RST Software Masters

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the co-founder and CEO of Jump.co, a Web 3 NFT crypto platform.

What challenge were you trying to address with RST Software Masters?

We needed a simple tool to administer physical assets we had in a database.

What was the scope of their involvement?

We hired RST Software Masters for their custom software development services to build a specific admin tool to streamline our asset management operations.

They basically created an open-source platform and thanks to their expertise, we’re able to harness a version that’s specific to our business. We utilize React, NestJS, and PostgreSQL among other software.

What is the team composition?

We mainly interface with the CEO, CFO, and two backend developers.

How did you come to work with RST Software Masters?

My co-founder and CTO found an admin solution and discovered that RFT Software Masters was the team behind that software.

After an initial productive call, we started a one-week engagement which went quite well and we’ve been working together since then.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve invested at least $45,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

Our ongoing partnership started in February 2022.

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

Our initial trial period went really well and since then, they’ve been knocking each project out of the park.

Their development velocity is faster than our internal teams’ because they’re very learned about the tool — as a result, we’re able to set up weekly sprints aggressively and accomplish multiple projects.

How did RST Software Masters perform from a project management standpoint?

The team is highly responsive and they consistently hit their deadlines.

We mainly use Shortcut and GitHub to manage the project, while we communicate through Slack, Zoom, and email.

What did you find most impressive about them?

We’re impressed with their knowledge and expertise on the tool we’re using, as well as their thoroughness and quickness in delivering their tasks.

Are there any areas they could improve?

They could improve on their staffing and hire more people.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

It’s always a good thing to start with a one or two-wee engagement before starting a full project, so try them out on a retainer to see if you’re comfortable hiring RST Software Masters.

We put them on a trial and it worked great for us as it really solidified our relationship.

Please describe your company and your position there.

In Transcash we care for the financial safety of companies in the transport industry. We have been active for 13 years and have succeeded in helping our clients effectively collect their overdue payments. As of 2016, we also assist in financing invoices. I am a Product Owner in this company.

For what projects/services did your company hire RST Software Masters, and what were your goals?

We provide our customers a bunch of financial services - the most important are debts collection and factoring. Every product was actually served by giving our customers another tool produced by different vendor and in a differet technology. It all looked strange and it wasn't consistent. Our customers were receiving a tons of emails and phone calls. It was hard to follow all the information spread in all those emails.

We knew that we needed one platform where our customers could log in and manage all the service we provide them. The second goal was to transform the process of signing new contracts with our customers. We wanted to cut off all the paperwork and let our customers do everything online.

In every single case we wanted to provide our customers the best possible experience and the best information we have to make them sure that we care about their money. And we knew that we wanted to turn into mobile devices to be on hand every time our customer needs us.

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

We knew that they have a great experience in producing large and safe IT systems, as they produce software for the whole Trans.eu Group (to which our company belongs). We just believed that they are the best choice and that we can trust each other. We know that they have a lot of tallented people on board, so whenever there is any problem with technology - there is always somebody that can give you a piece of advice.

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

At first RST have done a lot of workshops with our staff and our customers to find out how the new tool should look like and to make the most important decisions for future development. RST Software Masters helped us to discover the core functionalities we need to focus. RST estimated that it should take a year to produce the software we have designed.

Then, according to the scrum, we just started producing the most important functionalities one by one. After a month we had a working proof of concept. After that month we also knew how to integrate with the most important systems - so we were sure that we wouldn't get stuck on any technical issue in the future.

After couple of months we had a first version of the software done and we could launch it simultanuosly with the old tools. We have started the migration 4 months after the project was launched - that was quite impressive. After another couple of months we were ready to replace our old software with the new one produced by RST as all the old functionalities were covered by the new tool. Since then we listen to our customers and every two weeks we provide another version of our system.

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

We have 5 full time developers and also some part-time positions in the project (scrum master, ui designer, ux designer, devops, architect, delivery manager).

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

All the measures we gather about our customers satfisfaction shows a great progress recently. The NPS value has changed signifficantly, the opinions in Google has increased. Of course that was also because of the great work of our customer care teams, but the tool that we have produced in this project just gives us opportunity to cut off tons of unneeded work.

Right now every day there are hundreds of cases where our customers can help themselve online on our new website instead of calling us or sending us emails that needs to be opened, readed and answered. Instead of calling our customers to get any information we need - the system just gathers it online.

We are happy to have more time to focus on the most important issues in our business and the customers are happy that instead of calling them every single hour they can just do everyhing online in the most convenient time. That's a huge change in the communcation with our customers.

