Octobot

Introduce your business and what you do there

I'm the CEO of an international remittance firm.

What challenges were you trying to address with Octobot?

We needed help with custom software development.

What was the scope of their involvement? 

We've been working with Octobot on several projects, including integral development from outlining to design. They've helped us develop a back office platform for remittance management. Also, recently we worked on an update to help us make our process more scalable, which implied networking our software to an international platform. We also were looking to integrate different payment methods and create a frontend solution that could be a self-management platform for our clients.

In terms of tools, they use the latest technologies, like React, AWS, and Django.

Currently, they're providing maintenance to the platforms.

What was the team composition?

We've worked with Guillermo (CEO), a manager, a team of developers, and a tech lead, among other members of their team.

How did you come to work with Octobot?

I knew about them through Guillermo, who I know personally.

How much have you invested in them?

So far, we've spent around $100,000 with them.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in November 2021, and the engagement is ongoing.

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

We have weekly sprints with the developers in which they handle different requirements, and we evaluate how satisfied we are with the results. So far, regarding design, they've met our expectations, and our team is delighted with how they've responded and handled communications.

How did Octobot perform from a project management standpoint?

Their response time has been outstanding; the project was determined to last about four months, and we're in good timing. Regarding communication, we use Slack, emails, and weekly follow-up meetings. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

Their key attributes are their project management skills, organization, and great follow-up process. Also, the price-quality ratio they offer is great.

Are there any areas they could improve?

They could arrange meetings with the product owner on our side once every month to communicate the project's progress.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Be clear about your needs, and work on your outlines before working on the development itself.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the technical co-founder and senior director of software development for an online marketplace that provides a service for dog owners, such as dog sitting, walking, and training.

What challenge were you trying to address with Octobot?

We were looking for developers to supplement our software development efforts.

What was the scope of their involvement?

We brought in Octobot to supply us with software development experts that specialize in the Django, Python, and React frameworks. Our partnership is largely remote, but we still have people come to our office periodically for some of our in-house operations.

What is the team composition?

We’re currently working with about 11 software engineers and developers.

How did you come to work with Octobot?

One of our senior engineers met somebody from Octobot at DjangoCon.

How much have you invested with them?

So far, we’ve spent about $1 million.

What is the status of this engagement?

Our ongoing partnership started in October 2021, as we start to ramp up our partnership.

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

We measure the success of the partnership based on development velocity and positive feedback from both industry managers and senior engineers on the team and so far, they’ve been performing up to our expectations.

They’re able to fill the roles we need rapidly and we highly appreciate the skill set and communication skills of their individual engineers.

How did Octobot perform from a project management standpoint?

Octobot performs well from a project management standpoint, as they consistently meet their deadline and budget.

We mainly utilize JIRA and typically communicate through Slack and Google Meet.

What did you find most impressive about them?

We’re impressed with how their technical focus perfectly aligns with what we’re looking for, and their efforts in implementing a diverse pipeline when it comes to hiring people.

Are there any areas they could improve?

I can’t think of any constructive feedback as Octobot has exceeded all our expectations. Getting everybody on board has been a smooth process and it has accelerated our entire project in a meaningful way.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

My advice is to communicate with their leaders clearly because they’re extremely accommodating.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am an IT manager at an employment institution based in Uruguay.

What challenges were you trying to address with Octobot?

We recently with through a collaborative digital transformation with Octobot, which required them to develop a custom piece of software to help manage our different processes. This development represented the core of our institution.

What was the scope of their involvement?

Octobot used Python and Django for the development, and they also provided consulting.

How did you come to work with Octobot?

When we first found Octobot, they were a small company, and we had a very small development with them. Their work was excellent, and after that initial experience we increased our collaboration.

How much have you invested in them?

We’ve spent around $600,000 with Octobot.

What is the status of this engagement?

We began our first collaboration with them in 2013, and we’ve continued working together since.

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

Octobot’s services have always been excellent. The developments they’ve done for us have brought great benefits to our institution. Additionally, not only is our institution happy, but our users and clients have also provided great responses to the platforms.

