Surgyy Design Labs

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am the Chief Product Officer for our company and I am based in Singapore. We are currently in stealth and we are building a platform for open commerce that will help distribute consumer side financial services (like Buy Now Pay Later, Wallets, etc) rapidly. Our Platform will enable creating open loop payment tokens for these closed loop consumer side financial services.

For what projects/services did your company hire Surgyy Design Labs?

Surgyy was hired to build the following for our company.

1. Branding: Company Logo and website design
2. Customer transaction flow/experience (for the different consumer side journeys for payment)
3. Servicing portal experiences for OpenFabric (us) and Tenants (our customers)

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

We looked for designers through our network and also though platforms like UpWork and Clutch. We had a briefing session with the agencies. We reviewed portfolios of each of the agency we shortlisted. We also got quotes from each of the agencies for the entire scope of work. Our selection criteria were

1. Relevant Expertise (based on prior work)
2. quality of prior work
3. how personable was the team
4. Ability to scale
5. Cost

Describe the project in detail and walk through the stages of the project.

Once we signed the contract, we had a series of discovery meetings with the founder. We pulled together a list of detailed deliverables along with priority so that we have a sequenced list of deliverables. We agreed that it would be best for Surgyy to work on the customer transaction experience. Surgyy team together with our development team came back with 4 different low-fidelity experience proposals (based on the possible solutions that we could roll out from their brainstorming sessions).

We then finalised one of the proposal as our fist deliverable. Surgyy team then work on a high fidelity design that encompassed customer journey/flow for the chosen option, interaction and transition designs along with content for the flow that addresses any questions that would be top of mind for customers. The development team quickly mocked it up for a working prototype that we used for concept validation with prospective customers.

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

In total, we had 3 people that worked on our assignment. It was their Founder (Nasir) who was our primary POC and 2 other team members were there in the project.

Can you share any outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

The prototype that Surgyy and our development team produced was what we used in our initial customer discussions. These prototypes had been pivotal on two fronts.

1. Get all of our teams (engineering and commercial team) on the same page wrt product we are building
2. Get initial validation from potential customers where the prototype helped to succinctly convey the value we were bringing to them

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

The collaboration with Surgyy's team has been fantastic. It was as-if we had Surgyy's team as part of our team. We had twice weekly round-table meetings where the our product, engineering and design team (Surgyy's team) met to discuss progress, plans and challenges. In addition to that Nasir (Surgyy's founder) and I connected on a daily basis reviewing the iterations to the design on a daily basis. We picked up specific areas of the experience we wanted to improve/fine-tune along with brainstorming on what would make it better. The next day, we would see the designs updated with proposals from our brainstorming along with detailed nuances already taken care of. Surgyy did not feel like working with an external team - but rather an extension of our own team.

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

Nasir and team have been very impressive from the get go. In the initial phases, they patiently listened and absorbed very well what we were trying to do. Once there was clear understanding and alignment on what needs to be done, they very quickly put pen to paper and came back with very good proposals - that exceed our expectations. They have been tremendous partners who believe in continuous and iterative development - and have been in this journey with us patiently looking after each and every aspect of the user journey (be it transaction experience or servicing experience) and iterating together with us in a diligent manner.

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

We could always say that they could do things faster and in lesser cost, but quality is what matters. We loved the quality of output Surgyy's team produced and the partnership has been top notch.

Please describe your company and your position there.

We are a Generative AI platform called vidBoard.ai, that can create HD quality videos from plain written text. In short, you insert a script and out comes a video through our platform. This video is human avatar led, fully transcribed and animated. It can also be translated into hundreds of languages.

For what projects/services did your company hire Surgyy Design Labs, and what were your goals?

We hired surgyy for the website design UI/UX and for the platform design UI UX

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

I had seen Surgyy's work online and was impressed by their BD and customer enquiry support, which was quite instantaneous

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

I had a terrific time discussing the idea with Nasir and it was a smooth process right from start to finish. I have worked with several UI UX guys but with Nasir, it was a dream come true. We spoke for more than half an hour every single day via gmeet and he made sure that the project was spectacularly done. Many UI UX professionals and quite snooty and do not come on calls, but with Nasir it was totally opposite. The work that Nasir did was worth every penny.

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

1 - Nasir Mohammed - Founder

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

In one word. BRILLIANT

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

I have already mentioned this above.

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

Already answered above

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

At times, he is way too fast to comprehend, but I guess thats his style. All in all he is a good human being and a terrific professional to work with.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m a co-founder and the CTO of an AI-driven cloud platform for distributed energy services. We offer a platform for renewable energy developers and operators.

What challenge were you trying to address with Surgyy Design Labs?

We have a web-based app that gives users access to data that was analyzed by our machine learning backend. We wanted to revamp the look of our interface and how users interacted with data.

What was the scope of their involvement?

First, Surgyy Design Labs needed to learn user requirements and improve the UX. Before the project began, we showcased a lot of data on the platform and users had to jump through a few hoops to get to the information they needed. Surgyy Design Labs used Figma to redesign and overhaul the UX.

What is the team composition?

We worked with Mohammed (Founder, Consultant, & Designer).

How did you come to work with Surgyy Design Labs?

They reached out to me via LinkedIn, and they coincided with what we were looking for in terms of UI/UX designers. We like that Surgyy Design Labs was adaptable and flexible. They outlined milestones and provided a proper timeline and work distribution layout. We were also impressed with their portfolio.

How much have you invested with them?

The project cost was just under $5,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with Surgyy Design Labs in late-November 2020. We’re reviewing the final milestone and we plan to close the project in about a week.  

