Proactively transforming business with technology
SoftwareMill is a development and consulting company established in 2009.
We specialize in Scala, Kafka, Akka, and Cassandra and help clients scale their business through software, conduct digital transformation, implement event sourcing and create data processing pipelines.
Our areas of expertise include:
- distributed systems
- big data
- blockchain
- machine learning
- data analytics
We want to deliver software that matters to our business clients. We build on the traditional engineering work ethics and values, which translate directly to the quality of our systems, helping the client discover their true needs.
WHY SHOULD WE WORK TOGETHER?
Experienced Development Teams
- senior software developers with a business mindset.
- self-organization of teams and years of commercial experience.
- transparent communication and Agile project methodology.
- DevOps as a Service.
- Q&A and automated tests.
Battle-tested Technologies
- modern tools to build fault-tolerant, scalable software.
- JVM ecosystem offers tools and abstractions to model your business and create systems that scale.
Community Leaders
- involved in community and development of Scala open-source projects.
- organizers of Scalar, the largest Scala conference in Central Europe.
- experts at SoftwareMill Academy.
Estimate your project at [email protected]
Focus
Portfolio
Integrity, versatility, understanding of the business, right soft skills, strong work ethic, rich experience & top notch mastery of technology makes us the perfect choice. When working with clients, we excel in creating a mutual business relationship. We go beyond just executing tasks. Understanding the big picture allows us to give honest feedback, and assist you in improving business processes. Contact us:[email protected]
Reco.se Recommendation Platform
Jakob Dobrzynski, CTO from Reco.se about cooperating with SoftwareMill.
SoftwareMill - Your Software Task Force
A reactive platform for real-time asset trading
Client needed a new reactive platform, written from scratch with scalability and resilience as primary goals. The new platform needed to be able to take over traffic from the current one with minimum downtime. As a result of a project we've built a performant reactive system allowing fast trading and processing growing traffic with very high resilience in case of failures.
Review Platform - Project Acceleration and New Features Development
Client had:
Reco.se is a Swedish tech company behind the largest independent review site in Sweden where customers describe their previous experiences with a variety of companies.
Client needed:
We’ve joined our clients team to quickly scale their efforts and together we have been developing the platform on an ongoing basis. The scope of our work includes new features development, but also DevOps tasks and bug fixing.
We did:
We contributed to a number of infrastructure projects; one of which was moving from self-hosting to GCP cloud. We were also responsible for a major refactoring that included, for example, mailparsing project and search API project with Elastic Search integration.
Outcome:
The platform is currently the largest independent review site in Sweden. Since March 2019, users who want to leave a review need to get verified with their bank ID, which contributes to the website transparency and credibility.
Technologies
Scala, Akka, Play, Postgres, Elasticsearch, RabbitMQ, Kubernetes, Microservices
Full case study:
https://softwaremill.com/pdfs/reco_casestudy.pdf
Mobile App that Lets you Predict, Learn and Earn Bitcoin
CLIENT HAD:
Swissborg is a team of fintech experts and engineers that are creating a holistic crypto wealth management ecosystem accessible to everyone. The first part of the system is a mobile game that lets you predict, learn and earn Bitcoin.
CLIENT NEEDED:
We’ve joined our client’s team and together developed the mobile game. On the technical side, we were responsible for building the back-end of the app, mainly in Scala and Akka.
WE DID:
The part of the app that we developed consists of the following elements:
Forecast module which evaluates bids versus the exchange rates every 24 hours,
Calculation module that counts each player’s score
OUTCOME:
The app has reached 10 000 users (as of April 2019). It’s a fun, easy to use app that lets you predict the price of Bitcoin and earn it without taking any risks. It’s available on iOS & Android.
Technologies
Scala, Akka Streams, Postgres, Docker, Kubernetes
Full case study: https://softwaremill.com/pdfs/swissborg_casestudy.pdf
Debt Resolution System - from an MVP to a first client delivery
Client had:
Flexys had an MVP of the product that proved the business model is successful. Client needed an experienced team extension that would help not only with the product kick-off but also the team setup.
Client needed:
Our main task was to help Flexys with the technical side of the project while they built the team from the ground-up.
We did:
We work in a TEM (Team Extension Model) in which we augment the in-house IT team with developers that support the team with the expertise in a variety of areas including designing project architecture, developing high-quality code and mentoring.
Outcome:
We managed to launch the back-office part of the app, as well as brought the customer-facing part of the app to the next level.
Technologies
Scala, Akka, Cassandra, Postgres, Slick, Kafka, Docker, Kubernetes, Angular 6
Full case study: https://softwaremill.com/pdfs/flexys_casestudy.pdf
Real-Time Insights into Customers Online Behaviour
CLIENT HAD:
LPP S.A. collects online customers’ data (mainly: orders stored in databases and customers’ online behaviour) from various sources. The company approached SoftwareMill to help them streamline data pipelines to be able to capture crucial metrics and derive business value in real-time.
