Sysbee

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and position.

I am the Managing Director and Lead Developer of simulogics GmbH

Describe what your company does in a single sentence.

We are an independent game developer creating browser-based MMOGs for experts.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What specific goals or objectives did you hire Sysbee to accomplish?

• Take over management of our complete IT infrastructure
• Migrate bare-metal servers to dynamically provisioned VMs

SOLUTION

How did you find Sysbee?

Experience through shared client

Why did you select Sysbee over others?

• Pricing fit our budget
• Company values aligned
• Great previous experience

How many teammates from Sysbee were assigned to this project?

2-5 Employees

Describe the scope of work in detail. Please include a summary of key deliverables.

sysbee was tasked with taking over our aging and organically grown IT infrastructure which was previously managend by a single in-house admin. At the same time, we wanted to move away from bare-metal servers to gain more flexibility in deploying our game services while keeping costs as low as possible.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What were the measurable outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

More than 40 services were migrated to new management with minimal downtime. Everything is now properly monitored with an on-call team, kept up-to-date and backed-up frequently.

Describe their project management. Did they deliver items on time? How did they respond to your needs?

Project management was perfect to get the job done. Send an email and things get done quickly and in a professional manner.

What was your primary form of communication with Sysbee?

Email or Messaging App

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

It's like having a co-worker an email away. They understand your needs and experience level and act accordingly. They don't try to sell you an unfit solution because they'd prefer it. Instead, it's always a good one for the problem at hand.

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

I cannot think of things they could drastically improve at the moment. I am very happy with how things work at the moment.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I'm the project manager for AVITEH Audio Video Tehnologije d.o.o., located in Croatia. Our company operates in the media and entertainment industry and specializes in selling professional audio and video equipment.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Sysbee?

We were looking for a company that could provide web hosting services.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement? 

As our webshop is quite extensive, it needs to remain online at all times. Sysbee provides us with web hosting services. 

What is the team composition?

I'm in contact with two people from the Sysbee team. 

How did you come to work with Sysbee?

Someone recommended Sysbee to us. Our previous hosting provider had slow support, so we were searching for a better option. 

How much have you invested in them?

We've spent around €10,000 Euros (approximately $11,000 USD).

What is the status of this engagement?

The engagement with Sysbee began in August 2018, and it's ongoing. 

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Sysbee is exceeding our expectations. I appreciate the speed of their support team. If we encounter any trouble or changes, they typically respond within a few minutes. 

How did Sysbee perform from a project management standpoint?

The team delivers exactly on time and within the budget. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

Working with Sysbee has been a great pleasure for us. They're always ready and willing to help, and the team gets things done as soon as possible. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

Their support has been excellent, and I see no significant areas for improvement. Although the price could be lower, we're satisfied with paying for high-quality support. 

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

I recommend Sysbee for hosting and server purposes. They're the best company we've worked with in that area. 

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am a co-owner and CTO of Play Digital d.o.o. We are an IT company that develops web applications, e-commerce solutions, and accommodation rentals. We are a B2B and B2C company. 

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Sysbee?

A few years ago, we were looking to develop a new e-commerce SaaS platform for individuals who wanted to sell their products online in Croatia. We hired Sysbee as a partner to help us with infrastructure and other database operations we needed. 

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Sysbee has been helping us organize, manage, and create the entire infrastructure of the e-commerce site. This project has required a high variability of infrastructure with VPS services connected to a relational database. They help us manage these infrastructures and have set up AWS S3 Manager storage. Sysbee has also been responsible for organizing backups for our database and static files. 

What is the team composition?

We work with 3–4 individuals. 

How did you come to work with Sysbee?

I worked with them at a previous company and was very happy with their services. 

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent more than $10,000. 

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in January 2012, and the engagement is ongoing. 

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We are extremely satisfied with their services, and they take a lot of stress off our shoulders. When we have something outside our scope of knowledge, we call them, and they are extremely helpful. 

How did Sysbee perform from a project management standpoint?

They deliver everything on time and within budget. We primarily communicate via email. We had a few in-person meetings when we started working with them. 

Are there any employees from the service provider's team that you would like to give a shout-out to in this review?

We’d like to shout out Branko (Linux System Engineer). 

What did you find most impressive about them?

