for a long-term partnership with the right company. I researched the market and evaluated a dozen companies. It was a long and demanding process. I was looking for a partnership with a company that I could always rely on. I felt that JatApp was on the same page with me and I'm glad that I decided to move forward with them. They've become a big family for me, and have fulfilled all my expectations.

Could you provide a sense of the size of this initiative in financial terms?

The total development cost has been around $150,000. The maintenance contract we have is worth around $75,000. We've worked on app maintenance for about a year so far.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together at the end of 2014. The app was launched in January 2015. Right now, we have an ongoing maintenance contract for the app and I also use the services of their marketing team.

I plan on developing an iOS version of the application in 2016. JatApp will definitely be the team I'll use for this.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Could you share any statistics or metrics from this engagement?

JatApp did a wonderful job of creating the application. I'm very pleased with their approach for the whole development process. We worked together in order to tailor the app based on my ideas and business needs, fixing any issues along the way. They continue to provide support and important updates for it, based on user feed-back. They also provided a marketing team that works for my project.

How did JatApp perform from a project management standpoint?

They are very responsive, communicative, and have completed every job within time. Everything was completed exactly how I wanted, from my perfectionist point of view.

What distinguishes JatApp from other providers?

They are a great business partner overall. My project manager was brilliant: always available and organized. I received all required information in a transparent fashion.

I feel that I could throw anything at JatApp's team. Some ideas will be taken further and some not, but they always know what they're doing. They're true professionals and always find time to look into new directions for me.

Is there anything JatApp could have improved or done differently?

No, there isn't. I'm pleased that I found a company that fits my needs and is prepared to listen to my ideas. For now, everything has been great.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your organization.

Laraun Limited is specialized in development and design. We've been in the market for more than seven years and are based in Cyrpus.

What is your position?

I am the manager of the company.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What business challenge were you trying to address with JatApp?

We wanted to create a unique and interesting app within our market. We saw that the current trend at that time was for an Instagram followers apps. We needed the right developer for our idea.

SOLUTION

Please describe the scope of their involvement in greater detail.

They have acted as the sole developer of our app for both Android and iOS, using native languages, Java, and Objective-C respectively.

We started the project through a strategic workshop for defining our requirements. JatApp has worked with us throughout our research, helping us analyze the market, build our business model, and come up with the right strategies for the project. We started out with an idea which JatApp expanded. This is something that impressed me about them. They've also provided a lot of design concepts to choose from, which was amazing.

We were kept informed on a weekly basis about the development process and the work turned out great in the end. We really enjoyed working with them. 

Their team included three people: one backend developer and two app developers, one for each platform.

How did you come to work with JatApp?

They were recommended to us by a business partner. We met them and decided to go forward with their company.

Could you provide a sense of the size of this initiative in financial terms?

The total development cost was $60,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with them in March of 2015. The project took two months to complete.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Could you share any statistics or metrics from this engagement?

We have received a lot of reviews on app stores, and JatApp has provided us metrics for determining how interactive and well-received the app was. We've had some very good results.

How did JatApp perform from a project management standpoint?

Before we started working on the project, they asked us as many questions as possible, and provided a very detailed timeline. They met all our expectations and deadlines. The project manager on their side was in charge of the development process. We communicated constantly through email, Skype and phone calls. We came to work as one big family.

What distinguishes JatApp from other providers?

JatApp treated this project in a personal way. It didn't seem like it was just another project to them. Because it was our first mobile project, we had a lot of questions, which they were happy to answer in detail. JatApp was happy to help us in any other way.

Is there anything JatApp could have improved or done differently?

I cannot think of anything I didn't like about their job. JatApp is professional in everything they do.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and position.

I am the CTO of TubeSense BV

Describe what your company does in a single sentence.

Track and Trace and monitoring of transport conditions for biological samples for medical labs

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What specific goals or objectives did you hire JatApp to accomplish?

• Develop a robust smartphone App
• Consulting during the design process

SOLUTION

How did you find JatApp?

Referral

Why did you select JatApp over others?

Great culture fit, Good value for cost

What was the size of JatApp’s team?

2-5 Employees

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

Add new functionality to an already existing app.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

• Short development throughput time
• No errors during testing

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

Perfectly. Their good teamwork and pleasant communication were impressive

What was your primary form of communication with JatApp?

Virtual Meeting, Email or Messaging App

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

Fast and errorless coding

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

No

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I'm the CTO of a technology company

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

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

We required extra resources for an integration project that needed to be completed relatively quickly without impacting the workload of the current team.