How did Octobot Perform from a project management standpoint?

We’ve always had a very close relationship with them. They’ve shown great involvement in all our projects. Flexible and technically adept, Octobot always prioritizes project success. They are very personable as well.

What did you find most impressive about them?

It’s hard to choose just one aspect. Octobot has great technical skills and they also have a great ability to understand the needs of their clients.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

IPV Capital is a venture capital and private equity firm. I’m an associate, so a junior member on the investment team.

What challenge were you trying to address with Octobot?

We wanted to revamp our website to make it more professional and attractive.

What was the scope of their involvement?

Octobot built a completely new website. We had an existing website for them to work with but their team developed the new platform from scratch.

Octobot initially sent us a mood board with several different themes. We chose one of the themes for the website and then they started designing the product. Their team sent us PowerPoint presentations throughout the process, so we made edits to different sections of the website during the design and development phases. We finally launched the website four months later.

After developing the website, they built a data room where users can access files about our company. Users can create accounts and then enter our digital file repository where we can upload files such as tax records and presentations. Users can download these files. Octobot built the whole backend ecosystem supporting it.

What is the team composition?

Guillermo (CEO & Co-Founder) was our main point of contact, but we worked with 2–3 of Octobot's software engineers.

How did you come to work with Octobot?

We found them through referral. One of our partners at the firm was familiar with Octobot because his professional contact used their design services and was satisfied with them. We decided to work with them based on the strong referral.

How much have you invested with them?

For the website project, we spent around $20,000. The data room was an additional cost. We had a lot of back-and-forth changes for the data room, so it probably amount to $5,000–$10,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started the project in January 2020 and launched the website around April 2020.

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

We came to them without ideas for how we wanted our website to look. All we knew was that we wanted it to be simple. Octobot came to us with several different ideas and several different layouts, which blew us away. The website’s design impressed us.

When we had ideas, their team was willing to work with them. Throughout the project, Octobot was willing to come up with new ideas, which surprised us.

How did Octobot perform from a project management standpoint?

We communicated via email but also had video chats during which Octobot presented their work in progress. Throughout the project, we communicated about every other day.

Octobot was super engaged and helpful throughout the whole process. We had them make a lot of changes to the templates, and their team was always open to different ideas. They were open to our constant back and forth. Their team responded quickly and did quick work.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Their responsiveness was phenomenal. We came to them with a lot of different changes and updates. Every time we made a request, Octobot was open to it. They were never frustrated by our constant changes in direction. Their team was responsive to our changes and supportive of them.

Are there any areas they could improve?

It’s hard to find an opportunity for improvement. If I could make one recommendation to them, I would say that their team could’ve presented more ideas on how the website could look. They could’ve brainstormed additional thoughts, layouts, or ideas.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

I would recommend working with Octobot. Present your ideas but also give them room to think of the best way to execute the project. Be communicative about how you want to structure the website but let Octobot handle the design. They will give you a lot of unique ideas.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am the founder and CEO of Puppy Mama, Inc. We are a social media startup and lifestyle brand.

What challenge were you trying to address with Octobot?

We reached out to them for help on building our platform. We needed to get to MVP and perform market analysis in order to ensure a good product fit. I had initially worked on a mockup of the UI and UX myself, and was looking for a dev team which could bring it to the next level.

What was the scope of their involvement?

Octobot provided design and development for our platform. Since I was building a women’s brand, it was important to find a female developer, which is hard to do, especially in the US. There are multiple women on Octobot’s team, and all of them are talented. I have been very impressed with their work.

To start, we had two full-time developers, both of whom moved fast and with quality work. But, because I wanted to launch a more sophisticated MVP than what was originally in our contract, we upped the team to three full-time developers, as well as two UX/UI designers.

Immediately prior to our launch, Octobot brought in their senior developer, who worked very hard with the team in order to fix any last-minute bugs. I was impressed with how much emphasis, dedication and care was put into the project. Octobot was proud of the product, and they wanted it to look great. True ownership over the work is hard to find.

How did you come to work with Octobot?

