Shinetech Software Inc.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the CTO of a company specializing in imports and exports. We have three offices, including our headquarters, that are based in the UK, and one office in Germany. We also have an office in China.

There are three main parts to our business. The first is imports/exports and logistical operations. The second is personalized manufacture, where we take orders from clients and make them in the factory. Then, the third part is the UK export to China. We also do cross-border e-commerce.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Shinetech Europe?

The project was complex, and we didn’t think we were capable of doing this level of work, even with my extensive experience with similar development. We wouldn’t be able to manage the dynamics of that kind of team, which is why we decided to outsource the work.

Importing and exporting are both daunting processes. There are many documentation requests, including those from stocking and finding products, to exporting them and make declarations. There’s are entire set of money flow, information flow, and physical goods flow. We have to align these three processes, which is what complicates our business logic.

Software development requirements are also constantly changing, so what works in the beginning of the month, may not be feasible by the end. This leads to a whole spectrum of issues, and although any software development company will face this problem, it was especially bad for us in conjunction with our business logic.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

They helped in the design and development of the UI and UX for multiple industry level software projects.  

What is the team dynamic?

We started out working with only one person from Shinetech, then after we added more projects, we worked with anywhere from 18–26 people.

Shinetech is a large company, so it never took longer than a week to put a team together. I primarily communicated with a project manager, and also with a testing manager in order to ensure the software would perform effectively.

How did you come to work with Shinetech Europe?

We had a vendor selection manager at the time, and we were considering four different companies. Initially, we had a small project, and Shinetech offered a flexible engagement to us. We wanted to start with only one project because we weren’t sure if the relationship would work.

Shinetech later came to my office and proposed a guarantee of project execution, which offered us the comfort of knowing we had some protection. They were also an experienced as a well established company, so we decided to work with them.

What is the status of this engagement?

We worked with them from March 2015–June 2017.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Sometimes, I would have a project manager who was familiar with the industry, which afforded me the luxury of not having to deal with the design. Other times, I had to expel a great deal of effort to help the project manager understand what needed to be done.

Industrial software isn’t heavily focused on UI or UX design because the function of the software is what’s most important. Shinetech developed functional software and delivered great value incrementally to our business for the past 3 years. 

How did Shinetech Europe perform from a project management standpoint?

We had our own project management structure, and we let them integrate into our online process instead of allowing them to manage projects independently. We used Agile and Scrum methodologies, and they had developers who were familiar with both. We used VersionOne as our project management tool. We also had strict data control.

They are an offshore company, so there were time differences, which is a big problem. Sometimes, this only allowed for 2–3 hours during our working days when we could discuss the work. However, I’m happy with them because they offered me a good price, and I wouldn’t have been able to find an onshore team within the same budget.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Their team consists of very nice people. We’d previously worked with teams who actually used open source code without notifying us. Shinetech is quite different, and I actually ran a few independent code tests which yielded solid results.

Are there any areas they could improve?

They need to improve their design and management teams. They are very nice people, and they offered me a fair price, but they’re not a high-end development company. However, they’re still one of the best teams I’ve ever worked with.