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

We use Slack and Jira to communicate. We have weekly meetings to discuss future functionalities (backlog refinments) with a development team. As long as we work in a two weeks sprints - every two weeks we also have a sprint review and a planning session to sum up the changes in every new iteration and to plan a next one. Every single week we have also a UX and UI sessions to disscuss new functionalities and to turn the user feedback and business needs into new features.

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

The team really cares about the product. They understand the business and they always do their best to make sure that it all works together. Whenever they notice that there is chance to do something better - they report it. I have never heard that something works bad but this was how I wanted to do that so I shouldn't comply.

If the specification makes no sense (which sometimes happens) or there are some edge cases that needs to be covered better - it is always discussed. There is no "us" and "you" so I really feel that we play as a one team and I have a great support. I know that this is not only about this team.

This is about the company culture that is focused on a long term relations with customers. They care about giving customers the best quality service and I'm sure that they just want to grow together instead of making the most of us.

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

Nope

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the product manager for an electrical meter manufacturer.

What challenge were you trying to address with RST Software Masters?

We needed someone to develop a mobile app that cooperates with our meters.

What was the scope of their involvement?

They developed our Android app. Our customers use the app with our meters. They can download data and measurements from our meters, and add photos to the measurements. They connect to bluetooth and users can send the measurements via email. If the customer is onsite, they can take measurements and send them to someone who will file a report in the office.

What is the team composition?

There were 5-7 people. There was a product manager, developers, testers, and a project manager.

How did you come to work with RST Software Masters?         

My colleague told me about them.

What is the status of this engagement?

We worked together from 2016 – 2018.

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

We have about 1,000 users. The next step was to create a special platform for this application, but since it’s still under construction, we don’t have too many users yet.

I was happy with the cooperation with them. They gave me good suggestions and ideas.

How did RST Software Masters perform from a project management standpoint?

We worked in a scrum methodology.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They have a very good graphics guy, which was very important because the design looks nice for our customers.

Are there any areas they could improve?

They have very good quality, but sometimes they’re too expensive compared to competitors. If I want to add something small, I would like it to not be so expensive.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

My advice is to trust them and listen to their advice. They have good experience and can give you good advice.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the CEO of TERP. We’re a technology company developing smart, adaptive textbooks.

What challenge were you trying to address with RST Software Masters (formerly Software Brothers)?

We wanted to improve our existing solution and develop iOS and Android apps.

What was the scope of their involvement?

Initially, Software Brothers moved our code to AWS and made it scalable. Then, we started developing Android and iOS user apps and opening up our web platform so other parties can use our technology to make adaptive textbooks. The apps allow users to download textbooks complete with graphics and video. There are offline capabilities to combat poor internet access in our target region, meaning students can always complete their assessments. Currently, Software Brothers is developing an in-app shop for the Android solution and starting the iOS app.

What is the team composition?

We’re currently using two web developers, one Android and one iOS developer, a part-time project manager, a part-time UX designer, and a part-time tester.

How did you come to work with RST Software Masters (formerly Software Brothers)?

Our CTO had worked with them as part of two other companies, and he introduced us.

How much have you invested with them?

We’re spending about €40,000–€45,000 ($45,200–$51,000 USD) per month at the moment. The average for 2018 was €20,000–€25,000 ($22,600–$28,300 USD). The total is over €250,000 ($283,000 USD) at this point.

What is the status of this engagement?

We’ve been working together since January 2018. The Android app launched in November, and the first iOS version is going to launch soon. It will only have text and images, but we’ll fill in the gaps as we go.

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

Software Brothers’ work has been the foundation for us to go into the market. The Android app we launched was our introduction to the Asian market and has generated significant feedback that will help us improve our technology.

There will always be bugs, but we work closely with Software Brothers to solve them as they come up. Even though there were quite a few bugs in the beginning, we were able to launch the app to 2,000–3,000 students, and within a few months bug complaints had stopped. The app is functional and stable.

How did Software Brothers perform from a project management standpoint?

We needed strong management to work with an outsourced vendor, but they were up to the task. They were competent communicators, and our similar technology resources laid a solid foundation for cooperation. We had delays from time to time, and some of those came from our side, but tech developments never run perfectly. We maintain communication and handle issues as they arise.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Our previous vendor produced buggy, unstable updates, but Software Brothers rolls out updates smoothly.

Are there any areas they could improve?

They’ve improved lately, but early on we needed a system to track costs and prevent overspending every month. 

Do you have any advice for future clients of theirs?

To work with any developer, clients need internal technical experience.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I'm an international business development leader at a technology company based in Poland.