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

Surgyy Design Labs delivered what we agreed on and met all our metrics. The new design highlighted key metrics and reduced the time needed for customers to access the data they’re looking for.

How did Surgyy Design Labs perform from a project management standpoint?

The project management was alright, but it could’ve been improved. We often had to follow up with them to know when something would be delivered. However, once they got started on the task, they kept pushing on their own.

We communicated with them over Slack, and we brainstormed together. We discussed milestones over email.

What did you find most impressive about them?

I was impressed with their adaptability and flexibility. They were also very responsive to feedback.

Are there any areas they could improve?

They didn’t completely understand what we were looking for over the first 2–3 weeks of the project. They delivered designs without thinking about how users were supposed to interact with them. We told them that they could give us designs on paper, before creating the Figma versions. The second phase of the project went smoother.  

Do you have any advice for future clients of theirs?

New clients need to have a dedicated person spend time with the Surgyy Design Labs team and explain what they’re looking for. They should be given a clear understanding of what the client is expecting from their designs.

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am the co-founder of TagTaste which is an online community for food professionals to help them discover, network, and collaborate with each other. We are four years old startup located in Delhi NCR (India) with an in-house R&D team in both the tech and food domain.

For what projects/services did your company hire Surgyy Design Labs?

We have developed the entire tech stack in-house and are currently in a transition phase to prepare our platform to scale up. We needed to redo some of the key components of our platform so that our users can easily understand how to drive value out of the services that we offer by themselves. We needed unbiased input from some external designers and that's where we hired Nasir.

What were your goals for this project?

Our goals are to come up with the right design that increases user conversion, retention, and recall by 50% within 3 months and 300-500% within a 6-12 months time period.

How did you select Surgyy Design Labs?

We reached out to our network for agencies and freelancers with the right background and interviewed a few of them. We shortlisted Surgyy as Nasir was able to understand our problem statement the best.

Describe the project in detail.

We have a stable ecosystem in place already as our footprints are present in over 100 cities across India. Our product is still in the beta stage and we've identified a few modules that we need to develop in order to provide a better experience to our users. This increased the complexity as we had to redesign some key components, newly design some new ones, while maintaining or exceeding the standards that are already set after years of R&D and community engagement.

So we started by defining the problem statement better and dividing the whole task in multiple sub-tasks. Then we went ahead to identify the user cohorts that are most important from the platform point of view and started redefining things that need to take prominence and the others that could be taken in the background. Basis this, the designs are being made component-wise.

What was the team composition?

We have been interacting with Nasir throughout the engagement.

Can you share any outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

The project is on-going. However, we've started getting a decent shape in terms of understanding of the components and the redesign that can finally happen.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

He is always available for the discussions whenever we need him. Also, we had decided to meet at pre-defined regular intervals which is helpful in driving the project.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

They listen to us when we change requirements and they don't lose their cool when there isn't a clear direction given.

Are there any areas for improvement?

It's an on-going engagement. So far so good.

Please describe your company and your position there.

I’m the founder of an online education company

For what projects/services did your company hire Surgyy Design Labs?

For UI UX development of a new app that we are adding to our portfolio

How did you select this vendor?

I found them on Google search.

Describe the project in detail and walk through the stages of the project.

Quite straightforward. It was UI UX development for an app. We first did a round of wireframes and followed by UI iteration. Finally , a couple of rounds of feedback.

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

I only spoke to one point of contact and it was extremely convenient

Can you share any outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

The app's UI was delivered with complete satisfaction.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

Easy communication through WhatsApp made it all extremely easy

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

Available 24-7

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

Maybe a few corner cases could have been taken care of.

Please describe your company and your position there.

Am the CEO of the company Empieria Limited.

For what projects/services did your company hire Surgyy Design Labs?

We hired Surgyy Design Labs to work on Mobile Media one of the upcoming biggest apps in Uganda owned by Next Media Services.

What were your goals for this project?

- Creating a User-friendly broadcasting platform.

How did you select Surgyy Design Labs?

- Got to see his nice profile on Dribbble and got attracted to his work.

Describe the project in detail.

- The project was a broadcasting application with TVs, Radios and News feeds.

What was the team composition?

- IOS app developers. - Android developers - Backend Developers - UI/UX designer (Surgyy Design Labs)

Can you share any outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

- The project is neat and user-friendly and it's catchy on the user's eyes, and this is because of the nice UI/UX.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

- The workflow was smooth and the communication was really nice.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

The way they think outside the box while creating mockups for the apps.

Are there any areas for improvement?

I think everything was fine on our end with Surgy Design Labs.

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am co-founder of a leading SAAS platform in Mobile App Testing space with close to 200K users across the globe

For what projects/services did your company hire Surgyy Design Labs?

We wanted to revamp our user experience and in the process redesign the UI/UX of the platform.

What were your goals for this project?

Simply the user flow Convert the product UI design to wizard driven approach Improve the look and feel

How did you select Surgyy Design Labs?

Found them online among others. Found the approach and understanding aligned to our need.

Describe the project in detail.

Once we started we followed a structured approach to this project. After few rounds of workshops the requirement was frozen. Post that we had two more phase. In the second phase we worked iteratively on UI design . We are in last phase of acceptance test.

What was the team composition?

We worked with Nasir directly

Can you share any outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

We are still in the process of rolling out the changes.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

Very proactive communication. Delivered as per agreed timelines.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

Their clarity of thought, approach to product design, and adherence to timelines and cost were impressive.

Are there any areas for improvement?

It's been good for us