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    Warsaw, Poland

Your favored tech partner.

4.9
6 reviews

Sunscrapers is a Python and Javascript development shop based in Warsaw, Poland. We partner with startups, companies and brands helping them solve business problems with technology.

Our approach combines business savvy, software craftsmanship and agile project management to deliver state-of-the-art applications rapidly and efficiently. Our usual projects include search engines, marketplaces, analytics, e-commerce, social sites and SaaS.

We can help you with:

  1. product development 
  2. setting up a dedicated tech team in Poland
  3. augmenting your team with world-class developers 

We are organising PyWaw and have co-organised PyWaw Summit and Makerland. We're also contributing to Open Source community with djet and djoser being our most popular libraries. Our team appeared in Forbes and major Polish newspapers and our work was featured in BBC, Wired, The New York Times, Daily Mail, The Telegraph, The Boston Globe and many others.

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$10,000+
 
$25 - $49 / hr
 
10 - 49
 Founded
2010
Show all +
Warsaw, Poland
headquarters
  • Sunscrapers
    Pokorna 2/947
    Warsaw 00-199
    Poland

Portfolio

Key clients: 
  • 15Five
  • Asus
  • Canon
  • Caris Life Sciences
  • Kyocera
  • Lexmark
  • Ricoh
  • Samsung
  • Legalsense
  • Biorelevant
  • Open Finance
  • Trusted Housesitters

Legalsense

Legalsense is an online practice management system for modern law firms. It offers time tracking and invoicing features among many others. We have been working with the Dutch team in a Dedicated Team model (2-3 developers) since February 2015. 

Alcomap

Alcomap is a web application that lets you mark places where you drink beer. We've developed this project to learn and experiment with Google Maps technology available at the time. Conclusions we drew from Alcomap created foundations for many future algorithms and ideas.

Srello

Srello is the easiest and most convenient tool for Scrum project management, if you're using Trello. We've created an add-on application that helps us scratch our own inch: manage sprints and burndown charts. 

Daybees

Daybees is an event search application available on three platforms. There is a powerful infrastructure set up in the background with thousands of bespoke crawling scripts, numerous integrations and a scalable server set up. Daybees was soft launched in the UK and has gathered over 8 million event entries up to date. The project received $1m funding from private investors.

Algarve Wall

Algarve Wall is an online directory of businesses in Algarve, Portugal for local and tourist communities. Company profiles are created on a monthly subscription basis and payments are handled by Stripe. We were working with them in a Project model.

Playfull Bee

Playful Bee is an application for parents providing a curated curriculum for child's development and early education. It consists of a library of educational media, daily pieces of advice relevant to kids’ age and a set of educational games with instructions.

Skilltrade

SkillTrade is a skills exchange site based around the idea of exchanging skills. It gives you tools to find the right match basing on your interests, lets you browse profiles in a Tinder-like way and give you the option to chat with others in real time. It’s currently launched in Poland but is available in English too.

Learnskillz

Learnskillz is a global marketplace that brings instructor and students together for online and offline classes. It also allows teachers to manage their private tutoring schedule. We were working with the American team in a Project model.

Reviews

4.9
6 reviews
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Prototype Dev for Travel Startup

"What makes them stand out amongst others is that they can share a business vision."

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5.0

Quality: 
5.0
Schedule: 
4.5
Cost: 
4.0
Willing to refer: 
5.0
The Project
 
$10,000 to $49,999
 
Aug. 2015 - Ongoing
Project summary: 

Sunscrapers prototyped a community platform meant to help users plan and share their personal travels. The dev team now focuses primarily on resolving bugs and feature customization.

The Reviewer
 
1-10 Employees
 
London, United Kingdom
Adam Bradley
Founder, Routeer
 
Verified
The Review
Feedback summary: 

Assigned resources are typically adept coders and savvy technologists. They also have a clear grasp on what it takes to prototype successfully, which is rare to find. However, one salient area for improvement is their project estimation. 

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

We are a travel business running a social community platform for personal journies. I am the founder of the company.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Sunscrapers?

We are a purely online business and needed to develop the idea from the ground up and create an MVP [minimum viable product]. We have no technical skills here so it was going to be necessary to find a partner. 