CLIENT NEEDED:
Processing data, arriving at high velocity, required battle-proven tools for stream processing and the preparation of data for a recommendation engine. Due to the nature of the online retail business client needed a system featuring self-healing, as well as load balancing. Plus monitoring of the infrastructure health and performance.
WE DID:
Seven streaming applications have been delivered as well as devops scripts setting up Kubernetes and all necessary tools. As a result, our customer was able to attach custom dashboards to display the sales volume as well as feed their recommendation engine in a cost effective way without latency.
OUTCOME:
A transformation of the existing batch-based process into a data streaming platform built up on mature and popular open source tools. The reports are fed in real-time via stream processing applications build up on Kafka Streams and Apache Beam allowing LPP S.A. to interact with online customers in real-time.
Full case study: https://softwaremill.com/portfolio/#lpp
Cassandra consulting
Our certified Cassandra Architects helped clients with:
- event-sourced trading engine (as an Event Store),
- user and content rights management system for set-top boxes,
- storage and processing billions of energy-related readings.
We are a consulting partner of Datastax. We've gained hands-on experience architecting systems with Cassandra, one of the most widely used scalable, fault-tolerant database, by deploying it in clusters and writing applications querying Cassandra in a number of projects.
Kafka consulting
Our consultants, certified with Confluent Certified Developer for Apache Kafka, helped clients with:
- integrating Kafka in an enterprise environment, communicating with PostgreSQL, Oracle, ActiveMQ, RabbitMQ and other technologies, through Kafka Connect and custom Kafka applications.
- setup and maintenance of Kafka clusters using Kubernetes, choosing an appropriate partitioning strategy and sizing.
- leveraging Kafka in a reactive message processing pipeline, gracefully handling traffic bursts and distributing load through websockets to connected clients.
We are a consulting partner of Confluent. Our skills have been proven by numerous commercial projects.
Online wallet for cryptocurrencies
CLIENT HAD:
A Custom new cryptocurrency.
CLIENT NEEDED:
Online wallet for the custom currency and for Bitcoin, with transactions history and recovery tool in case the online wallet was broken.
WE DID:
We built backend system for wallet for both currencies, and analyser of blockchain, for discovery of transactions transferring money to users addresses from outside. Wallet addresses are multisig, where 2 keys out of 3 are enough to sign transaction. User has 2 private keys, our customer keeps 1, so user alone can transfer money from their addresses, but our customer needs user’s cooperation to do so.
OUTCOME:
Finished and tested product was delivered to customer. The customer has individual users accounts on it, as well as cryptocurrency exchange. Users are able to transfer their money, generate addresses, and see all their transactions history.
CATEGORY: Backend solution, Blockchain
INDUSTRY: FinTech
TECHNOLOGIES: Scala, Java
Real Estate Investment System
CLIENT HAD:
Highly coupled, microservice-based MVP with technical debt (classic 3 layer architecture) that was hard to maintain and problematic when adding new features required by customers or business department.
CLIENT NEEDED:
To get rid of the technical debt, prepare the system for easy and rapid implementation of new functionalities.
WE DID:
Refactored large parts of the system to DDD-like architecture which decoupled the components and made implementing new features easy.
OUTCOME:
Easily extendable, well tested and lowly coupled components of a scalable real estate investment system.
TECHNOLOGIES:
Java 8, Spring Boot, JPA, PostgreSQL, Liquibase, Vavr
Docker, AWS
Angular, AngularJS, Protractor
Ecommerce: Tipser
CLIENT HAD:
Legacy system with zero test coverage, tightly coupled with Microsoft infrastructure and difficult to scale/maintain. Web interface was full of bugs and not mobile friendly.
CLIENT NEEDED:
High quality, scalable code and architecture that will be easy to extend and maintain. Also test coverage and infrastructure automation were two of the most important goals.
WE DID:
New responsive web front-end, developed in a "mobile-first" spirit. Highly scalable API bridge that provides consistent and uniform REST API and makes further migration to Scala micro services fully transparent. We built a mobile-aware, WYSIWYG CMS and made static content management great again. We made deployment & infrastructure management declarative and fully automated.
OUTCOME:
No vendor lock-in and help with spinning up client's own dev team. Due to high automated tests coverage (> 80%) and zero-downtime Continuous Delivery clutched with advantages of applying git-flow patterns, deployments are just a matter of formality. Project gained more confidence
Technologies: Scala, Akka, Docker, Ansible, AWS, Elasticsearch, Klarna
Category: Backend solution, Mobile app
Business / Education: End-to-End workflow management
CLIENT HAD:
Started project with some dev teams.
CLIENT NEEDED:
New dev team to work on core back-end features.
WE DID:
We helped to build a workflow engine that ensures flexibility and compliance. we implemented new features, code and testing patterns using best practices.
