Springs

Please describe your company and your position there.

I'm the CTO of Codeworkshop.io, we are based in Cape Town South Africa

For what projects/services did your company hire Springs, and what were your goals?

We had a very short timeline to get a mobile up developed, tested and working for a client of our and required additional development expertise

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

We found Springs on Upwork at the time with good ratings and reviews, also Springs is positioned in a good timezone to communicate with from South Africa, we also had a virtual Meeting to discuss technical aspects of the project to asses proficiency

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

We handed over app designs and assets to springs to develop a mobile app built with Expo (React Native) which connected to our clients API The project was tested in 1 week sprints as the timeline was extremely short

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

There were 3 core members in the team, 1 Lead and 2 Mid level developers I acted as a development manager as the time to coordinate the project and testing between our internal and clients teams

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

Springs delivered a quality project on time. (considering it was a such a short timeline) which is still in use

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

Project management from Springs side was great, we communicated continuously through-out via Skype, we used Jira and Bitbucket for our development tools which simplified the development process

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

We were able to chat to any of the team members throughout the project and test continuously, all code was committed regularly allowing us to vet the quality on a continuous basis

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

Considering the timeline all elements were delivered as expected

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the founder and CEO of a company that provides professional web development, web design, and app development services. We also provide consultation services, mostly for IT startups. We are based in Saudi Arabia and the headquarters is in Riyadh.

What challenge were you trying to address with Springs?

We hired Springs to help us with website development.

What was the scope of their involvement?

Springs helped us build an online platform, for which I already had a Unified Model Language (UML) draft drawn up. They mainly concentrated on the development aspect of the project since I already did most of the preparatory design work, including wireframes, mockups, and colored illustrations. I sent their team my designs and they developed these from scratch on AWS. They made sure to follow my template and customize the product according to our needs. 

The Springs team also built the required core functionalities to enable administrators to add, insert, edit, delete, or update product information on the platform. They integrated Stripe and PayPal payment gateways as well, since the platform is subscription-based and requires users to pay a premium to enjoy our full range of products and services. 

With development complete, Springs now provides maintenance services. 

What is the team composition?

We’ve worked with about 15 people from their team. My main point of contact during development was the project manager and three QAs. For concurrent maintenance, we are working with only one developer on a full-time basis. 

How did you come to work with Springs?

I posted about the project on Fiverr and Upwork, and Springs approached me through the latter. A couple of other agencies reached out as well and I sent all of them the infrastructure that I had designed.

How much have you invested with them?

We have spent more than $250,000 on the entire project.

What is the status of this engagement?

We began our partnership in November 2019, and development lasted from February 2020–June 2021. We’re still working with them on maintenance. 

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

We didn’t get to launch right after development was complete since I needed to do more tests and migrate the site to Fargate. I hired another partner for the migration, and the task took a bit of time. 

We have, however, launched last January 2021. The website has thus far been very stable and has attracted a lot of users who want to sign up. Overall, we’ve received positive feedback, which means that the website is performing well even on the administrative side. I would rate Springs 100% for their effort because I am very satisfied with their work. They exceeded expectations in many areas.

How did Springs perform from a project management standpoint?

We ended up going way over budget. The initial estimate that they provided me was between $150,000–$170,000, but we ended up spending more than $250,000. There’s also a running monthly cost of $5,000, which means that we might exceed the $300,000 bar. I don’t blame Springs for exceeding the estimate, however. I’m a software engineer myself, so I know how IT projects work. 

We used Trello to track the progress of the project. They invited me to be a monitor and a product owner on the platform, and I was pretty much involved throughout the entire development process. We continue to communicate through Slack, Google Meet, or Zoom for any maintenance issues or change requests. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

The quality of Springs’ development work is strong from every angle. They’re good at handling sophisticated projects and will dig deep to create a great product from scratch. I also appreciate the fact that they have good QA professionals. The way they had a 360-degree view of every feature even before they are pushed into production gave me peace of mind. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, there’s nothing for them to improve.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

If you have an MVP in mind that you want to develop, go with Springs because they specialize in that. You can engage them from A to Z since they have designers, architects, and analysts who can help build your dream product from scratch.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the founder and CEO of a last-mile logistics technology company.