They are a great team with a large amount of knowledge. They also respond quickly and have tools that help make Sysbee even more reliable. They are experts in what they do and know AWS services inside and out. Sysbee goes above and beyond for us. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

There’s nothing we can come up with. 

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

If you are a software company in Croatia that wants to focus on developing applications and you don’t have that expertise, they are a great partner. Sysbee’s team is passionate about their work and consistently improves their knowledge. 

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there?

I’m the Head of DevOps for Human, an interaction company.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Sysbee?

We were working on some high-end development projects for our clients and needed additional support.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

So far, Sysbee has helped us launch four websites for our clients. For one project, they helped us develop a high-traffic multimedia website. We provided them with metrics, visitor destinations, and sources. With that information, they created the infrastructure, ensuring that the site would be able to scale with the client’s increasing demands.

Since then, they’ve continued to improve the platform by adding resources and improving infrastructure solutions.

They’ve also helped us launch several small websites for another client. Once they completed the first site, they set up and tested the site’s provisions and resources.

Now they help us maintain each site to grow with our clients’ demands and provide 24/7 support. To maintain the sites, they provide suggestions for testing and monitor how sites behave under different loads.

What is the team composition?

We work with two people.

How did you come to work with Sysbee?

I’ve known them for several years and have worked with them multiple times. They are the best in our area.

How much have you invested with them?
 
We’ve spent €190,000 (approximately $225,000).

What is the status of this engagement?

We began working together in January 2019 and our partnership is ongoing. 
     
 

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

They’ve saved us a significant amount of time, money, and resources. By providing round-the-clock support, they’ve taken a huge weight off our shoulders and raised the quality of our services.

How did Sysbee perform from a project management standpoint?

They are proactive and respond quickly when we need them. Always available, they’ve helped solve major issues even in the middle of the night. They provide a support email that’s always available to us and to our clients. We also communicate via phone.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They are extraordinary. They’re always looking for ways to optimize cost and improve performance. They want to create the best experience possible for us and for our clients.

The team is also personable, so they feel like part of our company. They definitely are the best vendor we’ve worked with

Are there any areas they could improve?

I don’t have any suggestions for improvement. 

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

They may cost a little more, but they’re worth it. You will never have to worry because they will step up and take care of things.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

Emma Sleep develops mattresses, beddings, beds, blankets, pillows, and other sleeping products. Lately, we’ve included some sleep tech products, like smart mattresses and gadgets that improve sleep.

I’m currently the principal software engineer of the company. I was the head of technology when I started working with Sysbee. 

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Sysbee?

We needed to make improvements to our cloud infrastructure. We hired Sysbee to make DevOps changes, which our team didn’t have the time to do. 

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

We had an initial meeting with Sysbee, during which I described the challenges our software team was facing. In the past, we had one staging server, and there would be 10 developers working on 10 different features. Merging 10 features on one infrastructure wasn’t ideal. If something didn’t work, we had problems identifying which feature was to blame. I gave Sysbee some ideas on what I wanted to change, and they reviewed all of the requirements. 

They created drafts of the feature and functionality changes that we could benefit from, and they implemented the proposal after we accepted it. They also created documentation. The idea was to improve our workflow so that we’d have a different infrastructure for every feature. We didn’t want to provision this infrastructure manually, so we talked to Sysbee about how we could change it. They did it in a native cloud way, using Lambda functions and other technologies. They basically created a command-line interface (CLI) tool that we can use to provision infrastructure for QA purposes.

After that, they investigated one of the servers that didn’t work well. We decided to provision a new instance, which Sysbee continues to manage. We added features after the initial implementation, including some spare database servers.

When they change something in a feature, they also change the documentation for the whole project, and they always send us the new version. They usually give us three possibilities to solve a problem and describe the consequences of each one. There might be different prices, implementation times, levels of quality, and so on.

They’re currently consulting and managing some services for us.

What is the team composition?

I’m working with Saša and Branko (Linux System Engineers). It’s hard to say with whom I’ve had the most contact; they use the same email, and one of them always answers.

How did you come to work with Sysbee?

I was previously a software developer at another company that had a business relationship with Sysbee. I’d heard they were good, but I hadn’t worked with them.

I met Zvonimir (CEO) and two of their engineers at a conference, but we didn’t talk about business. I talked to another agency that had worked with them, and they said that they’d get in contact with Sysbee about this feature we wanted.