OUTCOME:
Pilot release in progress, updating system as needed. Vocado reduced costs (no paperwork, no manual calculations) for schools in the US.
Technologies: Java 8, Spring, MySQL, Cucumber, Liquibase, MongdoDB
Category: Backend solution
Business/ Media: Big Data Back-end for Mobile App
CLIENT HAD:
An existing application in Ruby, which had severe performance and scalability problems.
CLIENT NEEDED:
A scalable API service with rapid development of new features.
WE DID:
Migrated the backend to Scala, provide continuous development of new API endpoints used by iOS and Facebook applications.
Implemented a recommender system which blends a number of preference inputs.
Check out case study on our blog!
OUTCOME:
Yap.tv went global (lots of data) with their social TV mobile application (Facebook and Twitter integration).
Technologies: Scala, Mahout, AWS, JavaScript
Category: Backend solution, Big Data
Business: REST API for Cloud Management
CLIENT HAD:
Zerigo provides feature-rich VMware View Hosted VDI and VMware-based Cloud Servers.
CLIENT NEEDED:
To improve reliability and quality of the existing software.
WE DID:
We've improved and extended a broker which unifies multiple VMware products' APIs into a single REST API with complex asynchronous execution support and informative error handling.
OUTCOME:
A well-tested backend component with a clean API, built with extensibility and easy troubleshooting in mind.
Technologies: Java 8, Groovy, Spring Boot, Redis, WebSockets
Category: Backend solution
HR & Recruitment: HRoBOT
YOUR SUPER-USEFUL HR ASSISTANT
"I'm here to help you automate the most of communication with your candidates. In a human way."
HRoBOT integrates with Slack to ease the hiring process in your organization. Through automatization of most common communication tasks, it saves you 40% of your time&money.
FLEXIBLE
HRoBOT is fully flexible, and tries to adapt to your process. Adding a new candidate is as easy as forwarding a single e-mail to HRoBOT.
Technologies: JavaScript, Node.JS, Slack
Category: Slack app, Web app
IT: UpdateImpact
HAVE A CRYSTAL-CLEAR VIEW ON WHAT LIBRARIES YOU USE
Keep the dependencies of Java/Scala/Groovy-based projects under control, by visualising, running static analysis and monitoring build results.
NO MORE ASCII-PRINTED DEPENDENCY TREES!
Technologies: Scala, Akka HTTP, PostgreSQL, Heroku, Event sourcing
Category: Web app
Insurance recommendation service
CLIENT HAD:
Knip provides a mobile application for hassle-free insurance overview and management.
CLIENT NEEDED:
Analytical application for data warehouse.
WE DID:
Developed the integration module between the data warehouse and the mobile app. Created an algorithm to match customer preferences with the best offers available on the market at a given time. Created a recommendation service (REST API and a web frontend).
OUTCOME:
A big data system, capable of processing huge amounts of data daily and later analyzing them using both statistical and machine learning methods. Ready to use mobile application. No upgrades/new features required.
Technologies: Scala, Play, Slick, AngularJS, H2
Category: Backend solution, Mobile app
Telco: Reporting and analytics platform
CLIENT HAD:
IP Integrated works with banks, airlines, and messaging companies providing accurate SMS reporting tools. There was existing legacy system, which didn't scale with increased demand.
CLIENT NEEDED:
Our main task was to implement efficient daily imports of SMS delivery reports. Secondly, our client neded an analytical platform, used later in the billing module. Finally, a modern web front-end was needed.
WE DID:
Developed an effective application that allowed for checking of billing status. We've also built a reporting platform for bulk SMS delivery, live status tracking for customers with analytics, data export and billing. The above was accompanied with a fast and responsive UI.
OUTCOME:
An efficient billing platform delivered to our Client.
Technologies: Scala, Akka, MongoDB, AngularJS, Rickshaw, Spark, Ansible
Category: Backend solution, Mobile App
Entertainment/ Media: Large Scale Social App
CLIENT HAD:
Emotiful aggregates data from Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, providing an app for browsing and tagging images.
CLIENT NEEDED:
To scale his contemporary system, migrate the infrastructure to AWS and deliver new features without downtime.
WE DID:
We implemented social network integration, mobile Push notifications and scaled the system to handle growing user base.
OUTCOME:
A feature-complete system with automated infrastructure and modular codebase, exposed as elegant and secure API for mobile applications.
Technologies: Scala, Akka, Android, iOS, MongoDB, Chef, AWS
Category: Backend solution, Mobile App
Security: Rule-based monitoring and alarm system
CLIENT HAD:
A security startup idea, for a self-managed home security system
CLIENT NEEDED:
Attikis brought a new business and technology model to the growing home monitoring market.
WE DID:
We've built a VoIP module that connects to the alarm devices and sends alerts (phone, SMS, email) depending on the user-defined rules.