What challenge were you trying to address with Springs?

We needed help with building a platform that allowed us to streamline the coordination among the multiple stakeholders involved in our business.

What was the scope of their involvement?

Springs provided us with a range of development services, from building custom software to better manage our internal processes to developing our company website from scratch and creating a mobile application for our drivers.

For the app, their team also worked on its UI/UX design, built an iOS and Android version, added all the necessary functionalities, and implemented any changes we requested. They built the app with React Native.

What is the team composition?

We work with multiple people from their team, including a project manager, web developers, and mobile app developers.

How did you come to work with Springs?

We heard about their company through a referral. During our conversation with them, they gave off positive energy, seemed trustworthy, and understood what we expected from them.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent around $170,000 so far.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with them in September 2020, and our engagement is still ongoing.

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

We essentially judge them on the quality of development, and they’ve been pretty good in that regard so far. They’ve also built everything exactly as envisioned while adding some of their own suggestions along the way. 

How did Springs perform from a project management standpoint?

While there’ve been a number of minor delays, Springs has been a very trustworthy partner, who’s always willing to help and learn new things together.

We’ve also encountered a couple of bugs and other technical issues, but they manage to resolve them quickly. The same can be said when it comes to urgent matters — in fact, they attend to them even on weekends.

As for communication, we interact through Slack. They use Trello to keep track of tasks and Figma for design.

What did you find most impressive about them?

What’s been most impressive about Springs is their transparency. For example, whenever we ask them to add more resources to speed up the development, they make sure to hire someone who meets our quality standards and budget. If they don't think it's necessary, they'll explain to us why.
Also, their team never tries to cut corners in providing services.

Are there any areas they could improve on?

They can improve on keeping track of everything as it’s discussed to ensure nothing is missed and avoid any further delays.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Make sure to be heavily involved in managing the project and clear in describing your needs and setting your expectations.

Please describe your company and your position there.

I'm the owner of a real estate inspection firm.

For what projects/services did your company hire Springs, and what were your goals?

We have been in business since 2013 and since inception, we have utilized third-party inspection report writing software applications. The currently available applications didn't offer the features and flexibility that I was lookin g for so I decided to engage a developer to develop our own report writing application that what a progressive web app and featured all the functionality and flexibility that I was looking for.

I hired Springs about a year ago to walk through a discovery phase with me so we could develop a plan of action and a budget for this type of project and, after the discovery phase, I hired them to develop this application.

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

I first looked in the USA (where my business is located) for a develop to handle this project and there were no shortage of talented teams. However, they we all very expensive and because I knew that I would still continue to refine the application after going live with the app, and knowing that in and of itself would be expensive, I decided to look offshore to see if I could reduce the overall cost.

I looked at many independent freelancing developers on TopTal, Upstack and Upwork. I ended up going the Springs because of their positive reviews and because they were one of the best rated agencies on Upwork. I also concluded that I wanted to hire an agency because the oversight and project management was very important to me. I am not a software developer and had never tackled a project such as this one before so having a project manager assigned to me was very important.

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

We started with a discovery phase. I thought this was very important and necessary to make sure we were all on the same page with regards to the scope of the project. It was money well spent. right out the gate, I was very impressed with the Springs' Team ability to grasp the concept and build out a framework for the project.

They developed schema for the site pages, wireframes and the project specifications in about two weeks. The they started working on the PWA using the project specifications in order to deliver a minimally viable product (MVP), which they did in about 4 months; right in line with their estimated time frame. Since then we have been enhancing the app during our alpha release and beta testing. We are currently about two weeks away from our full release.