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Sunscrapers acted as a startup service for our company. We handled most of the skeleton work in terms of creating a business model, as well as the design. Sunscrapers helped us test our points and define the model further.

We worked with a designer from Sunscrapers' team who expanded my initial sketches. There were also different software engineers, mostly frontend and backend Python developers, brought in when we needed the services. Sunscrapers' team was efficiently resourced. We mainly interacted with their principal and our designer, but I could reach out to anyone else. I'm not a web developer by trade, so Sunscrapers' contact was helpful in acting as an intermediary in our conversations.

How did you come to work with Sunscrapers?

I needed to find the right web developers for a slightly unusual idea. I researched companies through Google. Sunscrapers mentioned that they had a startup focus and the right business acumen for this. We had an initial contact and went from there.

How much have you invested with Sunscrapers?

The cost of Sunscrapers' services has been between £10,000 and £ 15,000 [US$12,000 and $18,000].

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with Sunscrapers in August 2016. The relationship is ongoing, although it's been put on the backburner a few times. Sunscrapers leaves it to me to evaluate what needs to be done next.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Could you share any evidence that would demonstrate the productivity, quality of work, or the impact of the engagement?

Sunscrapers has been able to build a functional backend, almost beyond what I thought was possible. That in itself is a big achievement. The design is spot-on and perfectly linked to the actual functionalities of the site. I'm overall amazed at how close Sunscrapers' work is to my initial designs. I was expecting to hear "no" for the entire project run, but Sunscrapers found solutions, even though the work cost slightly more than I was anticipating.

How did Sunscrapers perform from a project management standpoint?

Sunscrapers uses Trello, Google Drive, and various other systems which have helped our collaboration. I can see everything being worked on using Trello, as well as a breakdown of the cost. I have the same access as Sunscrapers, so I can intervene when I need to. Someone in my team is actually a project manager by trade, and she has been using the same systems as Sunscrapers. That was quite comforting to know.

What did you find most impressive about Sunscrapers?

What makes them stand out amongst others is that they can share a business vision, instead of simply selling a flat service. They've understood my need to pivot, get to the MVP stage, evaluate, test, and maintain that loop. Sunscrapers' principal has an entrepreneurial mind, so the whole company feeds from that.

Are there any areas Sunscrapers could improve?

Not particularly. Anyone working in the startup business will want to know about maximum costs outright. This is hard for a development team to estimate, but Sunscrapers could become more transparent about the process. Having looked at the end result, I should have understood that it would require more money, but I was trigger-happy in the beginning.

5.0
Overall Score
  • 4.5 Scheduling
    ON TIME / DEADLINES
    The work may have taken longer than anticipated to complete at times.
  • 4.0 Cost
    Value / within estimates
    Transparency around costs could be improved.
  • 5.0 Quality
    Service & deliverables
    I'm really happy with the work produced by Sunscrapers.
  • 5.0 NPS
    Willing to refer

Ongoing Dev on Flagship Product for Ad Tech Firm

"Something that definitely stands out is their knowledge and passion for Python/Django."

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5.0

Quality: 
5.0
Schedule: 
5.0
Cost: 
5.0
Willing to refer: 
5.0
The Project
 
$50,000 to $199,999
 
June 2015 - Ongoing
Project summary: 

Sunscrapers first resolved bugs in an existing flagship product. The project team then began to add new features like a custom reporting dashboard and they now remain focused on similar backend work. 

The Reviewer
 
11-50 Employees
 
New York, New York
Nazar Ivaniv
Co-Founder & CTO, 15Five
 
Verified
The Review
Feedback summary: 

Communication barriers and the considerable timezone difference failed to impact the engagement, which is extraordinarily rare in offshoring scenarios. Clients can expect uncompromising responsiveness and access to a wide variety of talented professionals. 

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

15Five provides communication tools between employees and managers, for different-sized companies. We do this by asking employees questions on a weekly basis, which are used as feedback for managers. I'm one of the co-founders and the acting CTO of the company.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Sunscrapers?