How much have you invested with them?

The total cost so far is €8,000–€13,000 (approximately $9,600–$15,700 USD).

What is the status of this engagement?

Our first meeting was in May 2020. They’ve implemented the key features, and they’re currently doing consulting, further development, and systems administration for us.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

My team can test the features we implement more quickly — we’ve been able to reduce the time to provision a QA environment from 40 minutes to just a couple. We have a more reliable QA infrastructure. We also have a more reliable server for one of our websites. Sysbee is a good partner that can support us in the future.

How did Sysbee perform from a project management standpoint?

They’re very responsive. They respond within 5–15 minutes through their info@ email. We don’t have too many meetings; everything goes through emails. 

Our work together is more service-oriented, rather than being a standard software development engagement. We each focus on our part, and, if they have a blocker or some missing information, they let us know.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Many IT companies take on as many projects and clients as they can. I think that Sysbee could find more work, but they don’t want to overload their team. They aim to respond to their clients quickly, and that’s what distinguishes them from others.

If we have something major to implement, they let us know when they can start, and that is when they actually begin implementing. They’re very precise when it comes to estimates, and I think that’s because they don’t overload themselves with work.

Are there any areas they could improve?

They could improve how they answer emails. They have multiple people replying from the same email, and I always have to try to remember who I’ve been talking to. They could adopt personal email addresses, or improve their ticketing system.

Do you have any advice for future clients of theirs?

It’s important to share as much information as possible when starting a collaboration. There are no particular issues that I’d want to warn people about.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the head of digital development at Hanza Media d.o.o., one of the biggest print and internet companies in Croatia.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Sysbee?

We were looking for a new hosting company since our previous one was expensive and not very reliable. We also wanted someone that could handle a large part of the job.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

We have a few developers but no experts that can do any kind of serious hosting or system maintenance for our websites. Therefore, Sysbee acts as our systems admin, handling all the backend and hosting work that’s required. Our biggest website, for example, has millions of users every day.

What is the team composition?

We work with three people from their team.

How did you come to work with Sysbee?

Our company opened a tender for the hosting job. Our managers and board of directors made the right decision in choosing Sysbee.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent between $400,000–$500,000 on their services.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in 2015, and the collaboration is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We’ve only had a couple of short instances of downtime in the five years we’ve been working with Sysbee.

How did Sysbee perform from a project management standpoint?

They’re like a part of our team even though we’re working remotely via phone, video calls, and email. They’re very involved and help us choose the best solutions. So far, they haven’t made a mistake.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Sysbee’s response time is almost instantaneous. Most of the time, they notice the problem and start fixing it beforehand. Overall, they do their job really well.

Are there any areas they could improve?

They should hire more people so that they can support more clients. Before, clients were able to log in to their web page and do some basic backend hosting stuff, but they made a new website a year ago and haven’t implemented those features yet. This makes it obligatory to contact them when changes are needed. They handle them instantaneously, but it was easier when, as clients, we could do those simple things ourselves.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the CEO of Tawseel E-commerce group. We operate five e-commerce platforms in Kuwait, including an online hypermarket, a daily coupons platform, a fashion designer’s platform, an art marketplace, and a video gaming platform.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Sysbee?

Originally, I was looking for top-notch system administrators, not only supporting us, but architecting our infrastructure needs with security in mind. This included everything from server requirements, security, and distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) protection.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

First, Sysbee scoped the infrastructure we required for each of our platforms. That included the type of server we needed and how many of them, both app and database servers. They advised us on how to make that infrastructure secure.

 Second, we focused on optimizing the system. They reached out to our coders and discussed how they could optimize our MySQL tables, web servers, code environment, and other fundamental details for how developers work. They made sure the most recent stable PHP updates were in place, they reviewed caching and what to cache, and they determined how to make our websites and apps faster by deploying the optimal content delivery network 

(CDN)for us and the geography that concerned us.

 The third phase was optimizing the infrastructure in a different way. They considered cost as much as they could, and told us when a server setup would accept lower specifications, therefore saving us a few hundred dollars here and there.

In their fourth capacity, they support us on a monthly basis for the event of a downtime, whether it’s infrastructure- or code-related. If an application goes down, they’ll contact the developers themselves, so we don’t have to be in the middle to get things up and running.

What is the team composition?

