Orange Sputnik

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I'm the CEO of a gig economy platform for on-demand services including deliveries and general labor.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

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

We needed to overhaul our platform, design, technical stack, in addition to increased capabilities across mobile platforms. For this very technical requirement, we sought multiple partners across different geographic zones and countries.

While we had meaningful proposals, our initial engagement with initial partners did not deliver the results we required. We continued our search over a 6 month period. The team at Orange Sputnik demonstrated a business-first and technical understanding of our requirements in a manner that connected across our organization.

Our advisors, board, internal and external partners understood the proposed approach, technical decomposition, business alignment, quality control, and deployment plan from the team at Orange Sputnik. We formalized our partnership, with the goal set to roll out features in a staggered manner that leverages functionality and usability into a great customer experience.

SOLUTION

How did you select Orange Sputnik and what were the deciding factors?

We engaged with Orange Sputnik after initial discussions that took a few months. In this time period, some of the other firms we had discussions with either did not understand our business environment relative to technical requirements, or simply were not capable of delivering an initial assessment.

The team at Orange Sputnik was able to translate our requirements into an actionable plan and communicated this very effectively. Our deciding factors were the following: Language barriers - There was no language barrier.

The Orange Sputnik team was very good with communication in a very collaborative manner. Transparency - The team was very transparent. While other proposals simply said "Yes" to everything, the Orange Sputnik team was not afraid to say no when the business, functional, or technical requirements were not aligned.

This is very important in communication and building trust. Technical Capabilities - The team was able to decompose in very clear terms an actionable plan, steps, stages, risks, dependencies, relationships, and trade-offs inherent in our product designs and development.

In addition to a working test plan, timeline, scope and costs. Availability - They are very available and we've built a very close relationship with them over the years. They are an integral part of our work and lives now.

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

We kicked off the project. The Orange Sputnik team built a working prototype within weeks, a full test environment, and a collaboration environment via JIRA and other project management tools including Skype, email clients and other auxiliary tools.

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

We've worked with over 8 people including Full stack developers, Mobile Application developers, UI/UX Designers, QA / Test Analysts, and other developers as well as Project managers and Testers.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We have over 300% growth within the first year. We launched subsequent versions of the platform, in addition to iteratively improving based on market data and feedback. We project increasing growth 8X even through COVID-19.

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

We used JIRA, GitHub and a few other platforms to collaborate and manage projects. Their project management style is very agile, with some rigidity when necessary. The transparency, collaborative communication, and availability has created a high degree of trust, which lead to a collaboratively agile management approach that continues till the present day.

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

The relationship we have built so far. It's unusual for entities spread across geographic zones to build trust across business lines. Having met the leadership in person, there is a uniqueness that translates into alignment in every facet of our business and into other project opportunities as well.

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

The time zone issue could be challenging at times. But once you get into a cadence and operating velocity, this becomes less of an issue. Also, sometimes whenever a new resource is added to the team, it may take a while to get them fully oriented with the ongoing deliverable schedule.