OUTCOME:
MVP (Project is temporarily closed)
Technologies: Mobicents, Drools, AWS
Category: Backend solution, Web app
Communication: DNS Panel and internals
CLIENT HAD:
Zerigo provides a cloud panel for DNS, an essential part of the Internet.
CLIENT NEEDED:
Improvements in the existing DNS system.
WE DID:
We've maintained Zerigo DNS as a whole - from the web application to server internals.
OUTCOME:
Improved the overall reliability of the application and turned legacy code into a clean code.
Technologies: Ruby, Ruby on Rails, Sinatra, PowerDNS, PostgreSQL, Redis, Chef
Category: Backend solution, Mobile app
Business/ Telco: High-performance SMS broker
CLIENT HAD:
Previous-generation system which couldn't cope with increasing message loads.
CLIENT NEEDED:
There were three main focus areas. First, reliable delivery of hundreds of messages per second. Second, an integrated billing module with a web front-end. Finally, covering new use-cases of the system, for example new interfaces, integrating with other providers.
WE DID:
Implemented a high-performance, reliable SMS message queue, with nightly stress/performance tests. We also developed a web application that allowed for checking of billing status. Also, on top of the system, we created an SMS-iMessage-like solution.
You can read a case study about the project our blog!
OUTCOME:
Fail-safe and efficient system with high bandwidth.
Technologies: Scala, Akka, Groovy, AngularJS, Java, Drools, MongdoDB
Category: Back-end solution, Web App
Legal/ Marketplace: LegalUp
USE THE BEST LAWYERS AT THE LOWEST PRICES.
Choose from experienced layers at the top law firms.
Using our service you can either purchase common law services at a fixed-price or ask for bids from lawyers for more complicated cases.
PARTNERSHIP
When building the service, we are cooperating with a young, energetic team of lawyers. They handle the legal stuff, while we take care of IT.
Technologies: Java, Spring, Apache Wicket
Mobile: Scalar Conference Mobile App
CONFERENCE AGENDA & LIVE INFO IN YOUR POCKET. IOS + ANDROID.
Scalar Conference 2017 application for attendees. Scalar is the biggest conference on Scala language in central Europe. Organised since 2014 is gathering developers from all over the (functional) world.
Technologies: React Native, Android, iOS, AWS S3
Reviews
the project
Java Optimizations for Software Solutions for Schools
"Softwaremill developers have big experience with Java and this has helped to identify low-hanging fruits."
the reviewer
the review
The client submitted this review online.
Please describe your company and your position there.
I'm the CEO of a company that provides software solutions for schools.
For what projects/services did your company hire SoftwareMill, and what were your goals?
Softwaremill helped us with our Java code refactoring, optimizations and solving bugs/errors in the system. We had to reduce the load on our servers and improve the platform uptime and user experience.
How did you select SoftwareMill and what were the deciding factors?
Softwaremill was recommended by a trusted source as a professional company providing Java development services.
Describe the scope of work in detail, including the project steps, key deliverables, and technologies used.
Java code refactoring and web app optimizations
How many people from the vendor's team worked with you, and what were their positions?
3 different developers worked on our project in different stages of the development process.
Can you share any measurable outcomes of the project or general feedback about the deliverables?
There is less load on the servers and we see much better results in our monitoring systems. Fewer errors, fewer downtimes, and better users experience through improved response times.
Describe their project management style, including communication tools and timelines.
We used emails and slack for communication and conference calls for daily updates. Gitlab for project management.
What did you find most impressive or unique about this company?
Softwaremill developers have big experience with Java and this has helped to identify low-hanging fruits to achieve the best results.
Are there any areas for improvement or something they could have done differently?
More experience working with DB optimizations might be another added value but was not an essential part since we have some knowledge in our team.
the project
Augmentation of Developers for HR Company's New Platform
"They fit into our processes very nicely and brought new ideas while also being pragmatic with documentation."
the reviewer
the review
A Clutch analyst personally interviewed this client over the phone. Below is an edited transcript.
Introduce your business and what you do there.
I’m the director of engineering at Assessio, which is a SaaS-based assessment provider for the HR industry. We have a SaaS platform that offers psychometric tests for both recruitment and development purposes, to hiring and HR managers, but also for leadership development. We have in-house-developed assessments on the personality side of things.
We have a lot of history and experience in both developing the assessments on the R&D side of things, as well as in consulting in the organizational space, specifically leadership development and management consulting. For the last five years, we’ve also been developing our own SaaS platform to deliver these assessments.
What challenge were you trying to address with SoftwareMill?
We were starting the process of building a new set of tooling. Right now, we’re in what we call the “potential” space, measuring candidates’ and individuals’ potential, and we want to move more into the development space, with a number of new tooling around leadership training and coaching.
We had some rapid prototypes made up for some new tools, and the idea was to build a whole new platform to deliver those.
What was the scope of their involvement?