We plan to keep enhancing the app over the next year or so as we get feedback for our team. After about a year or so, we plan to take the app to market by offering to others in our profession. As it stands now, we feel that this app is better than any offering currently on the market.

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

Nick was my project manager and my primary point of contact for the project. We had two full stack developers working on the front end and back end and one designer and an QA Manager.

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

We haven't fully launched our app, but we've utilized it in the alpha release and beta testing. The feedback from my inspectors has been great and everyone is excited to transition to our new app. The feedback has told us that the app is easy to use, very intuitive, and significantly reduces the time it takes to produce a report for our clients.

Users also really enjoy the simplistic and elegant design. We are estimating that this app will save 1 to 2 hours per day per inspector in report writing time.

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

Working with an overseas team in the Ukraine is something I had never done before. I was very much concerned about the level of communication. I don't speak any Ukrainian so it was imperative that the team speaks good English...and they did. We communicate primarily through Slack and Google Meetings.

My project manager Nick would have a summary and questions for me at least once a week during development and quite often, we spoke several times a week and continue to do so. I also have access to the leadership management team and they are always very responsive to any concern I have. Their style is very friendly and calming. I actually look forward to my meetings with them as a bright spot in my week.

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

Most impressive is that fact that I feel as though I am a valuable customer to them and I get the sense that their mission is for me to succeed with my project. I don't get the sense that I am just another customer. I find that they are thinking about my project even when we aren't communicating and they come back to me with thoughts and ideas that may improve my product.

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

I wouldn't say there are areas for improvement. I'm sure there are but I wouldn't be able to delineate them.

Please describe your company and your position there.

Our company provides a directory for business aviation suppliers for example maintenance organizations, training organizations etc. I´m the managing director and also responsible for the platform development project.

For what projects/services did your company hire Springs, and what were your goals?

To create an online directory for business aviation that is able to be downloaded like an app from scratch.

How did you select Springs and what were the deciding factors?

Dedicated Developers and Project Manager compared with a great cost structure.

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

Initial brainstorming and visualization. Creation of a mindmap and user experience details Development process backend and frontend Testing phase and adjustments Launch Maintenance and updates

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

One Project Manager who I dealt with all the time and held weekly video calls on progress and timelines.

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

All the deliverables were perfectly developed and the communication was very good. All issues were addressed and sorted in a very short time. All costs were clear and no surprises came up.

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

We had the base concept which was broken down in sprints for each week and I had all access to review all steps and processes within gitlab and slack.

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

Springs amazingly merge our ideas and theirs.

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

No

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am the founder of a web application that allows user to search and review books.

For what projects/services did your company hire Springs, and what were your goals?

I needed an agency that could assist me in developing my idea, from conceptualizing the main features, find development options, suggest best tools and develop them.

How did you select Springs and what were the deciding factors?

I had been in contact with several agencies and had introductory meetings with all. The guys at Springs have been very patient in providing explanations and answering all my questions, always available when I was calling a meeting to require more information and very precise and exhausting in providing estimates for the work to be done.

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

We had several meetings to discuss my ideas, I presented a few mockups that helped visualizing the concept of the website. We discussed the technology to be used, we opted for Node.js and Due.js. I have been assigned a manager that was my main contact at the agency and that was supervising the job of the developers, in a very efficient and smooth way.

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

The project manager was my main point of contact, there were 4 to 5 developers and a graphic designer working under his supervision.

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

The web application has been successfully developed.

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

The project manager was my point of contact, my requests and comments and the requests and comments from the developers were communicated through him.

We used slack as main platform for communication and to discuss different features using different channels, and then we used Trello to check on the different tasks and workflow. Both were new to new but I found Springs' communication tools and management style very professional and effective.

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

They showed from the beginning a very professional attitude, were always very supportive and reassuring, which is something that I appreciated being not at all an IT person. I was looking for a reliable agency that could assist me throughout the development process, someone I could trust, and I found this in Springs.