I found them through a friend in a senior position at another tech company in San Francisco. I was considering whether to find a CTO or a dev shop offshore. He gave me quite a few names, and I also received contacts from other friends. I interviewed a few shops, and felt that Octobot not only had a good price, but their principal is also a talented and smart person who listened to us and cared. I told him what my vision was, and he quickly understood it, relaying back what value his team could bring.

Octobot was the best out of all the shops I visited, and I was also impressed with the technical infrastructure in Uruguay. Video and phone calls were the same as when communicating with someone in San Francisco. When I interviewed other companies, the bigger distance and/or lack of infrastructure were a source of frustration. In order to have a true partner, they needed to be accessible and reliable. As a nearshore company, relative to California, Octobot is only four or five hours away from us.

How much have you invested with Octobot?

I’m confident that Octobot would negotiate in good faith with other clients, but our project may be different than others, given that we’ve leveraged them as a full-time member in our team. I was the only employee of the company at the time, so I needed Octobot’s help more than other people may have.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with Octobot in October 2016. We spent two to three weeks ensuring that the UX design was exactly what we wanted before moving on to the development phase. We launched in mid-March 2017. We continue the contract with Octobot, but we’ll build more features only after we’ve tested the platform.

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

People have been very impressed with our platform, and have requested introductions to Octobot’s team. They took the software to the net level, creating a sleek design and plugging in different types of modules. I’ve received many compliments.

How did Octobot perform from a project management standpoint?

I couldn’t be happier with Octobot’s team. They’re a pleasure to work with, and we even cracked jokes during our meetings. It wasn’t a dry collaboration; Octobot was in it as much as I was, and it was important to see that passion from the people I was working with.

I was trained on the development process, and got onto the same project tracker as the team. When I identified a bug, I put it in, and we developed a very good rhythm. We’ve been using the django-project-management application, through which I can give overviews of the app by myself.

My husband and I visited Octobot in Uruguay, and we’ve been impressed with their office space. They also surprised us by having the CEO and three other team members come to our office in order to help us with the demo phase.

What did you find most impressive about Octobot?

My husband and I have been very impressed with the work provided by Octobot, and we treat them more as partners, which is hard to find when outsourcing developers. They have been our team since the beginning, and I strongly appreciate their counsel regarding how to make the app better and lessons learned. Instead of just doing what we’re asking them to do, Octobot has given them that extra layer which we hope to see with any third-party partner.

Are there any areas Octobot could improve?

There were issues here and there, but their project management was very professional. Given what downsides could have occurred, I have no complaints. We were given results for testing in order to eliminate any issues later on.

What tips or recommendations could you share that might increase the likelihood of success with Octobot?

Having had the same dev shop from the beginning has allowed us to find a good rhythm, and I strongly recommend that others find the same kind of partner. There is a lot of added value in sticking with one team.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the product owner of an intelligent barn operating system. It connects different devices in one spot and allows automation, tying other data sources such as herd and feed data. Overall, it’s a solution in the dairy space for everything around the barn.

What challenge were you trying to address with Octobot?

We hired them to do all the development work on the product itself.

What was the scope of their involvement?

We layout the roadmap and requirements of what’s needed, and Octobot is the team that delivers and gets the work done. We use Figma for UI/UX design, and Octobot uses a couple of different programs for development.

What is the team composition?

There are now eight people on the team. We have a team leader, 2–3 backend developers, and about five frontend developers.

How did you come to work with Octobot?

They were hired before I came on, so I’m not sure how they decided to go with Octobot.

What is the status of this engagement?

I’ve been working on the project for about five months. It started in April 2020, and it’s ongoing.

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

It’s not an official metric, but we measure the progress based on the releases and our roadmap. We see if we’ve hit the mark and continue to add and solidify what we have. The end result will be the product on its running stage.

Moreover, we rely a lot on them to get the work out. Without Octobot, we wouldn’t be able to develop the product that we want. They’re crucial for our business.

How did Octobot perform from a project management standpoint?