SoftwareMill was brought in primarily for backend Java development, as well as architecture specialists, to help complement the existing team. It wasn’t an outsourced endeavor where we gave them specs and had them build us something and come back in six months.
We already had an in-house team building the SaaS platform, and a number of those individuals worked on the MVP platform, together with other consultants.
We’re leveraging their Java backend microservices experience, as well as AWS, infrastructure, UX design, and React frontend. They came in very much focused on the backend and on architecting that side of things.
What is the team composition?
SoftwareMill provided two developers. We had eight developers across the team.
How did you come to work with SoftwareMill?
I’d worked with a couple of their founders on an educational startup in the US. We were all working remotely, and I was really impressed with them at that time. They left to build out SoftwareMill, which is a well-regarded company in Poland, especially in the Java and Scala spaces. We kept in touch, and I reached out to them when I was looking for additional consultants.
How much have you invested with them?
The cost was around $200,000 over the 10-month collaboration.
What is the status of this engagement?
Our collaboration with SoftwareMill lasted from June 2019–April 2020, ending early due to the COVID-19 situation. We’re based in Sweden, and the situation here is probably similar to everywhere else. At the organizational level, there was a decision made to cut all external consultants. I’d love to bring them back as soon as the business situation allows it.
What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?
I’m really happy with the work they did. They complemented the existing team, and we obviously have a number of great engineers as well. We managed to soft launch the MVP internally in late-January–early-February 2020, and that was an amazing achievement, considering the scope and objectives for that project.
Their two members that worked with us were extremely professional and knowledgeable, and they were experienced at working remotely. They joined the team and the daily standups, and stayed involved in the online discussions, using Slack and Jira.
They were very comfortable working in the CI/CD pipeline we had running, using git flows, pull requests, code reviews, and other standard agile methods. They fit into our processes very nicely and brought new ideas while also being pragmatic with documentation, balancing being software craftsmen delivering perfect code, and addressing the needs of the team and of the business.
How did SoftwareMill perform from a project management standpoint?
The communication was generally really good. They joined our agile processes, and they took responsibility in asking questions when they weren’t sure about the requirements.
They worked together with other members of the team, whether it was a product owner, frontend developers, or designers, to ask clarification questions when needed. We had a fairly lightweight agile process, and they fit nicely into that. Everything was as visible as it needed to be when working remotely.
What did you find most impressive about them?
They also came over to Stockholm, and they were good on both a professional and social level. Their members added to the team spirit, which is important when working remotely. I’m really happy with the work they’ve done.
Are there any areas they could improve?
There’s always room for improvement in technology since things are moving so quickly. Nothing in particular springs to mind.
Do you have any advice for future clients of theirs?
It’s important to include the individuals as part of the team, at least in the model we had. Clients should keep the communication up and keep expectations and goals clear while giving them space for creativity and innovation.
SoftwareMill’s developers really wanted to do a good job, and a lot of the onboarding was around understanding the problem we were trying to solve, not just getting code out of the door. They really wanted to understand the user problem we were trying to solve. Spending time upfront communicating that is a great way to get the best from them.
the project
Portal Development & Maintenance for Telecom Company
“They have good developers and understand what needs to be done.”
the reviewer
the review
A Clutch analyst personally interviewed this client over the phone. Below is an edited transcript.
Introduce your business and what you do there.
I’m the technical director of a telecommunications company.
What challenge were you trying to address with SoftwareMill?
We needed to develop a portal for analytics.
What was the scope of their involvement?
SoftwareMill developed an analytics portal for our customers. It’s an onboarding process that allows users to monitor the quality of their delivery rate and more. Some of the technologies they used included Angular, Java, and MongoDB. They’ve finished building out the portal and now provide support and maintenance.
The SoftwareMill team recently revamped the portal by modernizing and updating it; this includes its code, frontend, and database. As new services become available, they integrate them into the portal as well. They’re currently working on another phase of the project. We’ll be rolling the revamped portal out next week to our customers; we’re presently doing in-house testing.
What is the team composition?
We worked with five people in total, encompassing two frontend engineers and three backend engineers, one of whom specialized in AWS infrastructure.
How did you come to work with SoftwareMill?
We found a shortlist of companies online. The reason we chose this team was because of their experience in working with companies similar to ours. Also, we liked the fact that they understood the goals we had for the project.
How much have you invested with them?
We’ve invested roughly €440,000 (approximately $402,000 USD). It was about €220,000 (approximately $201,000 USD) for the initial build and then we spent some more on the revamping of the portal.
What is the status of this engagement?
We began working together around July 2013, and the work is ongoing.
What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?
I’m quite pleased with SoftwareMill’s work. The initial portal worked well with very few issues. Their team provides excellent support and has put the tool into our customers’ hands to analyze their data.
How did SoftwareMill perform from a project management standpoint?
They do ok with project management, but it could be better. Regarding the budget, they did go over.