SOLUTION

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

We found the Jatapp knowledgeable and cost effective

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

We provided Jatapp with a scoping document and had 2 separate follow up calls to clarify any follow up questions. The project has a NodeJS/MySQL based architecture

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

There were 2 people from the vendor involved a Business Development manager and Project Manager

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The project was delivered on time and free of bugs

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

We kept in constant communication over a common slack channel

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

They understood the requirements very quickly with minimal input from ourselves.

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

None

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

My company specializes on creating educational apps. I am a Product Manager at plant identifying app

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

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

We hired JatApp to create an MVP of plant identification mobile app. We needed the solution from scratch and for both platforms - Android and iOS

SOLUTION

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

We have talked to many IT companies before choosing JatApp. Smooth communication with development team was the very necessary thing for us, because we had an idea what we need and a lot of research. JatApp structured everything on the very beginning and offered some interesting functionality. It was done on so-called pre-sale stage and it impressed us a lot.

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

The application is developed from scratch for both Android and iOS. We started our collaboration with detailed business analysis and market needs research. The killer feature of the application is AI used for plant recognition. As for functionally - there are user profiles, payments, plant catalog, chat with specialists, care tips, push-notifications.

Adminsystem has been created to manage users. As for technologies - Kotlin and Swift were used for mobile development, Laravel for backend, and Vue.js for frontend part. We also used Firebase. It is planned to add many other useful things. Jatapp's product experience helped us a lot to determine the right stages of product development and launch.

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

It was a big team:

• project manager
• product analyst
• 2 backend developers
• iOS developer
• Android developer
• 2 QA engineers
• frontend developer
• UX/UI designer
• motion designer
• marketing specialists.

I am as Product Manager dealt with everyone

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

In the first months after the launch of the MVP, we see a large increase in users. Hope, it will be a stable tendency

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

Our cooperation was extremely effective. Their project manager and product analyst communicated with us every day reporting the progress. When we needed to talk directly to the development team they were always opened to it. I love it very much. Project was managed agile using Jira.

All communication was through a Slack channel and Zoom meetings. The development was divided into two-weeks sprints and after each we were shown some results.

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

They deal with the project as if it was their own. It impresses us

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

I don't have any ideas for now

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m an individual consultant who’s mostly working with small companies in the healthcare sector here in the US. I have a solid background in supporting and providing relevant information to businesses that would like to digitalize their patient-related documents. To do that, I have a pool of software development providers who I trust, and I ask them whether they have the time to do the work that I need to complete. One of the providers that I work with is JatApp.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with JatApp?

We hired JatApp to develop an ERP system for a small private hospital. My external customer was part of the healthcare sector. To get information about their patients’ medical history, they handed out paper forms that had to be filled in. Sometimes, they sent out emails of the same form.

Once our third-party client received the information, they’d store all the data of the patients through scanning it on the app. However, their platform was quite outdated. As a result, our external client wanted an ERP system that would enable them to be more efficient in working with patients as they wanted to completely automate their processes.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

JatApp created our external client’s system from scratch using PHP. The team made it possible for doctors to generate different types of medical forms through the ERP system. As a result, doctors didn’t need to send portal document format (PDF) files with blank spaces that patients needed to fill in.

Additionally, with the new system, patients could easily find the form they need and they could fill it out whether they were at the hospital or at their home. After that, doctors would easily find the form in the system.

In total, JatApp had completed 10–12 types of documents. That number would most likely go up in the future because the proof of concept (POC) stage was rather successful. 

What is the team composition?

We worked with a developer, content developer, UI designer, and project manager.

How did you come to work with JatApp?

JatApp was recommended by someone I knew. That person had already worked with the team 2–3 years ago. Based on that person's positive feedback, we engaged with JatApp.

How much have you invested with them?

We spent $70,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We worked together from August–December 2020. This project wasn’t the first time we worked together.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

With the success of the POC stage, our external client was convinced that they should increase the number of documents in their ERP system. In addition, our third-party client was satisfied because they didn’t need to write, print, or scan in order to collect information.

We also appreciated JatApp’s good reporting skills. On top of producing high-quality work, they submitted their deliverables in a timely manner. Overall, we were more than happy with our partnership.

How did JatApp perform from a project management standpoint?

Our communication was good, and we had no complaints.

What did you find most impressive about them?

We appreciated that JatApp delivered what they promised.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, we didn’t have anything particular that they could improve. Everything went smoothly.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Be very clear and specific with your requirements at the very beginning of the engagement. The more detailed your project requirements are, the better the estimation and communication will be. Nothing will good will come out of the relationship if you don’t have a clear understanding of what you need. Above all, be ready with your budget.