As our team grew, we've needed to hire additional people to help cope with increasing demand and a whole slew of priorities. We were looking for a very specific skill set, namely experience with Django/Python. This is what Sunscrapers specializes in, so it was easy to make a decision on them.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Sunscrapers was initially involved with technical support, solving the bugs we were logging in GitHub. It was the best way in which we could introduce Sunscrapers to our system and have the team gain knowledge fast. This was done for 3 months, during which Sunscrapers mainly interacted with our customer support team. After 1–2 months, Sunscrapers demonstrated that they'd learned our system and were able to navigate around issues. As a result, we also involved Sunscrapers in new feature development. Throughout this experience, Sunscrapers continued to help us with support issues, but the biggest benefit we've seen from them is developing new features.

All of the features built by Sunscrapers have been successful. I was surprised by the level of attention to detail shown by their team, and by how much Sunscrapers cared about our project and the product itself. Sunscrapers has come back with suggestions for alternative approaches, trying to make our product better and more successful.

Sunscrapers implemented a custom user dashboard that became popular with almost all of our customers. It allows people to give high-fives to co-workers in order to show appreciation for help given. Objectives was another feature built in part by Sunscrapers. It has also been a successful addition to our platform.

Sunscrapers assigned two resources to us. They've acted as our own developers, communicating with us directly. I only hear from Sunscrapers' owners when we receive invoices and during routine check-ups; otherwise, the communication is the same as with our full-time employees. This removes any third-party or man-in-the-middle miscommunications. Even though Sunscrapers is 6 hours ahead of us, they've been willing to stay in late from time to time for important conference calls.

How did you come to work with Sunscrapers?

We interviewed around seven companies in total, each offering engineers with different skill sets. Some of them couldn't demonstrate their English proficiency, which made it difficult to demonstrate their Python skills.

One of my lead developers is from Poland. He found Sunscrapers at a Django conference in Warsaw, talked to them, and introduced me to the team. After a thorough interview with the developers, we felt that Sunscrapers would be the right fit for us. One of the reasons for picking Sunscrapers was that we were already working with a person in Sunscrapers, which made communication easier. Secondly, the team's level of English knowledge was very good, compared to some others we had used. Lastly, Sunscrapers demonstrated very good Django Python skills.

How much have you invested with Sunscrapers?

The cost of Sunscrapers services has been around $80,000 so far.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with Sunscrapers in June 2015. We're still working together.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Could you share any evidence that would demonstrate the productivity, quality of work, or the impact of the engagement?

Sunscrapers is a part of the team which is building new elements and fixing issues. It would probably be impossible for me to point out any stats which directly resulted from Sunscrapers' work, other than the features which they built exclusively. Those features make up our product, and they've contributed to its expansion, as well as to our ability to gain new customers.

How did Sunscrapers perform from a project management standpoint?

The communication with Sunscrapers is frictionless and easy, even though the team is 6 hours ahead of our office. I've never had an issue getting in touch with Sunscrapers and clarifying requirements; they also reach out to us if something is not clear or if the team has improvement suggestions.

Sunscrapers puts in around 30 hours of work per week on average. Based on the weekly reports from Sunscrapers, I've seen that those hours are well spent. They are very efficient with their time, and I've never had a question regarding why so much attention was put into a specific part of the project. Sunscrapers is efficient, transparent, and provides exceptional communication, making ours an easy and successful partnership.

Our general communication happens on Slack, with daily check-ins discussing issues and anything else that doesn't require face time. Every week, we have a Zoom conference call with all developers. For specific sprint planning and ticket assignment, we use Trello. GitHub is also a big part of the work. We use it as our main repository for bug tracking and code review. Our requirements state that at least one other developer needs to review a full request, with 2 people being required for billing-related matters or changes in critical functionality. Sunscrapers' team is a part of that review process. They also take care of issues logged in GitHub.

What did you find most impressive about Sunscrapers?

Something that definitely stands out is their knowledge and passion for Python/Django. I've talked to other groups which offered Python specialists, but Sunscrapers' developers were top-notch. They were also down-to-earth, despite being technically knowledgeable and smart. Sunscrapers' resources make it easy for the rest of our team to work with them.

The communication is easy, Sunscrapers has been flexible in meeting hours, and they generally seem to be happy with the product we're working on. It's important for us to know that Sunscrapers' team enjoys the work and that they want to be a part of our team.

