Radixweb

BACKGROUND

Please describe your organization.

Visiun provides data analytic software and services to its clients.

What is your role at the company?

I am the chief technology officer at Visiun.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What was the business challenge that you were trying to address with RadixWeb?

Visiun wanted to take its industry-leading analytics solution and move it from a client-based application to a pure cloud-based solution.

What were your company's business goals for the project?

We wanted to have a solution, which our clients would recognize for the same deep analytics, yet looked like it was made for the cloud and was not simply a quick port of a client solution.

SOLUTION

Please describe the scope of their involvement in detail.

This was a project hosted in Microsoft Azure environment. It involved a lot of SQL Server, C#, .Net, Telerik Controls, web services, and Redis Cache.

How did you come to work with RadixWeb?

We wanted a partner who was big enough to be able to pull in specialized resources when needed, but not so big that we would have trouble getting their attention. Radix has turned out to meet both of these points very well.

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

We expect the project to take more than five years.

What is the status of this engagement?

Radix's work for us began in July 2014 and still continues. We have engaged them for additional phases of work during the last year. They have delivered on their commitments, and we have felt increasingly comfortable continuing to send Radix additional work.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Could you share any statistics or metrics from this engagement?

I do not have any obvious metrics to share, but Radix did deliver our cloud-based solution, which is now working excellently. We continue to enhance the solution with Radix.

How did RadixWeb perform?

RadixWeb has been excellent – showing expertise in all of the key technologies we needed: C#/.Net, SQL Server, Azure, Telerik controls, and ABCPDF. Our own fluid requirements have made it challenging at times, but RadixWeb has excelled.

What distinguishes RadixWeb from other providers?

When we felt things were not going perfectly, Radix was quick to agree with our assessment and was proactive in offering solutions, which we felt went beyond what was required. For example, early on, we felt that the four-person team was not delivering updates at a quick enough pace, Radix agreed and had come to the same conclusion. They removed one team member and replaced him with two others for six months – so 25% additional resources on the team at no additional charge. With some smaller items, Radix self-identified and offered solutions, which we felt were very fair.

In hindsight, are there areas in which they could improve, or things you might do differently?

I can think of no obvious things they should have changed. The resources allocated to the project were not always optimal, but the root cause was that we had changing requirements and priorities. Radix definitely did adjust as needed.

What advice would you give to a future client of theirs?

Give Radix good insight into your product plans. That will allow them to stay ahead of the curve in terms of lining up the best resources and offering suggestions on how to best staff and deliver.

This is not exactly specific to Radix, but still applicable: the more specific your requirements, the less likely you are to be disappointed. In most cases, when we did not get what we wanted, it was because we left our requirements at too high a level.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your organization.

The name of the business is eCAT, which is an acronym for Electronic Compliance Audit Tools.

What is your position?

I'm a co-founder.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What business challenge were you trying to address with RadixWeb?

About four or five years ago, my partner had this idea about digitizing audits. By audits I mean, for example, health care audits and hygiene audits. Its processes that are ordinarily carried out repetitively on paper. He was doing these audits himself and, as it turns out, he was being paid handsomely to do them, but nobody was paying him to sit at home, doing all the reports and trying to figure out whether things were trending up or down.

Eventually, he had the idea of digitizing them, and he couldn't find tools out there to do it, so he asked me to get involved as a partner to help shape that entire project.

SOLUTION

Please describe the scope of their involvement.

The initial business from our perspective was all about shaping what we felt was the ideal tool to automate the task. What we wanted was to take that paper and clipboard and drop it onto people's smartphones or tablets. Back then, the main platform was Windows and, as we got going at it, we realized that technology changed quite quickly and that Android was the next thing. Then, of course, it was Apple.

Radix came up with a way of handling all that for us because to be honest we were quite computer illiterate, I suppose. We were relying on their guidance all the way through, as to how to approach it, and what platforms to build it on and whatnot. We've actually rolled it into something called PhoneGap, and PhoneGap translates to Android; not entirely, but it makes the process easier. We had the mobile app up and running, and then we developed a website to work in parallel with it.

