Sentia

BACKGROUND

Please describe your organization.

Our company is Shippit. We connect online retailers with a network of carrier services. We've got a piece of software that allocates jobs from e-commerce shopping carts to carriers.

What is your role and responsibilities?

I am the co-founder and technology lead of the company.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What was your goal for working with Sentia?

We were in need of a developer to build our platform from the ground up. We had just come up with the concept for our business, and we needed someone to make it come to life. That's why we partnered with Sentia.

SOLUTION

Please describe the scope of their work.

Sentia was responsible for creating our ecommerce platform. We wrote the technical specification and then Sentia developed the wireframes, mockup, design, build, and architecture. We had done the requirements gathering and discovery in house. They work on a project-by-project basis. 

What was your process for selecting Sentia?

We went through an RFP [request for proposal] process. We did some desktop research to identify 10 agencies, and then we got that down to three. We sent the specs to those three companies and got quotes back and interviewed them. We wanted someone onshore. We wanted them to be able to implement with Agile and let me manage the team. Also, the cost was a factor. Sentia was the best fit for us.

Can you give a sense of the size of the initiative?

The initial cost of the platform was $100,000. Now, it's costing us $5,000 a week for maintenance.

When was the work completed?

Our partnership is ongoing. We've been working with them since August 2014.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Do you have any statistics or metrics on the project?

I don't have any metrics to share on this project. We don't have any system feedback that would correlate to any feedback that Sentia would have.

Are you satisfied with their performance?

Sentia was on budget, which was great. However, they were not quite on time, because they have a number of projects at one time– 14 right now. It's more about how we fit into their schedule. Overall, we are very happy with our partnership.

What differentiates Sentia from other partners?

The Sentia team is very good at building internal capability. We got funding last month, and we're transitioning out of Sentia, only using them on a project basis. What they've enabled us to do is collocate with them, so that we're able to transition the work to our developers that we've hired.

What advice would you give to future clients of theirs?

The client needs to pay for the project management. I have a project management background, so I'm able to manage the build, dependency, and critical path. But, if that was a non-PM [project manager] or non-technology person doing it, they'd have issues.

Is there any area that you think they could improve upon?

I think that their project management could be better, but their work is good.