I’ve worked with three of their members: Zvonimir (CEO, Sysbee), Branko (Linux System Engineer, Sysbee), and Saša (Linux System Engineer, Sysbee). We’re in contact with Zvonimir for any business requirements we may have. Branko and Saša both run the system administration and consulting parts. I can get in contact with them anytime I have an issue.

How did you come to work with Sysbee?

I’ve known their people since before they formed Sysbee. They were all working together at a different company, which eventually split. All the B2B accounts moved to them.

Initially, I got in touch with their people through a Croatian development firm. We were doing a full audit on our e-commerce platforms, and part of that was on the system administration side. They recommended the team that did the first audit for us, and it was like magic. We’ve been in touch ever since. They made us understand what needed to be done very easily. They were quick to implement the solutions we required, and everything they’ve done from that audit till today has been above and beyond.

I’ve had a couple of competitors of theirs try to approach me—given that the kind of work we require can easily be done remotely—but I just said no. Sysbee went above and beyond every time we asked them to do something. Most of the time, it’s actually them telling us when we need to do something. When we actually ask them to do something, they just work magic; they get a hold of everyone they need to in order to fix whatever went wrong, and they treat it like their own business. Any competitor trying to pitch to us shouldn’t bother.

 How much have you invested with them?

Within their official capacity as Sysbee, we’ve spent $25,000–$35,000 on their services.

 What is the status of this engagement?

Our first project with them started in September 2011, and it’s ongoing. We started working with them as Sysbee in June 2018.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

They’ve gone above and beyond whenever I asked them to do something. More often than not, they’ve raised areas where we could improve the performance of our servers and infrastructure. They approached us with ideas on how to decrease our spend on infrastructure. They figured out ways to optimize certain things, or they brought newer technologies to our attention. They’ve tested numerous ones, and they know the ins and outs of various technologies, so they can save us money on our infrastructure.

 How did Sysbee perform from a project management standpoint?

More often than not, they would put down the plan before we asked for one, and it would be meticulous and detailed. They got everyone who needed to be involved on our behalf, reaching out to our coders, for example. They coordinated with them on everything. From this point of view, we’ve been lucky to have the team from Sysbee take care of any project management requirements we had.

Most of our communication is done through email, followed by videocalls. On the rare events where we require live coordination, we just hop on to Skype.

 What did you find most impressive about them?

They treat our business as if it was their own. I assume that this is how they treat all their clients, and we’ve been lucky to have them on our side. Sysbee is the most stable and reliable contractor we’ve had as a company, across all our sectors.

 Are there any areas they could improve?

No, nothing comes to mind. We have certain requirements and scopes, and Sysbee has performed near perfectly for us within those. They respond with the same level of enthusiasm and dedication, no matter which of our team contacts them or through which channel.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

RTL Croatia is a TV broadcaster with a significant digital portfolio. I’m the head of digital for the company, responsible for all digital products and processes, except editing.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Sysbee?

We first hired them for different tasks a long time ago, like web hosting and related services. Our most recent collaboration with them has been for the organization and maintenance of our AWS infrastructure. This is a completely new approach in the Croatian market, and it included content personalization elements.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

We focused on data science as well as a more recommendations-focused area of data science. We needed a system guide who knew how to organize and maintain all the services needed for our data projects. The first part of the project was concentrated on business intelligence. We have a data science team that connected all the possible data sources, pulling all the available data on a daily basis and storing it inside of AWS.

The second part—content recommendation—was a bit more complicated. It had connection points to AI and machine learning, so it required a more complicated level of AWS. We needed someone who knew exactly what we were doing, what services we needed, and how to optimize them in everyday work for this specific project.

Regarding the posting and maintenance of all our other digital products, we count on Sysbee for almost 30 websites. We have a network and all the services that go with it.

What is the team composition?

My team has worked with three people from Sysbee: Zvonimir (CEO, Sysbee)—who’s working as the lead—and two Linux system engineers.

How did you come to work with Sysbee?