What challenge were you trying to address with RST Software?

We hired RST software to help us build our product or platform, which we are currently selling to 45 countries in Europe. 

What was the scope of their involvement?

We’ve been collaborating for more than 14 years now.  RST Software is helping us create freight exchange with us for our supply chain management platform. The web-based platform is integrated with mobile applications for the users of our system. 

We started off by explaining our idea to connect shippers, couriers, and forwarders. RST Software has mainly been responsible for building the entire structure and architecture of our product. We design the UX aspects internally, while their team focuses on how it should work from the backend perspective. They also built the CRM.

What is the team composition? 

Right now, about 50 of our internal employees work with 150 people from RST Software including developers, testers, and scrum masters. The project and product managers from our side have dedicated points of contact from their team. We work together very closely in the same office. 

How did you come to work with RST Software?

Originally, the owners of our respective companies started cooperating when they were students. They were friends first. One of them had the idea, and the other had the skills to do it. 

What is the status of this engagement?

We’ve been working together since the project first started in about 2004. 

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

We're continuing to work on the project together daily. They even help us with our PI planning, which we conduct every two months. Our business meets regularly with the team from RST Software who are creating the platform and software. We provide feedback every three or four weeks because we were together on most of the sessions. They show us all the work they complete every single month. 

Every six months, we gather user feedback from users based on the net promoter score (NPS) index. Using these surveys, we ask our customers and users what they think about different parts of our company. The questions range from customer care to our product. For example, I know Apple currently has an NPS score of 70. Last year, we closed the process on ten points on the NPS scale, which ranges from negative 100 to 100. 

How did RST Software perform from a project management standpoint?

RST Software is responsible for completing all the tasks for our projects that relate to developing news functionality, models, or the CRM they created for us. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

From our perspective, communication is the most the most important part of our partnership. We've been impressed with RST Software's level of engagement. 

RST Software always cooperates with us. They also frequently suggest better ways to develop, import, and implement new features within the platform. They have their own ideas about our product, which is the best thing they could share with us. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

No. We've been able to manage any issues or problems we've had because they're always open to our feedback. 

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the founder of Nordic Innovators, now called Mooji. We’re a startup that works with an image platform aimed at reducing stress, anxiety, and depression in hospital patients.

What challenge were you trying to address with RST Software Masters (formerly Software Brothers)?

We were an early-stage startup with a concept product that was tested in the market using mockups. Software Brothers was hired to develop our MVP.

What was the scope of their involvement?

After agreeing on a concept outline, we had a one-day workshop with Software Brothers at our office where we discussed the MVP’s requirements. We scoped out all the relevant technical details — our product comprised of a frontend that controls the server backend. Content can seamlessly integrate on a digital screen. It works with Apple AirPlay and Chromecast.

We needed a scalable backend with a frontend that displays a specific feel. The backend is hosted on AWS, and the app is for Android. We also specified that the MVP needed to be built upon following our market test. Security aspects were also discussed. Software Brothers also helped create the graphic identity of the company. Their team developed a logo and some animations for the app.

What is the team composition?

We had a team of 5–6 people that included an account manager, a graphic designer, a project manager, and a development team. We worked with a frontend and a backend developer. Depending on the stage of the project, we could’ve augmented more.

How did you come to work with RST Software Masters (formerly Software Brothers)?

Software Brothers was recommended by various clients I worked with at another company. They’ve used Software Brothers to develop their solutions.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent €70,000–€80,000 (approximately $79,000–90,000 USD) so far.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with Software Brothers around August 2018, and the collaboration is ongoing.

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

We’re ready to test the MVP in the marketplace. The only feedback has been internal, and the overall team is satisfied.

How did RST Software Masters (formerly Software Brothers) perform from a project management standpoint?

Their account manager performs exceptionally well, but they changed their project manager twice, which caused a few issues. Specific members of their team are effective at communicating and meeting deadlines. Our project management software was Slack.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Software Brothers had a strong understanding of the product and market we’re trying to address. They assigned developers with insight into our business, which was nice.

Are there any areas they could improve?

Communication was difficult because of shifting project managers. This isn’t a general issue, but projects lose something when a person who was there from the beginning leaves. The exchange of project managers doesn’t benefit any engagement because the same level of understanding isn’t there.

Do you have any advice for future clients of theirs?

Clients should do their best to make sure the same project manager is kept on the team throughout.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I'm the head of engineering at City Pantry, a platform that helps deliver food from caterers to offices in London. 
 

What challenge were you trying to address with RST Software Masters (formerly Software Brothers)?