Communication and deadlines are very important for our role together. We have planning sessions every other week for the sprints to come, and we use Aha!, a roadmap planning tool. All the team has access to it so they can follow along. We also use Pivotal Tracker — an agile system product like Jira — to store and organize all the work needed.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Compared to my experience with other development companies, Octobot has performed exceptionally well. The team is thorough and timely. If they have any doubts, they address them and ask us.

They’re also pretty intelligent, resilient, and accommodating. If there’s an issue, they’re willing to work late. Moreover, Octobot has similar aspirations as ours in terms of making a mark in their industry, and it reflects in their service.

Are there any areas they could improve?

We have difficulties sometimes because they primarily speak Spanish, so things may get mixed up a bit. However, it never affects the quality of the work; it just makes it harder to explain certain things, so we just have to rephrase questions.

Nonetheless, we don’t have any complaints. They’re an amazing group to work with.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the co-founder of Cloud IT Guru, a technology solutions company.

What challenge were you trying to address with Octobot?

My company wanted to develop a product. We needed to hire a development company that could understand our product idea and take it to production.

What was the scope of their involvement?

We already had the product’s user interface, design, and mockups, and we provided all of this to Octobot. They developed our product using Python, PostgreSQL, AWS, and Docker containers.

What is the team composition?

We work with two Octobot team members.

How did you come to work with Octobot?

We evaluated a lot of companies on Clutch, and Octobot’s reviews were very good. In our interview with Octobot, they expressed interest in our product. We wanted to implement a complicated product architecture, and Octobot understood these needs better than any of the other vendors that we considered.

How much have you invested with them?

My company has spent $60,000–$90,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in September 2018, and the project is ongoing.

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

The product came out much better than we expected it would. We’re very happy with the way the project has gone.  

How did Octobot perform from a project management standpoint?

We followed an agile development methodology. Octobot managed project deliverables with Pivotal Tracker and Slack, and we had no communication challenges. We had weekly calls to discuss progress, and the same Octobot team members were always on the call. The team was open to answering questions and sharing information.

What did you find most impressive about them?

I don’t believe we would have gotten this experience from another firm. Octobot took the time to understand our user interface. We admire their proactive and detail-oriented team.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, I haven’t found anything for them to improve. They have a very good understanding of the system, and they make customer service a top priority.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the founder of zealpath.com

What challenge were you trying to address with Octobot?

We wanted to find a developer to create an MVP solution. We went on to consider several developers and Octobot appeared as one of them. We went ahead and developed an MVP with them.

What was the scope of their involvement?

They used Python, AngularJS, AWS. In terms of the project, we had a team of 3-4 developers assigned to the project. We’ve had a great experience in the requirements process. They wanted to understand the value proposition and add a business outlook. They weren’t limited to only develop the functionalities but to understand our business objective. They’ve gone above and beyond, contributing and helping us greatly with design. This has contributed to our value proposition and their understanding of how the business works so they can continue helping us.

How did you come to work with Octobot?

We found them online. It’s good to highlight that we wanted to work in English in case the project is transferred to another development. But all of our meetings are in Spanish. The documentation and everything else is in English. This is an advantage.

Their time zone works perfectly with our times in Europe. This is fundamental as we get to catch up with Octobot at the end of our workday.

How much have you invested with Octobot?

10k-50k

What is the status of this engagement?

We’re still working with them until May for now.

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

Octobot’s reactions to issues that arise has been very good. They’ve also recognized when parts of the solution needed to be readdressed without charging us extra. Their dedication and client service is really good. They want us to be happy.

How did Octobot perform from a project management standpoint?

We’ve used Google Hangouts to do the weekly catchup meetings. We have always used a project manager and they have created all tasks. We haven’t had to figure things out too much. Wireframes included related explanations with the users’ flows. They’ve been able to create their own sprints and tasks.

We haven’t needed Slack. They resolved their issues. Communication was efficient. Our time zones work very well with them.

What did you find most impressive about Octobot?

They were able to question themselves on why do certain things before working on a task. In some cases, they found weak points of the product. Having the scrum master who also acted a product manager was able to understand the product.