What did you find most impressive about them?
They have good developers and understand what needs to be done.
Do you have any advice for potential customers?
In working with any remote team, remember that project management is very important.
the project
Scala Dev Team Augmentation for Cybersecurity Startup
"They know how to work remotely; they can help compensate for the distance and detachment."
the reviewer
the review
A Clutch analyst personally interviewed this client over the phone. Below is an edited transcript.
Introduce your business and what you do there.
I’m the VP of R&D at Salt Security, a cybersecurity startup. We offer an API security product.
What challenge were you trying to address with SoftwareMill?
We were in need of Scala developers.
What was the scope of their involvement?
SoftwareMill augments our team and helps with Scala development. They contribute to several areas of the project to make our build better. In some cases, they do the entire service themselves, and in others, they add to our existing services.
What is the team composition?
There are two full-time software engineers.
How did you come to work with SoftwareMill?
The engagement started before I joined the organization. I know the company was looking for an outsourcing company that was known for their expertise in Scala.
How much have you invested with them?
We spend between $13,000-$20,000 per month.
What is the status of this engagement?
We started working together in April 2019 and the work is ongoing.
What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?
In the beginning we had some quality and process issues, but we had regular discussions and mutual feedback sessions. There was a bit of an adjustment process as the two engineers work remotely, but we’ve gotten better together. They meet their deadlines and the quality of their work has consistently improved. We enjoy working with SoftwareMill.
How did SoftwareMill perform from a project management standpoint?
We manage the project on our side, but SoftwareMill is an experienced and mature team. They communicate their progress and keep us updated on plans for particularly complicated features. We use both Slack and Monday, and we recently implemented TeamSpeak.
What did you find most impressive about them?
We like working with SoftwareMill. They know how to work remotely; they can help compensate for the distance and detachment. The team does a good job.
Are there any areas they could improve?
When we wanted to scale up, we couldn’t. They didn’t have the capacity to add DevOps. Now they have more resources, but they were fully booked when we needed them.b One of the reasons we hired an outsource company is because you can easily scale.
Do you have any advice for potential customers?
My advice, with any outsourcing company, is to give SoftwareMill a clearly assigned task to build something from scratch. Then you can measure them on it. It’s better to have an early disappointment than to see it in four months after onboarding them.
the project
Scala Development for Data-Driven Pharmaceutical Company
“They're very thorough, and their documentation is excellent.”
the reviewer
the review
A Clutch analyst personally interviewed this client over the phone. Below is an edited transcript.
Introduce your business and what you do there.
I work for a biotech company that is active in injectable pharmaceuticals used in imaging, diagnosis, and treatment. We focus mainly on oncology, specifically in prostate cancer. I'm the senior director of data science, and I oversee a team of about 15 people who help analyze diagnostic images.
What challenge were you trying to address with SoftwareMill?
We're working on a new data platform for medical images. We wanted to hire a team with expertise in Scala.
What was the scope of their involvement?
We collaborate with them, but they do most of the work. They started working in the backend, but we added a frontend developer about nine months into the project. Everything fits within a cloud platform, so we use a lot of cloud services as well.
What is the team composition?
At most, we had a core team of three, with six additional members who support the project. I set up all the meetings and communication.
How did you come to work with SoftwareMill?
I knew about them through some research I did, so I actively sought them out for this project. I liked the contributions they've made in the field, and they had a lot of credibility.
How much have you invested with them?
I believe we've spent a little more than $200,000 at this point.
What is the status of this engagement?
We started working together in January 2019, and the collaboration is ongoing.
What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?
They're a great resource for us, especially as we didn't have a clear idea of our final outcomes. They provide a lot of input, and we use their ideas.
How did SoftwareMill perform from a project management standpoint?
I often come into meetings with an idea of how to solve something, and by the end of the meeting, that idea has changed completely. I like that a lot. They're a fully remote company, and they're well-versed in teleconferencing, email, and Slack. They self-organize within the core team, and one main point of contact is available for most of our communication. We use the Atlassian suite, so we work in Jira and Confluence.
What did you find most impressive about them?
We're very impressed by their workflow, and I’m so pleased with our partnership. They're very thorough, and their documentation is excellent. They're always available, and they work long hours to accommodate our time difference.
Are there any areas they could improve?
They are very technical, so it took a little while to learn their mode of communication. That is fine for us, but their technicality could be challenging for other clients.
Do you have any advice for potential customers?
Our Slack channel is always open, and it helps to have a feature like that to chat or ask questions.
the project
Infrastructure Dev for Fashion Company
"…thanks to the infrastructure, we’re able to compete with market leaders."
the reviewer
the review
A Clutch analyst personally interviewed this client over the phone. Below is an edited transcript.
Introduce your business and what you do there.
I’m a big data architect for LPP, a fashion company and market leader in Eastern Europe.