Are there any areas Sunscrapers could improve?

Sunscrapers is one of the most expensive developers we're using, out of all the other teams. Based on the value we've gotten, it still makes sense to use Sunscrapers.

5.0
Overall Score
  • 5.0 Scheduling
    ON TIME / DEADLINES
    Sunscrapers' developers have been very accountable for their work. They have integrity, which is a huge aspect for remote employees.
  • 5.0 Cost
    Value / within estimates
    Sunscrapers is expensive, but the value they bring is amazing.
  • 5.0 Quality
    Service & deliverables
  • 5.0 NPS
    Willing to refer
    As long as I don't lose my own developers.

Long Term Dev Engagement for Legal Tech Startup

"For a company the size of Sunscrapers, it's unique that they try to keep relationships on a more personal level."

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5.0

Quality: 
5.0
Schedule: 
4.5
Cost: 
5.0
Willing to refer: 
5.0
The Project
 
$50,000 to $199,999
 
Feb. 2015 - Ongoing
Project summary: 

Sunscrapers supplies variable teams of engineers who develop new features for an existing practice management solution [SaaS], marketed to lawyers. 

The Reviewer
 
1-10 Employees
 
Utrecht, Netherlands
Founder & CEO
 
Verified
The Review
Feedback summary: 

Assigned resources always deliver superior code but direct project oversight is sometimes required if/when they become distracted or overwhelmed. Those reluctant to get heavily involved throughout the dev process should be mindful of that.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am the owner of a software-as-a-service provider that caters to law firms, delivering an online practice management solution. We operate in our home market in The Netherlands and abroad, in various European countries and elsewhere.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Sunscrapers?

We'd had some experience with Polish nearshore developers and were looking for a new team to help us grow our development team. 

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Sunscrapers has been involved in new feature development, maintenance, and bug fixes. We are continually improving our product; some of the features built by Sunscrapers include email billing and billing reminders. Sunscrapers also built an iOS app for time recording.

At the moment, we are working with 3 full-time developers from Sunscrapers, but the original team was made up of 2 resources. We work directly with them, but one of Sunscrapers' founders is also involved in team management. That direct involvement is important for us as it helps the long-term relationship.

How did you come to work with Sunscrapers?

Sunscrapers was recommended to us by a previous partner. We considered other companies, but Sunscrapers was the first one we tested and we were happy with the results.

How much have you invested with Sunscrapers?

The cost of Sunscrapers' work has been around $200,000 per year.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with Sunscrapers at the beginning of 2015.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Could you share any evidence that would demonstrate the productivity, quality of work, or the impact of the engagement?

We have had a hard time finding developers in our niche, but Sunscrapers has a good team that helps us out. We are working on a continuous basis with the company and rely on Sunscrapers' overall expertise and their ability to provide quality programmers. Individuals can come and go, but Sunscrapers has developed a good business relationship with us. They're an extension of our own team, which is valuable to our company.

One of the developers working with Sunscrapers left 6 months ago, but this is normal for the industry. Sunscrapers replaced him right away, but it did involve a small learning curve for the new person. New developers usually get up to speed within a couple of weeks. It does help that Sunscrapers' founder remains involved in our work. Not only is he able to bring people up to speed, but he is also knowledgeable about our product. Currently, there's a lot of demand for programmers, so we are happy with Sunscrapers’ pool of engineers.

How did Sunscrapers perform from a project management standpoint?

Sunscrapers is a part of our team and Slack is our team communication tool. We've integrated them into a number of Agile tools for planning and version control.

What did you find most impressive about Sunscrapers?

Sunscrapers' team maintains a personal relationship, which is important for this type of work. Programmers are not always the most sociable people and it's important that they're aware of what we're trying to communicate, especially in an offshore relationship. We have visited their office and Sunscrapers has also visited us. We've tried to set up the team in such a way that it is a part of our company.

For a company the size of Sunscrapers, it's unique that they try to keep relationships on a personal level. They invest in people and find quality programmers who don’t only care about being paid a lot. We are glad we found Sunscrapers as a partner.

Are there any areas Sunscrapers could improve?