The principle is that you would go to your hospital, clinic, or wherever you're doing your audit, and you do that on your tablet. You would then submit that, and it would go on up into the cloud. Then, the calculations would happen there, in terms of how it's performing today versus yesterday, or this week versus last week, or this branch versus another branch within the industry.

Between us, during the development phase, we would have continuously been guiding them as to how we wanted it to look and feel, and how we felt the user interface should be designed. Because they understood that if we're going to roll this out to bigger organizations, then training has to be absolutely minimized.

They had great patience with us, and we had patience with them. Between us, we came up with a system. The very first place we went to had 70 people, and we had them trained pretty much in 24 hours and ready to go. To us, that was a great marker of how the first launch went, and it's been really improving from there.

The back-end of the website – that's been an ongoing development process, and we're continuously trying to get the interface better for the end-users. Most importantly, it's the reporting structure and the mechanics around that. In other words, how those reports are distributed. They can be fired based on what we call alerts, which are triggered based on specific business logic. It could be something like a score is too low, or an inconsistent parameter, which requires somebody to be notified about it. The system takes that audit, reconfigures it, emails it out, and creates tasks. Now, you've got open tasks as a result of the audit. Then, other people can log into the system and close out those tasks, reassign them, move them, complete them, or whatever it is.

We wanted structures in place that allowed the full users, which might be auditors or super administrators, all the way down to what we call task closer, which is the kind of bare minimum. If you login as a task closer, you literally get your open tasks in front of you, and then you close them out. That's a little tour of what we've been about for the last few years.

We've got investment onboard, and we've been growing our business for the last four years, obviously. Right now, we've got quite a good number of what we consider blue chip companies using the system. Really, it's just about onboarding as in getting more people to buy into it. As we go, of course, and as various clients come on, if somebody wants something bespoke, and it's very bespoke to that client, they will pay for that accordingly. We set up a slightly separate system for them.

In the main, what we've tried to do is retain one core system, which every client has, and the clients that do suggest stuff that we feel is good for everybody, we put it into everything. However, if it's very bespoke to a specific client, then we just leave it for their particular domain.

Right now, we're working with a core team of three programmers. We have two clear product lines, and there's one programmer/developer on each of them. The third programmer is on the mobile product, and then we have a fourth guy who does all of the QA [quality assurance]. That's as small as the team has been. Sometimes, we take in bespoke work, and we bring in two extra programmers for that. At the height of the development project, I think there were 10 or 12 of them, but that was three or four years ago.

How did you come to work with RadixWeb?

We are not experts in all of this, but we looked at a number of potential programmers in Ireland, and also in the United Kingdom, but we found them to be slow in what they were offering and also very expensive. They were sort of estimating the project would take 18-months, and we just couldn't believe it was going to take that long.

Once we had screened through Ireland and the U.K., people here suggested that we should try India. We didn't really know where to start in India, so we just started combing through the web. We had 20 or 30 potentials, and we started making phone calls, and all that kind of stuff. We eventually narrowed it down to four or five providers, and I think the last three we actually met in person to interview and have demos.

Being honest, we wouldn't have had the wherewithal to say whether these guys were fit for purpose or not technically. We explained to each of these people what we had in mind, and we expected them to come back to us with a proposal of how it might look and feel, and how they would see it rolling out. We learned a lot from each and every one of those. Each of those meetings showed us, "Well, there's something we didn't know before or something we should consider for the next one." We did get some advice from friends and family. There was one guy in particular who did a bit of programming himself, so he gave us quite a few pointers of what to keep an eye out for, at the very least.

I suppose Radix seemed to tick more boxes than anybody else, but I think the final thing for Radix was that they had two guys, in particular, at the time on the team that just seemed to get it. I can't describe it any better than that, but they seemed to understand deeper and better than any of the others did. They were able to come back to us much more sharply with, "Well, this is what you guys are actually looking for." We were like, "Yes, that actually does make sense." Their interpretation or their intuition on what we were trying to explain seemed to be a notch above the other people we were talking to.