We needed a partner to expand our tech team of 10 in-house developers.

What was the scope of their involvement?

Software Brothers helped source and recruit potential developers, and now they manage a team of three developers remotely. Companies create an account on our platform, and then users can search through a wide variety of vendors that they can order food from. Our company takes care of the booking and communication between vendor and customers, including on the day of delivery. Software Brothers provides office space and HR for the three developers, who use Symfony for the backend and Angular 7 and AngularJS for the frontend, as requested.

What is the team composition? 

The have one lead developer and two mid-level developers, all who interface directly with our team.

How did you come to work with RST Software Masters (formerly Software Brothers)?

A colleague referred them.

What is the status of this engagement?

We partnered in July 2018, and the work is ongoing. 

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

They built some great features that benefit our overall work.

How did RST Software Masters (formerly Software Brothers) perform from a project management standpoint?

They don’t do project management, but we have regular stand-up meetings and communicate daily via Slack and Google Hangouts. They’re responsive to our needs and requests, solving problems quickly.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They worked quickly to ramp up the team and found great developers to work on our project.

Are there any areas they could improve?

They should try to do better at matching their environment to that of their client’s.

Do you have any advice for future clients of theirs?

Make sure to maintain clear communication. 

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the owner and CEO of Infogym, a company that focuses on the relationship between the gym, the personal trainer, and the user of the gym. We’ve developed two applications: one is free for everyday users which can be used like any other fitness app, with exercises, fitness routines, and tracking, but we use 3D animation instead of videos to give users a better view of their exercise.

The second application is the professional, paid version for trainers. They can connect with a user, much like Facebook friend requests, and create workouts and routines on their behalf, track workouts through scheduled sessions, and have full access to users’ statistics and workout diaries.

What challenge were you trying to address with RST Software Masters (formerly Software Brothers)?

We have an in-house development team for backend and API work, but we had raised money and wanted to develop the frontend applications quicker than we would have done internally.

What was the scope of their involvement?

Software Brothers developed our iOS and Android applications (the trainer app is also available on iPads). We also have a mobile-friendly web version developed in-house by our team.

We provided documentation for our in-house APIs, along with requirements for how we wanted to build the apps. We also provided finished designs, not just wireframes. This helped the team see the finalized version, and they also completed the web version and created user stories.

What is the team composition?

We started with one project manager and, at one point, had around six people from their team working on the apps. We scaled it up and down as needed and had the ability to change speed, unlike with our internal team.

How did you come to work with RST Software Masters (formerly Software Brothers)?

We went on AngelList and a few niche sites, where we were approached by Software Brothers. We had a chat, and we decided to hire them.

How much have you invested with them?

The cost of their work was around $200,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with Software Brothers in February 2016. The free version was launched around December, and the trainer app was launched in June 2017.

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

In the first couple of weeks, we were the number one free app in Norway and Singapore, and the number one fitness app in the U.K. and Australia. In two weeks, we attracted 50,000 users.

The grade point average score they use for code quality is the highest we’ve ever seen.

I work for another company building a POS system, and, based on my experience with Software Brothers, I brought them into this other company as well, which shows how happy we are with them.

How did RST Software Masters (formerly Software Brothers) perform from a project management standpoint?

We had to change project managers, but the new one took over and did a fantastic job. Having a team like ours, with 4–6 outsourced people, we definitely needed a project manager to handle all communication.

We used JIRA for tracking the project—tasks, bugs, issues and so on—and Slack for communication. The language barrier caused some issues, but being in the same time zone helped, and Software Brothers has been responsive. We felt the manager was working fulltime with us, even though he had other engagements.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They provided a lot of help on user-friendliness. The app improved a lot because of the feedback from Software Brothers’ project manager and developer. We've tried a lot of offshore companies from India, Vietnam, Sri Lanka and so on—they would make whatever they were told, and didn’t care if it didn’t work. We didn’t have this feeling with Software Brothers. Everyone was on the same team, just like having them as our own employees.

They’re also not afraid of telling me when I have a bad idea, and it’s something I appreciated. It felt like the developers cared and were proud of what they were making.

Are there any areas they could improve?

The biggest challenges we’ve had were around planning. They have experience working with clients like us, but we don’t have experience working with other software houses, so the matter came down to Software Brothers knowing to ask the right questions without us prompting them.

Do you have any advice for future clients of theirs?

For any outsourcing project, it’s important to plan everything. It’ll make everything so much smoother because you won’t have any arguments over last-minute changes.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I'm the COO of the company. We have developed a location-based enterprise platform called Tracers, as well as a consumer app for location-based messaging.