Were there any areas for improvement?

I think this happens with every company with some junior programmers. The person who started to develop the product wasn’t as qualified as others but this didn’t represent a cost for us. People need to learn and we understand companies need to have some junior developers. There were some changes in the assigned developer but it wasn’t a loss for us.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

Bycle is a bicycling app. I am a co-founder of the company.

What challenge were you trying to address with Octobot?

We needed to bring our concept to reality. We had been keeping it on the backburner, and weren't able to pass it from design to a fully working app. We needed a development team which could fulfill what we required.

What was the scope of their involvement?

Octobot not only succeeded in developing our iOS app, but they became a strategic partner in helping us achieve our business goals. We wanted to create not only a working app regarding UI [user interface] and UX [user experience] but also improve the concept itself.

We have used the Swift language with a backend infrastructure on Amazon Web Services. We also used Mandrill for communications with our users, and Mapbox as a mapping software.

Because of our budget and depending on the phase, we've worked with one or two developers from Octobot's team, the average being one resource. Their principal also participated in the project, working closely with us.

How did you come to work with Octobot?

We had been discussing the project with another team and were trying to determine if we could work together. We posted a request and made ourselves available for collaboration. I don't remember the specifics, but there was something in Octobot's approach which we found to be very humane. The team was in the same time zones and spoke the same languages as ourselves and our business partners. This meant that we could have easy communication with Octobot. Their website also looked very good. The prospect was very appealing to us, so I scheduled a Skype interview.

How much have you invested with Octobot?

The cost of Octobot's work has been around $60,000–$70,000 in total so far. We have completed different milestones, each with different costs.

What is the status of this engagement?

We have been working consistently with Octobot since February 2016. The project is ongoing, with Octobot acting as our in-house team.

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

We wanted to create an MVP [minimum viable product] in time for a tech conference. Octobot created a working app which we could run from a phone, rather than an animated proof-of-concept. It allowed us to get a lot more attention, and gain leverage in our negotiations.

We had a technical difficulty before a meeting with Women's Health magazine, and it was critical that we got the app working properly. Even though I was in New York, while Octobot's team was in Uruguay, they were there for us, making the app work minutes before we walked into the meeting. That sense of reliability showed us that we weren't simply outsourcing a project, but bringing in a group of people who would have our backs. Octobot has incredible communication and accessibility, especially in the case of our two partners from their team.

Right now, we are in the beta-testing mode for the app. The best measures I can provide are regarding response and execution rate. Octobot has been very good at achieving our goals and handling unexpected circumstances. The team has been able to solve any problems which popped-up within the course of a week, on average.

Our app works with a specific bike mount, and we needed to add GoPro camera integration to the app. Within one week, Octobot delivered a prototype. Whenever we have a new demo, we're impressed by their work.

How did Octobot perform from a project management standpoint?

We almost have daily communication, and we try to have a full review of our achievements once per week. This gives me a good feeling over the collaboration.

Our project doesn't always involve building fully functional solutions from the start. We may look at proofing a particular feature, and within a week Octobot will deliver a result which we can test.

Octobot has Scrum management for the team, which is extremely effective. The group is very organized, working based on roadmaps and feature-breakdowns. They've pushed us at the same time to conform to the same organization.

Communication is mainly done through Slack, but we also have Google Hangouts sessions and in-person meetings. The relationship with Octobot is personal and approachable. The group isn't very bureaucratic, but they're still very organized. This allows us to brainstorm during every session, conceptualize, and take the app to an actual successful result.

What did you find most impressive about Octobot?

Octobot has helped us understand what was or wasn't possible. Even though we could unleash our imagination and bring new ideas to the table, Octobot always knew how to manage our expectations, which is important. Octobot never said no to anything, but they still let us know what our limitations were. Their abilities regarding software development are very strong. Octobot has been able to manage any challenge we put up, giving us good time estimates. They're also good at providing alternatives which may provide the same results regarding UX.

Are there any areas Octobot could improve?