On price, I don't think they were the cheapest, but they certainly weren't anywhere like what U.K. developers might have been. Ultimately, that's really what it was, their intuition and what they brought to the table in terms of identifying what we really wanted. From having done the initial mockups and overview, and conversations with two or three other companies, we just thought they were a better fit.

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

I can tell you now we're spending about $12,000 a month with them – that's right now. At the peak, there were a lot more team members involved, and we were writing things from scratch.

What is the status of this engagement?

The relationship is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Could you share any statistics or metrics from this engagement?

Because it was a kind of a rolling development, we didn't ultimately know what the final product was going to look like. We did have a fair idea in our own minds what it should look like, but as we got in with more clients and more customers, we recognized that we had to adapt it relatively quickly. There was quite a strong learning curve on our side. For the first while, in fairness to Radix, even though we tried to do it, we didn't really enforce too many of the KPIs [key performance indicators] that we had each agreed upon because, frankly, we were changing the goal post nearly too quickly for them to stick.

As we got more settled, we had more KPIs in there, and they were really more around client issues. We said that if a client has what we called a show-stopping bug, meaning they can't actually perform an audit, then it was all hands on deck, and that had to be fixed as smartly as possible. In the main, we've never gone down entirely. We never had a complete stop. We've had the bugs on the mobile app sometimes, but the show-stopping ones, we've nearly always fixed them well within 24 hours. From a customer service point of view, that was one of our biggest KPIs – that we wouldn't let anybody wait longer than a day, and we've got that locked down.

On the other side then, when we decide there's a new piece of work to be done, we tend not to put a huge amount of pressure on them because we want it done right. We would agree at the start that this change is going to take 10 days. It doesn't always come back within 10 days, sometimes it could be 11 or 12, but other times, they'd come in on seven or eight. That, to be fair, might also depend on what other bugs might have happened in the meantime. To measure it, if it's something we've often done, we do look at it month on month, but we don't really hold it there. It's not a carrot and a stick type of thing. We're probably not as standardized as we should be.

How did RadixWeb perform from a project management standpoint?

We've never gone over budget, and we would be quite sharp on that, especially being a startup. We would lock down whatever the price of the development is, and they've never breached that mark. I can't tell you if they did it cheaper, but certainly they've never gone over the budget. In terms of time, it's always been there or thereabouts. It's certainly never been so far over that we had big issues. That's not been the case. Both on budgets and time, they've been pretty sharp.

We don't really use project management tools or bug trackers. I don't think we're big enough, we don't really have enough, although we do use Zoho. That's been more from the client-facing side. The tickets generated there are handled by our technical manager. The ones he can't fix, he passes on to Radix, and it's usually handled within a day. What sometimes happens is that a client says, "This isn't working," and when we look into it, we realize that it actually wasn't meant to work that way. It needs a change. Then, we go back to the client and say, "If you want this change, we'll scope it out, we cost it out, and then we'll come back to you." Then, we'd agree to those timelines at Radix, and feed it back to the client.

The main tool we use between Radix and ourselves is Redmine. The programmers are consistently putting updates every day of the week into that. Then, once a week we would have a Skype conversation with them where we'd agree whatever the objectives should be, give or take, for the following week. I do think that the Redmine tool could be used a bit better but, to be fair to Radix, I'm not sure that it's their fault. We probably don't enforce that enough. What I mean by that is that we tend to agree on a lot of stuff over Skype, and we do follow Redmine, but it's not like I would look into that every day of the week and see if they're ticking things off day in and day out.

Redmine could probably be used better in terms of tracking the order stuff, and the smaller fixes. They probably should be done a bit quicker at times, but again, I can't speak to when somebody else jumps in and says, "Here's an issue that we do need to move up the priority list, and have something else moved down." Rather than get bogged down explaining why something was two days late, we tend to take the good with the bad. If it is two or three days late, chances are it's because we've moved something else for service.

What distinguishes RadixWeb from other providers?