Sunscrapers shouldn't generally let its programmers deal with customers on their own. Instead of assigning us a developer and letting us figure things out, the company should be aware of what's going on and how individuals are performing. Sunscrapers needs to stay involved with project management and HR components. We have tried different scenarios with them and this has definitely improved in the past period. They are more involved with the productivity and quality of their engineers.

What tips or recommendations could you share that might increase the likelihood of success with Sunscrapers?

Clients always need to define their expectations, especially if there's distance between them and the development team. It's important to make sure that people understand what is being asked, instead of simply sending out ideas and wireframes over, then expecting the team to fully understand them. I've always preferred trying a partner relationship out for a few weeks, with a small task and at some kind of discounted rate. The provider needs to prove to the customer that they will be able to do the job.

5.0
Overall Score
  • 4.5 Scheduling
    ON TIME / DEADLINES
    Scheduling with software development is hard. Estimates can be wrong because of unforeseen consequences. We try to schedule together with the Sunscrapers team as best as we can. Keeping in regular and direct communication prevents unrealistic goals.
  • 5.0 Cost
    Value / within estimates
    Sunscrapers offers competitive pricing/good value for money.
  • 5.0 Quality
    Service & deliverables
  • 5.0 NPS
    Willing to refer
    I definitely recommend Sunscrapers.

Python Developed Solution for Digital Agency

"The communication, both written and verbal, has been fantastic."

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5.0

Quality: 
5.0
Schedule: 
5.0
Cost: 
5.0
Willing to refer: 
5.0
The Project
 
Confidential
 
June 2015 - Ongoing
Project summary: 

Sunscrapers supplied a full-stack engineer to help build a dynamic content management platform for programmatic display ads. 

The Reviewer
 
51-200 Employees
 
Denver, Colorado
Director, Ad Manager
 
Verified
The Review
Feedback summary: 

Sunscrapers satisfied all project requirements and brought considerable problem-solving skills to bear. They were fully equipped to handle the time difference. Stakeholder feedback has been overwhelmingly positive.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I'm the director/ad manager at digital product agency. 

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Sunscrapers?

We had a hard time finding any talent in the United States and needed to keep the momentum moving on the product that we're building, which was a dynamic content management platform for display ads.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

We had one developer from Sunscrapers working on this project.

How did you come to work with Sunscrapers?

I don't know how we first found them, but they were chosen because of their skill set. We were looking for a full stack developer who could do both Python and frontend code.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started in summer 2016, and it is ongoing. We're getting closer to launch, and after that, we plan to continue the engagement, adding new pieces to the product and potentially doing another product.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Could you share any evidence that would demonstrate the productivity, quality of work, or the impact of the engagement?

The feedback that we've had from both the technical and business side has been terrific, which is why we continue to extend the relationship. We have committed to keeping the resource on for at least the remainder of the year, if not longer. In terms of productivity, they’re meeting all of our service standards in terms of how fast and how good the code is. We have a lot of regular reviews weekly of the code, and the quality is exactly where we want it to be for the work that we're doing.

How did Sunscrapers perform from a project management standpoint?

Everything has been really outstanding. The communication, both written and verbal, has been fantastic. They follow test-driven development, so that's really fantastic. For the code reviews, a standard pull request gets made, and then our team will review it and provide feedback. Once everything looks good, we'll deploy it. Bugs, if they're small, can be fixed within a day; if it's larger, like a structural issue, that can take days or a week, but it's all fully in line with our expectations.

They're very available. We use Hangouts for doing video conferences every day for our stand ups, JIRA for ticket management, and Slack for asynchronous communication—they're just phenomenal at all that. There is a big time zone difference; the end of their day is the beginning of our day, but we've been able to think up with our team at a specific time with them and have had zero problems with communications, which is super effective in making progress.

What did you find most impressive about Sunscrapers?

The biggest benefit of working with the person that we are currently is that they're not just implementing requirements as they’re laid out: they're bringing a lot of strategic thinking to it. The benefit of that is that it allows us to have less concrete requirements. We're able to spend less time building perfect wireframes and really detailed requirements, and we're able to work through problems with them. They do a lot of problem-solving at a strategic level, which means that they've done a good job in understanding the application and business needs and translating that into solutions that are brought to them really only half-thought-out, taking them all the way to code.