Every startup will want to spend as little as possible, and Octobot is not the cheapest software development company out there. In general terms, we've never had a real issue, though. Any situations we've encountered in the past, like moving from email to Slack, were always improved on-the-spot. Keeping up with bugs and fixes proved to be difficult recently. We had a single channel on Slack for discussing bugs, but we've made a dashboard on which we upload videos, pictures, and descriptions of particular bugs.

It's not always the best to work with a team from another city, but we have overcome these things through technology. We couldn't be happier with Octobot. It may sound too good to be true, but it's the reason we've kept working with Octobot, even though we found cheaper solutions on the market.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

We are a full-service advertising agency with five global offices and around 500 employees. I work in our connected experiences team, which creates and manages everything that touches the internet. My role within that team is development director. I oversee the execution of all the visual properties and user experiences we design.

What challenge were you trying to address with Octobot?

We worked with Octobot to build our own website. They refreshed our former one, which was about four years old.

What was the scope of their involvement?

At our request, Octobot used WordPress as our CMS and platform. We had some familiarity because our previous site was built on it. We explored a few options, but settled on WordPress. Their team hired a WordPress specialist to accommodate this.

We worked with them on about a dozen other projects. The technologies ranged from HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, to iOS app development. We’ve also done some API work with a workflow management tool called Workfront.

Another large project used a JavaScript library. It was developed for a site that used a 360-degree camera to give a virtual tour of an indoor space.

What is the team composition?

From the hours report Octobot gave us, we worked with five or six developers. The developers were all based in Uruguay, but our main point of contact, the co-founder, worked from Minneapolis for most of the year. He was in Uruguay for the first month of the project. Outside of that, he came onsite for meetings and reviews. We had the team from Uruguay on videoconference.

How did you come to work with Octobot?

We had worked with them a lot before this project, so they were a proven partner. Compared to our other options, the price point was also excellent. Otherwise, we would have had to acquire internal development resources or pay twice as much to use a similar local development shop.

Because of our history with Octobot, we knew that they were a good partner who would accommodate our timeline and functionality changes. They also had great attention to detail. We could resend designs and wireframes, and they would implement the functionality and design immediately in very high fidelity. With other remote teams, that can be a long, frustrating cycle of reviews and revisions. We were very happy with the work Octobot did for us in the past. That largely influenced our decision to use them for this project.

How much have you invested with them?

For this project, the cost of their work has been $50,000–$80,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

It’s an internal site, so employees have many opinions on it. We started talking about it internally in October or November 2017. Octobot effectively began developing the site in March 2018.

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

We got excellent internal feedback. Everyone in the agency loved the way it looked and functioned, which I largely attributed to Octobot’s attention to detail. They implemented our visual designs at a high fidelity. When we ran into issues, Octobot proactively suggested alternative solutions and enhancements, which we implemented quickly.

We supplied wireframes, designs, animations, and other pieces of functionality for visual implementation. Once we started development, some of those elements proved impractical or simply clunky. Octobot usually brought those situations to us with a potential solution and an estimate of how long its implementation would take. Working with them was exceptionally valuable.

In many cases, their alternative solutions were excellent fixes. Our team could have devised them on their own, but the fact that Octobot could make those suggestions was indispensable. They already had roadmaps for building them, which expedited their path. 

How did Octobot perform from a project management standpoint?

They were very good partners, and flexible with the changes we dictated. We used to communicate with them on Slack. When our company shifted away from it, Octobot didn’t skip a beat. We continued to use email and other tools. 

We gave their co-founder access to Workfront, our internal workflow management tool. He seamlessly communicated through that tool, using it in coordination with Octobot's internal project management tools. It was great to have their co-founder as a local resource. We got the best of both worlds, with face-to-face conversations to hash things out, plus all the benefits of a remote team.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Their key strengths were their flexibility and ability to execute whatever we threw at them, often on very tight timelines. They never failed to deliver what we asked for within a reasonable amount of time, even if it was beyond our initial goal. They were either early, on time, or gave us a heads-up that they couldn't meet a deadline. They were always upfront about the feasibility of those timelines and deliveries. They often hit deadlines early, which was always a bonus.