What challenge were you trying to address with SoftwareMill?
We tried to implement a Kafka Cluster as well as Apache Kafka streaming technologies on our own. But we failed and needed to outsource those competencies.
What was the scope of their involvement?
During the three-month project, our goal was to build a streaming infrastructure to process data in real time for our big data analytics. Kafka Cluster was constructed on a Kafka on Kubernetes platform, and we also used Kafka String API. We had different databases, such as Redis and MySQL. For analytics, we used BigQuery. SoftwareMill built the infrastructure that is connected to our sources on premises and transfer the data in real time to the Google Cloud.
What is the team composition?
We worked directly with two people from their team. In this project, we had a DevOps engineer and a Java programmer.
How did you come to work with SoftwareMill?
SoftwareMill is a certified partner of Confluence, which is the company behind Kafka technology.
How much have you invested in them?
We spent between $25,000–$50,000.
What is the status of this engagement?
We worked with SoftwareMill on this project from February–May 2019.
What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?
We just started to deploy machine learning algorithms, but thanks to the infrastructure, we’re able to compete with market leaders.
How did SoftwareMill perform from a project management standpoint?
Sometimes it’s challenging because we worked most of the time remotely, but we’ve had three onsite visits when they came to our headquarters for two days each time. Overall, I feel that our engagement was positive. SoftwareMill was responsive, providing us with internal files for every product and piece of software. When the project was finished, we were able to use them right away.
What did you find most impressive about them?
In terms of technology, their team was flexible. While we started with the Kafka String API, we had to switch to another API for a different set of reasons. Along with the transition being smooth, the developer and DevOps engineer were positive about learning new things. They stuck to the three-month timeline, doing everything to deliver a ready solution.
Are there any areas they could improve?
While the project was completed as scheduled, we didn’t have a channel to communicate small issues that we found as there was no place for small support afterward. Internally, they only hire experts and seniors, so they were unable to provide low-cost support after the project was finished.
the project
Web Development Staff Augmentation for Reviews Platform
"I’ve been impressed by how easily they acclimated to our in-house technology and practices."
the reviewer
the review
A Clutch analyst personally interviewed this client over the phone. Below is an edited transcript.
Introduce your business and what you do there.
I am a software developer for a Swedish online reviews company that offers information about restaurants, service providers, and the like.
What challenge were you trying to address with SoftwareMill?
I was looking to scale our efforts quickly, but I had difficulty finding suitable talent in Sweden. I hired SoftwareMill to provide remote staff augmentation for website development.
What was the scope of their involvement?
SoftwareMill works with the Scala stack along with Postgres and Elasticsearch. We rely on them to fix the existing code and build new features while working with our frontend and backend.
What is the team composition?
We work with one remote full-stack senior developer.
How did you come to work with SoftwareMill?
I learned of SoftwareMill through a friend. Once I contacted them, I spoke with a sales and technical lead who confirmed that they could match me with a developer that met our requirements.
How much have you invested with them?
We’ve spent between $25,000–$50,000.
What is the status of this engagement?
Our collaboration began in June 2018 and remains ongoing.
What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?
Our entire team worked better and faster with the addition of an outside developer. Our SoftwareMill teammate has brought many practical recommendations and enhancements.
How did SoftwareMill perform from a project management standpoint?
We communicate very well with our developer. We hold morning stand-ups, and we feel as though he is completely integrated with our team.
What did you find most impressive about them?
This experience has been my first time working with an outsourced development team. I’ve been impressed by how easily they acclimated to our in-house technology and practices.
Are there any areas they could improve?
No, I can’t identify anything needing improvement at this time.
Do you have any advice for potential customers?
I would advise future customers to specify what their developer will be doing on a day-to-day basis so that they have a better idea of what to expect from the engagement.
the project
Scala and Angular Development for Financial Software Solution Company
"They have an excellent ability to work remotely without it being a barrier. They fit seamlessly into our team."
the reviewer
the review
The client submitted this review online.
Please describe your company and your position there.
We develop software solutions to help with debt recovery, enabling organizations to collect from their customers in a fair, efficient, and intelligent manner. I'm the CTO.
For what projects/services did your company hire SoftwareMill?
We hired SoftwareMill to help us while we built our team from the ground-up. They function as part of our team and provide us with deep expertise in some of the technologies we use, primarily Scala programming.
What were your goals for this project?
This is an ongoing development effort to build new features and functionality for the market.
How did you select this vendor?
We were looking for deep Scala expertise. We noticed SoftwareMill from some of their open-source contributions that we were using.
Describe the project and the services they provided in detail.
SoftwareMill has provided two full-stack engineers who work remotely as part of our team to develop features using Scala and Angular.
What was the team composition?
Two full-stack engineers from SoftwareMill augment our team.
Can you share any information that demonstrates the impact that this project has had on your business?