To be fair, I don't have a whole lot to compare them to because they're the only ones we've ever really used. That said, if I had to guess, I think it's their approach to client relationship management. RadixWeb has some project managers or leads that do seem to have a good intuition, and they understand us quite well.

Is there anything RadixWeb could have improved or done differently?

If I've learned a lesson over the years, it's been to spend more time in that first stage, of getting that right and understanding it right. Usually it's our issue. We might not give it enough time, and then when we get the final product back we're kind of going, "That's not exactly what we're looking for." Yet, it's probably what we did sign off on in the first place. They would then go back and fix that quite smartly for us, and they don't mismatch too much really, in the grand scheme of things.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and position.

I am the Director of Operations of TopDawg

Describe what your company does in a single sentence.

TopDawg is a wholesale dropshipping platform.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

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

• Improve and maintain our software servers

SOLUTION

How did you find Radixweb?

• Online Search

Why did you select Radixweb over others?

• High ratings
• Company values aligned
• Other

What was the size of Radixweb’s team?

2-5 Employees

What was your primary form of communication with Radixweb?

• Virtual Meeting

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

Maintain and improve our existing website and all its moving components. As well as integrations with our database, website hosting with AWS, and API interface with external partners.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

• We have had several sprints containing many updates and improvements to our website and platform architecture.

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

Yes, delivery times were as expected and they have been very attentive to our needs.

What was your primary form of communication with Radixweb?

• Virtual Meeting

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

Radixweb has an excellent skill set across all types of code development and webhosting environments such as AWS.

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

At this time, Radixweb has met all of our expectations.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I'm the cEO of Future Company Consulting. We provide high end consulting and development and IT services to medium to large corporates both in Australia as well as the USA and Hong Kong

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

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

We needed a customisable powerful, feature rich print system for both our business as well as our 50+ clients

SOLUTION

How did you select Radixweb and what were the deciding factors?

Reviewed 4 systems and Radixweb had the most superior product and the best support and account management.

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

Kick off meeting and explaned what we wanted and the team helped deliver that and get us live in under 10 working days.

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

3 - Sales Account manager, technical account manager and finance team.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Immediate revenue income trhough use of the platform which has steadily increased in time as we add additionalproducts and the platform releases new innovative features.

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

We followed true Agile processes with daily standups and almost 2 daily sprints.

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

Professional "CUSTOMISED" site in extremely short period of time with ongoing support and incresed features.

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

None that I can think of. They have eceeded my expectations at every point.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

Brand Interactive Communications help clients in various industries connect with their target audiences by implementing simple strategies that integrate marketing Communications across online and offline mediums.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Radixweb?

Website design and development with integrated APIs

What were your goals for this project?

To help a client meet its governing body’s digital marketing criteria

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor?

Radixweb was recommended to us by a strategic partner.

Describe the project and the services they provided in detail.

Website for sports association, we needed some complex and responsive web develop to meet the client’s needs.

What was the team composition?

I was given a project dev lead for one to one contact with all needs and requests and he had an integration team for implementation. Not certain if the exact number, but there was never a delay.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Can you share any information that demonstrates the impact that this project has had on your business?

We have been able to serve this client and may have the opportunity to do work with other members within their association.

How was project management arranged and how effective was it?

Deadlines were always adhered and having one person for all requests ensured that nothing fell through the cracks. It also helped develop a more trusting relationship between my company and Radixweb

What did you find most impressive about this company?

Their patience and responsiveness set them apart.

Are there any areas for improvement?

Just more emphasis on design aesthetics.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I’m a lead engineer.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Radixweb?

We hired them for QA testing.

What were your goals for this project?

We wanted to have E2E (end-to-end) tests of our platform.

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor?

We were looking for a vendor that could write Selenium E2E tests in Python.

Describe the project in detail.

Radixweb performed E2E tests for our platform. Our registrar operations included registration, transfer, and domain management.

What was the team composition?

They supplied two backend engineers, a frontend engineer, and a team lead.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We were able to have test coverage to critical areas of our platform.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

They were always available.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

I was impressed with their consistency and attention to details.

Are there any areas for improvement?

Nothing comes to mind.