What challenge were you trying to address with RST Software Masters (formerly Software Brothers)?

We were employing developers in London but ultimately figured that Software Brothers could provide more flexibility and cost savings, with the same skill level. We were changing our software relatively quickly and wanted to have access to resources relevant to our particular needs at one time. We had been using a mixture of recruitment consultants and other resources in the industry, but none worked the way we had intended. 

What was the scope of their involvement?

Software Brothers developed new features for our platforms. We needed to put together MVPs quickly and relatively cheaply, so Software Brothers initially rewrote the frontend and backend of our apps almost completely from scratch.

Our backend was developed with an obsolete technology, which clearly wasn't a long-term solution because it has been subsequently shut down. During the redevelopment process, Software Brothers made valuable suggestions and implemented new features.

We have used six developers and a part-time project lead from their team. I was responsible for managing the project on our side.

How did you come to work with RST Software Masters (formerly Software Brothers)?

I don't remember what our initial contact with them was, but I believe that they had been in touch with our CEO. They called me and we talked through what we were looking for, and they seemed to be a good fit.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with Software Brothers at the beginning of 2016.

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

One of the things we wanted was for Software Brothers to turn our MVPs into scalable solutions. They created an app that could work reliably with a large user base. We're working with a large international multimedia company that wanted to know that our app would be stable, and assigned developers who tested the app's performance and scalability. They were very happy with the results of their tests. 

How did RST Software Masters (formerly Software Brothers) perform from a project management standpoint?

The answer is very much developer-dependent. We have worked with a few resources that, quite honestly, weren't as productive as the rest, so the team has been subsequently adjusted. The good developers from Software Brothers are really very good, so anyone being measured against them will have to work hard in order to achieve the same results.

We've used JIRA, Trello, and Slack for our collaboration with Software Brothers. JIRA proved a bit too complex for our needs, so we've mainly only used the other two tools.

What did you find most impressive about RST Software Masters (formerly Software Brothers)?

They're the only company of this kind that I've used, so it would be hard to compare them to anything similar. Our contact from Software Brothers has been available and keen to not only respond to our questions but also to inquire about our satisfaction. He has pulled everything together on Software Brothers' end, checking if we were happy.

Are there any areas RST Software Masters (formerly Software Brothers) could improve?

They could always work cheaper and faster, but this isn't really a criticism. This is more of a general commentary on the nature of tech services.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I'm COO of a startup that creates digital social marketing applications and an online marketplace for fashion retailers.

What challenge were trying to address with RST Software Masters (formerly Software Brothers)?

We needed to outsource the software development of our social application which will integrate to our existing internet retail marketplace project. We wanted to create a product which met the designs and requirements we presented so that it integrated seamlessly with our existing internet project. Our goal was to ensure that this product was delivered on time, with high-quality assurance, and within our budget.

What was the scope of their involvement?

We presented them with our requirements for definition, logical design overview, test specifications, and graphic design. Software Brothers was responsible for implementing this with the physical design, implementation programming, and testing.

They also provided a project manager that worked closely with our team to ensure that the requirements were understood and the project was delivered on time. They also provided integration and acceptance testing. With Software Brothers’ strong quality assurance practices, we were able to work well together in partnership on the project.

How did you come to work with RST Software Masters (formerly Software Brothers)?

We approached five different software development companies that had a good reputation and received quotes which we further evaluated. Software Brothers gave us the best proposal.

How much have you invested with them?

This was a medium sized project, but I’d rather keep the cost confidential.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started requirements, logical design overview, definition, and presentation to Software Brothers in August of 2015. All the graphic design and documentation had already been prepared well in advance by us. Software Brothers started physical design and implementation in October of 2015 and completed the work at the end of February of 2016.

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

The project was delivered on time and within budget. It was all broken up into sprints, which were implemented, tested, integrated, and analyzed in terms of quality control, schedule, and budget risk. Each sprint was managed by both parties and delivered on time. Software Brothers also added extra small features on their own initiative which worked well with the user experience of the software application.

Software Brothers had very good team dynamics with strong quality assurance practices. We would be happy to use them again for any future outsourcing.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They were very efficient in their approach to different aspects of the project, and also given that our employees are from a computer science background, we recognized that they were very professional in software quality assurance practices which is key to a successful project. They also communicated very well and worked in a fair partnership in negotiations.

Are there any areas they could improve?

I think that in hindsight we would have liked to have discovered them earlier.

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

Our key approach was to understand the importance of good quality assurance practices to work well with Software Brothers. Through this, we were able to succeed in completing a project that we are happy with and was a good experience for our team.