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

Whatever bug was there they were always ready to fix it. I a couple of occasions they were unsure on how to proceed, but they immediately found the right resource in their team to perform the task.

Please describe your company and your position there.

I’m the CEO assistant for management and internationalization at Spectrum AG. We provide a trainee program designed to fill the gap between what today's college graduates learn in universities and job requirements.

For what projects/services did your company hire Springs?

We needed to automate our service, which was being run through Excel sheets. Compiling and presenting our data to management was becoming a serious problem.

What were your goals for this project?

We were aiming to reach specific international expansion goals.

How did you select this vendor?

They contacted us through LinkedIn.

Describe the project and the services they provided in detail.

Based on our internal requirements, they designed and developed an ERP. They were also responsible for security and QA.

What was the team composition?

Our primary contacts were their COO and a project manager. I’m not sure who exactly worked on the project or how many people there were.

Can you share any information that demonstrates the impact that this project has had on your business?

It’s too early to determine the actual impact of the project, but we can say our employees’ productivity has been significantly enhanced. Finding information is much easier than it was when we had to look through countless Excel sheets. Producing reports and presenting data to management is also much simpler than it was before.

How was project management arranged and how effective was it?

They organized the effort into two levels: a project team and a project committee. The committee set the scope while the team implemented its plan.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

They were highly responsive, deadline-oriented and solution-driven. Whenever we had a question, they responded directly. Their willingness to incorporate functionalities into the requirements after we began was especially noteworthy. Instead of saying no, they looked for ways to integrate new features into existing modules.

Are there any areas for improvement?

Internal communication between the project team and the project committee regarding the scope could have been improved, but we had a very positive experience overall.

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am the managing director for a software solutions company that specializes in the construction and services industry. We provide bespoke integrations to third-party software as well as a SaaS product for document automation.

For what projects/services did your company hire Springs?

A client approached us about a custom integration to a workflow management system. The project—which relied heavily on Cron API, deciphering large amounts of data, and creating notification letters and emails—needed some specialized guidance. 

What were your goals for this project?

The goal was to automate the seamless, accurate creation of notification letters and emails to over 20,000 customers in a timely fashion and with an intuitive interface.

How did you select this vendor?

I read through a number of Clutch reviews and interviewed several companies. I liked the quality of Springs’ portfolio and, after speaking with their management, felt confident that they possessed the technical knowledge necessary to deliver a quality solution within budget. 

Describe the project in detail.

I provided the technical specifications and mockups for my desired design and flow.  Given the technical nature of this project as well as my familiarity with the third-party API, we decided that I would manage the project directly and call on their project manager as needed. The team implemented a DigitalOcean hosting platform and PHP architecture, then answered any questions I had regarding the setup.  

What was the team composition?

In the beginning, several people were involved with establishing the initial graphical user interface (GUI) and API functionality. Later in the project, I communicated with one developer on a daily basis, particularly during the testing and debugging stages.

Can you share any information that demonstrates the impact that this project has had on your business?

This project has been transformative for my client; they can now quickly and efficiently produce the notifications they need to stay compliant. They are so satisfied that they have requested bolt-on functionality for other areas in their business, such as warehouse reporting.

How was project management arranged and how effective was it?

My expanded involvement allowed me direct access to the main developer, which I prefer. The Springs team communicated well, remained accessible, and was always available for brainstorming and troubleshooting. 

What did you find most impressive about this company?

They are a team of creative developers who find a way to make things work. Bugs are a necessary evil in software development, but the team took them in stride and always found a solution. I also found their prices to be fair and competitive. 

Are there any areas for improvement?

Design is not their strong point, and they could benefit from an in-house designer to refine their GUI. However, they compensate for this by quickly implementing suggestions and revisions. I would prefer to have a developer with strong coding skills anyway, as opposed to a one with a broader, less specific skill set like design. 

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the managing director of Huxley Digital. We’re a web development and design firm that services small to medium-sized companies in the B2B market.