My company already had a relationship with Sysbee when I came to this position. Sysbee was originally part of a larger company. They take care of premium customers. We’ve been working with them for more than 10 years.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent $250,000–$500,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

Our AWS project started around two months ago. We started talking about it in March 2019, we got an offer a week later, and they started working on it the next week. I would guess the overall relationship with Sysbee started around 2011. I started working for the company in 2015, and they were already here.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

When I came to the company in 2015, our digital portfolio featured only one website, which was hosted by Sysbee’s initial company. Since then, we’ve added more than 30 websites to our portfolio, which boosted our rank among Croatian publishers. We asked for a complicated task, and they did it perfectly. We’re now the second-largest publisher in Croatia, and 80% of that is maintained and supported by Sysbee. Everything we've done so far in terms of reach, real users, visibility, and portfolio is powered by them. If it wasn’t for their quality support, we wouldn’t have succeeded.

How did Sysbee perform from a project management standpoint?

We hadn’t originally planned to use Sysbee for our latest project. We’re outsourcing our data science team, and we had the idea at the beginning of the project that they’d be the ones to take care of AWS. Before the start of the project, we realized that the team’s knowledge base from a system perspective wasn’t good enough.

In two weeks’ time, we managed to raise the project from the dead with the help of Sysbee. They employed their project management skills, understood everything we needed, and planned it correctly and within budget. We’re already live with all of it, so the project management skills from their side are excellent. Outside of that, we’re in contact almost every day in some periods, and weekly, if nothing emerges. They’re very fast to respond to every request and situation we’ve had, and 99% of our situations have been resolved in minutes.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Support is one of the most important things we do within this project. If we need to call or email at any time of day or night, Sysbee will make sure we’re getting a response as soon as possible. We’ve had this from Sysbee from day one. That’s something we can’t measure in money. When we have 30 products, there’s always a high possibility that something will go wrong from either side. In all these cases, Sysbee’s support has been really proactive and fast. Their professional support is excellent, and I want to highlight that.

Are there any areas they could improve?

We’ve done a lot of projects with them since I’ve been here, and we’ve discussed every part of our relationship openly, so I wouldn't say they could do anything better. Everything that could be improved has been improved and there are no failures from their side.

Do you have any advice for future clients of theirs?

I advise clients to be as open and precise as they can with their requirements or problems. I’m sure that—just as with our company—everything that can be solved, will be solved.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and position.

I am the Vice President of Software Development of ch-aviation.

Describe what your company does in a single sentence.

Provide accurate data and news on the airline industry.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What specific goals or objectives did you hire Sysbee to accomplish?

Manage our AWS infrastructure.

SOLUTION

How did you find Sysbee?

Referral

Why did you select Sysbee over others?

• High ratings
• Pricing fit our budget
• Great culture fit
• Referred to me

How many teammates from Sysbee were assigned to this project?

2-5 Employees

Describe the scope of work in detail. Please include a summary of key deliverables.

To better respond to increased demand for our services, we decided to move away from bare-metal servers and migrate to AWS.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What were the measurable outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

• Reduced the number of work hours our developers spent maintaining infrastructure to zero
• Gained insights & suggestions on how to best use AWS resources

Describe their project management. Did they deliver items on time? How did they respond to your needs?

All requested deliverables were done either on time or ahead of time. They are very easy to communicate with and keep track of the work, and their suggestions are always aligned with our business needs, as if they are a part of our development team.

What was your primary form of communication with Sysbee?

• Virtual Meeting
• Email or Messaging App

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

Quick response time and proactive suggestions based on our usage patterns.

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

No.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I'm running a leading Croatian event ticketing company Entrio with over 2.000 events served yearly. I am founder and CEO.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Sysbee?

SysBee is our partner for years and they take care of our complete web infrastructure, including system administration, scaling, maintenance, consulting etc. Biggest project that we did together is migration of Entrio to AWS cloud, which they did smoothly, with great communication, and always there to help and advise.

SOLUTION

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

SysBee, ex. Plus hosting, are a well-known Croatian hosting and cloud provider so after several recommendations from my colleagues, we chose them back in 2011. and we are working together ever since.

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

SysBee analyzed possible solutions and steps needed to migrate our infrastructure, gave us easiest path to desired goal and executed smoothly. They're always taking into consideration our business goals too, so they suggested we transition in phases which was a great decision.

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

Two experienced, senior system administrators.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Everything is working smoothly, our web speed has increased and our traffic capacity has multiplied.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

Workflow was very effective, everything was arranged on 2 videocalls and further coordination was done via email.

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

Responsiveness and flexibility.

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

I think SysBee should keep up the good work and keep all their qualities.