Without SoftwareMill's help, it's unlikely we'd have been able to deliver to our first client. They've been fantastic.
How was project management arranged and how effective was it?
We use Scrum to manage daily work, facilitated by Slack, Google Hangouts, GitHub, and JIRA. Our colleagues from SoftwareMill visit every six months or so for a summit. Communication is good, and the team is fully engaged and productive.
What did you find most impressive about this company?
They have an excellent ability to work remotely without it being a barrier. They fit seamlessly into our team.
Are there any areas for improvement?
Nothing comes to mind.
the project
IoT Development for Smart Building Technology Company
"They were invested and interested in the project and were passionate about their company."
the reviewer
the review
A Clutch analyst personally interviewed this client over the phone. Below is an edited transcript.
Introduce your business and what you do there.
I’m the COO of Ersules. We’re a web development firm that provides hardware and software for building automation solutions.
What challenge were you trying to address with SoftwareMill?
We were looking to outsource development of a new part of our cloud-based software: a high-volume, real-time data transaction system.
What was the scope of their involvement?
The tool is focused on building automation, analytics, and insights. SoftwareMill developed the entire solution, with most of their work utilizing Scala. They delivered the UI and backend infrastructure and now implement any new requirements we receive.
What is the team composition?
Our team size varied as the project progressed. We worked with 6–10 developers and several DevOps resources and UX designers. These resources transitioned on and off depending on what stage we were in.
How did you come to work with SoftwareMill?
They possessed experience with the appropriate technologies and had strong references we were able to communicate with. Our timeline lined up with their capabilities as well.
How much have you invested in them?
We’ve spent around €500,000 Euro ($564,000 USD) so far.
What is the status of this engagement?
We’ve been working together since December 2016.
What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?
SoftwareMill’s quality surpassed our technical team’s metrics. They represent strong value for the money, which hasn’t been the case with several other companies I’ve worked with. My relationship with SoftwareMill is one of the highlights of my career. They’ve been a pleasure to work with since day one.
How did SoftwareMill perform from a project management standpoint?
We had stand-ups with them every morning, and we appointed our own scrum lead as opposed to having a project manager from SoftwareMill. They’re a very flat organization, which was unusual for us because we traditionally operate with more formally structured businesses. This didn’t hamper the relationship at all, however. They always met our deadlines, and we appreciated the enhanced flexibility they provided us. If we had a call with our client, one of their developers was always free to hop on and provide support. Their individual autonomy worked to our advantage.
What did you find most impressive about them?
On a personal level, working with each of their developers was a pleasure. They were invested and interested in the project and were passionate about their company. Their deliverables are second to none.
Are there any areas they could improve?
Their project management style might be an issue, depending on the size of the project they're undertaking. It worked well for our scale and scope though.
the project
SMB Proxy Dev for Majoir Telecom Company
"...[T]hey carefully explained the technical steps they took to accomplish their goals."
the reviewer
the review
A Clutch analyst personally interviewed this client over the phone. Below is an edited transcript.
Introduce your business and what you do there.
I’m the quality engineering manager for a telecom firm in the Philippines. I’m in charge of both manual and automated testing.
What challenge were you trying to address with SoftwareMill?
We had a project with a strict timeline and lacked the necessary in-house resources. We needed a firm with expertise in SMPP Proxy.
What was the scope of their involvement?
I served as the point person for the project, relaying our requirements to SoftwareMill’s team. We needed to add an SMPP Proxy layer to an existing product to connect with our postpaid subscribers. Most of the tech stack was built using Java.
What is the team composition?
We were assigned two developers, in addition to a part-time project manager.
How did you come to work with SoftwareMill?
We searched for a vendor with the necessary expertise that could complete the project within our timeline and on budget. It was clear from the interview process that SoftwareMill could provide technologies that would expedite delivery of the product.
How much have you invested in them?
We spent around $50,000.
What is the status of this engagement?
We worked with them between November 2017–January 2018.
What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?
SoftwareMill helped us finalize the contract so that we were both clear about our respective roles. They also began work while we were still finalizing the contract, allowing us to complete the project ahead of time.
How did SoftwareMill perform from a project management standpoint?
They provided weekly updates and managed the project through Trello. We could monitor their progress and easily add any repair requests, which they addressed quickly.
What did you find most impressive about them?
I was very impressed by their proactive decision to start the project before finalizing the contract. Communication was also easy, as they carefully explained the technical steps they took to accomplish their goals.
Are there any areas they could improve?
They provided quality engineers, but these individuals also handled testing. It would be helpful if they supplied separate testers to eliminate bias.
Do you have any advice for potential customers?
We experienced a slight delay because we failed to articulate our requirements in the beginning. Be sure to clearly explain your goals.
SoftwareMill was able to successfully carry out the tasks. The client noted that there was less load on the services and they've been seeing great results on their monitoring systems. There are now fewer errors and less downtime thanks to the efforts of the team.