What challenge were you trying to address with Springs?

Our in-house staff consists of web designers and marketing professionals, but we lack sufficient server-side expertise. Therefore, we needed an external company to act as our development partner.

What was the scope of their involvement?

Springs developed a couple of customer-facing websites using a Laravel PHP framework. They’ve integrated these sites with a sophisticated user access management software and various APIs. They also designed some initial screens through a solid understanding of frontend frameworks like Bootstrap. Their team worked well with our designers to implement CSS elements into two subscription management platforms. More recently, they’ve used Vue.JS to complete the JavaScript work required by our current project. Overall, they’ve demonstrated a lot of skill in applying a frontend finish to the server-side work they’re assigned.

What is the team composition?

They’ve assigned us the same project manager for each project. While they act as our primary point of contact, we’re also granted access to the company’s principals.

How did you come to work with Springs?

We found Springs on Upwork and reached out to them. They handled the initial inquiry professionally and demonstrated an understanding of the complexities involved with our project. They asked the right questions instead of immediately agreeing to our terms. We appreciated that approach and hired them.

How much have you invested with them?

The project cost around £40,000 (approximately $52,000 USD).

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with them in December 2016. There’s been a couple of small gaps in the engagement, but our relationship is ongoing.

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

It’s a bit too soon to gather reliable metrics from the platforms they’ve completed. The marketing around their first project with us failed, so there aren’t many people using that product. They haven’t finalized our current project, but we expect it to be a success. Their development knowledge enables us to confidently accept and sell project s outside of our internal skill set. We’re a long way from investing in additional full-time resources, so their contributions are integral to our success.

How did Springs perform from a project management standpoint?

Their team is responsive and capable of providing thorough documentation. We used Jira to track the first project, but the current undertaking is organized by an old-fashioned mix of Trello and Google Docs.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Their highly skilled team isn’t afraid to step up to a challenge. Also, their ability to communicate is exceptionable. The company directors are always available if needed. We’ve outsourced a total of 4 companies in our history, and Springs is by far the most notable.

Are there any areas they could improve?

The language barrier can be frustrating at times. Although they communicate better than any other outsourced firm we’ve worked with, improvements could always be made.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Every outsourced engagement needs a dedicated project manager on both sides. I frequently reach out to Springs and give them feedback on how they’re performing. That prompts them to fill in the gaps regarding project expectations. This level of contact benefits our projects.

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am one of two co-founders of UrbanCircle, an online marketplace for child-related services such as academic tutors, sports coaches, music and arts instructors, babysitters, and nannies. By providing access to a large pool of qualified resources, we strive to create a single reliable source for parents needing childcare and development support. 

For what projects/services did your company hire Springs?

We hired them for web design and end-to-end development.

What were your goals for this project?

Our primary goal was a frictionless customer experience on both our web and mobile platforms that allowed families to view detailed profiles of various alternative service providers.

How did you select this vendor?

They responded to our job posting on Upwork and were among 10 of the companies we shortlisted to interview. 

Can you go into detail about the services they provided and the scope of the project?

They designed and developed the marketplace from scratch using a Bootstrap template design, then customized it to fit our requirements.

What was the team composition?

The team consisted of one partner, one project manager, and one analyst.

Can you share any information that demonstrates the impact that this project has had on your business?

Families can now make informed decisions concerning the best care for their children, then book and pay service providers online and on-demand, eliminating the need for bank transfers or time-consuming phone calls.

How was project management arranged and how effective was it?

Although the project leadership changed twice, the third and final manager’s attention to detail was instrumental in meeting deadlines and expectations. They were generally flexible regarding our change requests and did their best to deliver the demos on time. 

What did you find most impressive about this company?

Rather than confine their problem solving to the initial scope, they found creative ways to resolve issues.  

Are there any areas where they can improve?

Since we were first-time entrepreneurs with little experience, they could have been more proactive in presenting and suggesting best practices to us before we figured it out ourselves.