5.0
Overall Score It's just been really good. We've kept them on for almost a year now and planning to keep them on for much longer. We're really happy with them.
  • 5.0 Scheduling
    ON TIME / DEADLINES
    It's been really phenomenal. There were never any surprises or delays.
  • 5.0 Cost
    Value / within estimates
    They remained within our budget for the entire duration.
  • 5.0 Quality
    Service & deliverables
  • 5.0 NPS
    Willing to refer

Custom Dev for Boutique Tech Firm

"An aspect I like about them is that we were able to speak directly with the development team."

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4.5

Quality: 
4.5
Schedule: 
5.0
Cost: 
5.0
Willing to refer: 
5.0
The Project
 
Confidential
 
Feb. - May 2015
Project summary: 

Sunscrapers developed a Python-based, peer-to-peer pet sitting platform in close collaboration with another supplier, responsible for delivering the final solution to their own end-client. 

The Reviewer
 
1-10 Employees
 
London, United Kingdom
Founder, Tech Agency
 
Verified
The Review
Feedback summary: 

Pros include uncompromising responsiveness and superior English skills. Sunscrapers also facilitates effective communication between clients and their assigned dev teams.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am the founder of a web design agency based in London. We work with small businesses, creating their branding and web presence. In the latter case, we work with external companies in building web applications rather than building them ourselves. 

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Sunscrapers?

We needed to build a website for one of our own clients. We had been working with an SEO company and together we were building a custom PHP-based platform. However, we needed to move it to a more efficient technology to allow for future improvements, both from a usability and SEO standpoint. We went exploring what we could do with other technologies and other suppliers. 

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

We have worked with Sunscrapers on developing a Python website, an advanced platform that is a mixture of e-commerce and social media. The site is aimed at pet owners looking for alternatives to using pet hotels. With the platform, pet owners can find people who can look after their pets and apartments while they're away. The platform works through a monthly or yearly subscription, and it also has messaging functionalities. We worked with a 5-person team from Sunscrapers. Together, we rebuilt the backend of the platform from scratch using the client's technical specifications. The frontend remained as it was. They had no hand in that. 

How did you come to work with Sunscrapers?

I was familiar with Sunscrapers and approached them. We didn't have a specific requirement for the Python language, but, because they provided a competitive quote, we decided to work together. We considered 2–3 other companies.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with Sunscrapers in the beginning of 2013. The project had a 3- to 4-month duration. Because we have changed our business model, we've started to concentrate on building and designing small websites using open-source technologies like WordPress and Magento. As such, we don't require a lot of custom work. If we ever have a Python platform to build in the future, I will definitely approach Sunscrapers.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Could you share any evidence that would demonstrate the productivity, quality of work, or the impact of the engagement?

The website was initially built using PHP so it lacked more advanced functionalities. Its performance speed was an issue and it was not a scalable solution. Our aim was to improve the user experience as well as to make administrators' lives easier. There was also an SEO factor to consider. All of these things have been improved, making for a more reliable and effective site experience.

How did Sunscrapers perform from a project management standpoint?

Sunscrapers delivered on time and within budget. We used Basecamp for our collaboration.

What did you find most impressive about Sunscrapers?

An aspect I liked about them is that we were also able to speak directly with the developers themselves. I find this important when building a website; it ensures that nothing is lost in translation. Sunscrapers has made sure that the English level of each resource is near-perfect, making it easy for us to communicate. Sunscrapers' team was responsive in replying to emails.

Are there any areas Sunscrapers could improve?

None, at least based on my experience. 

4.5
Overall Score
  • 5.0 Scheduling
    ON TIME / DEADLINES
  • 5.0 Cost
    Value / within estimates
  • 4.5 Quality
    Service & deliverables
  • 5.0 NPS
    Willing to refer
    I would definitely refer Sunscrapers for projects requiring their skillset.

Backend Development for Technology Firm

"I never felt like I was fighting egos, which can be a reality in this industry."

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5.0

Quality: 
5.0
Schedule: 
5.0
Cost: 
5.0
Willing to refer: 
5.0
The Project
 
$50,000 to $199,999
 
Feb. 2016 - Ongoing
Project summary: 

Temporary client leadership utilized Python engineers in support of two existing products, which required further dev. These products remain heavily supported by assigned resources. 

