Sigmeo

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

We specialize in car assistance, car rentals, and home assistance—services meant to help people who’ve been in accidents with their cars or at their homes. I’m the CIO of the company, covering everything from SQL servers to call managers, Windows devices, headphones, and everything else IT-related.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Sigmeo?

The challenge was to write a new operating system for our company. It needed to cover all our processes and provide functionalities for reconfiguring our systems as fast as possible.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Sigmeo developed our platform. It’s a CRM and CMS in one piece of software. The backend was written in the Symfony PHP framework, and it has a Microsoft SQL Server database.

We need to respond quickly and have 100 people in our call center, dealing with requests in less than 30 minutes. The system needed to be very fast, with a lot of automation. Drivers are asked for basic information at the start of a call, based on which the system automatically helps us find tow trucks and car rental companies.

What is the team composition?

Sigmeo has a 40-person team, and we’re working with 5–6 of those people, including an architect and two developers. Previously, we worked with two more developers and a tester.

How did you come to work with Sigmeo?

I was looking for the best company to create this software for us and found Sigmeo through a recommendation from a friend. I got in touch with their president, and they proved to be the best out of the four we evaluated.

How much have you invested with them?

The cost has been 2 million–2.5 million Polish zloty (approximately $500,000 USD).

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with Sigmeo in July 2016, and it’s ongoing. It took us two and a half years to prepare the system, and we implemented it in May 2018, with a new version in January 2019.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The time cost of the processes is key for us. Previously, it would take an agent 40 minutes to assist a driver. Currently, it would take them 2–2.5 minutes to find the drivers and send a truck on site. Overall, our processes have become 30–40% more efficient with the new system, and we’ve saved 15 full-time equivalents so far.

The whole logic of our process is in the system. While our old system required a 12-month training period for new members, it now only takes two weeks. That’s a huge improvement when it comes to training new employees.

How did Sigmeo perform from a project management standpoint?

We haven’t had any issues in this regard and all tasks have been delivered on time. We’re using Slack, SwiftKanban, and Codebase for project management.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They’re very flexible, so there is never a problem to find new specialists that could make custom solutions for our needs. They’re a professional team with good project managers and architects, so communication isn’t a problem. They approach everything from the customer’s point of view, rather than thinking only like programmers who lack ordinary business or nontechnical understanding.

Are there any areas they could improve?

Not for now.

Do you have any advice for future clients of theirs?

I don’t have any advice in mind. Sigmeo is a good company with many specialists, so they’re able to answer any question and find a solution.