The Reviewer
 
1-10 Employees
 
United States
Founder & CEO, Tech Firm
 
Verified
The Review
Feedback summary: 

Sunscrapers makes every effort to supply their clientele with reliable, on-demand resources who excel both technically and strategically. 

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

We provide broad software and analytics services, mostly for startup companies. We build web applications for companies looking to get their first product out of the door, or for bigger ones looking to build internal tools. I am the founder and president of the company.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Sunscrapers?

I was working with a media company in New York City, helping them work through the transitioning of their vice president of engineering. While they were looking for a new person to take over, I was in charge of the internal tech team. We were supporting 2 main products but didn't have the technical resources for 1 of them. Since they were already putting considerable effort into searching for a permanent technical lead, it didn't really make sense to increase the burden for only one more resource. I made the call to outsource it and we began to look for a partner that could help us with these products. 

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Sunscrapers assigned one of their developers to our work, embedding him into our team. He came in and did a fantastic job of following my guidance and adding value to the product. The solution is using Django Python, JavaScript, AngularJS, a PostgreSQL database and Elasticsearch. The deployment is done on Heroku. We are using Amazon Web Services S3 for asset deliveries. We have a small team, and there has been some attrition within it. Sunscrapers' resource is the only person working on the product at the time, handling all significant tasks.

How did you come to work with Sunscrapers?

I met one of the founders of Sunscrapers at PyCon in Montreal, in the spring of 2015. We started chatting and I realized that I wanted to have Sunscrapers in my Rolodex of partners. It was only a matter of the right project coming up from then. I considered 2 other options for the current project but chose Sunscrapers after looking at factors like expertise, price, and location. Sunscrapers had the best price, but they actually had the least convenient location. Our other options were in New York and Brazil, so they were closer to our time zone. We found a way to make the difference work, so it hasn't been a problem. The cultural fit was another issue; Sunscrapers was happy and enthusiastic to become embedded within our team. Other agencies had more resistance to adapting.

How much have you invested with Sunscrapers?

The cost of Sunscrapers' work has been $75,000 so far.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with Sunscrapers in February 2016. The engagement has been ongoing since then.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Could you share any evidence that would demonstrate the productivity, quality of work, or the impact of the engagement?

Our developer has been amazing. We've been able to accomplish all of our major milestones. Our product had some serious bugs. After tackling all of those, we increased test coverage, implementing automated testing for the first time for about 65% of cases. This was a major accomplishment in terms of improving general stability. We migrated the application from Python 2 to Python 3, which was a big maintenance win. We have reduced unneeded dependencies on old or irrelevant Python packages, cleaning up the stack on the backend.

We were introducing corporate accounts, which required a lot of backend work refactoring the existing code base. Sunscrapers' resource was very good at keeping the work on track.

How did Sunscrapers perform from a project management standpoint?

Sunscrapers' developer is one of the best I've worked with in this regard. We used Jira for sprint climbing and user stories, as well as GitHub for code reviews.

What did you find most impressive about Sunscrapers?

Sunscrapers is a very friendly and easy-to-work-with company. I never felt like I was fighting egos, which can be a reality in this industry. Sunscrapers was working with me, as opposed to working for me.

Are there any areas Sunscrapers could improve?

Sunscrapers is one of the best options when it comes to Python/Django, but I'd like to see them improve front-end technical capabilities.

What tips or recommendations could you share that might increase the likelihood of success with Sunscrapers?

I recommend setting expectations as clearly as possible. The good news is that this is easy to do with Sunscrapers. They're also very flexible in either working on a project or retainer basis.

5.0
Overall Score Sunscrapers has been the best agency I've worked with.
  • 5.0 Scheduling
    ON TIME / DEADLINES
    The only caveat is that scheduling can be a bit more challenging than with an American company. In terms of setting deadlines and milestones, Sunscrapers is fantastic.
  • 5.0 Cost
    Value / within estimates
    Value per dollar sets Sunscrapers aside from the competition.
  • 5.0 Quality
    Service & deliverables
  • 5.0 NPS
    Willing to refer
    I do it as much as I can.