Univio

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

Sensi Labs is a company specializing in the development and maintenance of software solutions, as well as in the provision of maintenance services in the corporate sector. We offer services in building dedicated solutions, portals, applications and information architecture. I am the CEO of the company.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire UNITY Group?

In this case we hired Unity to help us in creation of crucial elements of developed software which is a part of bigger project for one of our customers. Generally Unity developers help us to develop software in Java/PHP/Python technologies.

What were your goals for this project?

We needed a system that was designed to meet our customer requirements. We required ability to work with distributed architecture and deep integration with customer systems.

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor?

We have noticed during the previous cooperation with the CEO that Unity is a highly knowledgeable and effective team, so we chose them for our project. Initially, we set the timeframe and the system specification. Then, after presenting the costs, we started cooperation.

Describe the project and the services they provided in detail.

Project with Unity was a part of bigger project for our customer. We had to create, deploy and maintain distributed document generation tool. Unity' developers enrich our agile team and were responsible for end-to-end and continuous software delivery.

What was the team composition?

Unity developers were crucial part of our agile team. We also cooperated directly with CEO and we worked with five software developers.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Competence and knowledge of the Unity team helped us to work very efficiently and react very fast for requested changes. This and ability to work in flexible way provided high level service.

How was project management arranged and how effective was it?

The team was managed by us using agile methodology. We provided project manager, architect, analyst and testers. Unity provided developers. Customer provided Product Owner. We used Jira, GitLab, Teams and CI/CD tools. We communicated in English daily.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

Unity Group offered a one-stop solution. With a lot of companies, it is rare to get in touch with the CEO. Being able to talk to CEO directly and having a transparent dialogue with him separates them from other companies.

Are there any areas for improvement?

There is nothing that comes to my mind that needs improving. I am satisfied with how the entire process had been going.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

Nest Bank is headquartered in Warsaw, Poland, and we have locations in Gdansk. We provide quick loans to private customers and small entrepreneurs.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with UNITY Group?

I hired them for a CMS implementation project, requiring work on a website.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

They created a new website for using the Kentico CMS. It has integrations with other systems, including a CRM, a workflow system, and an e-recruiter for HR. We had a different company create UX screens and designs for those screens, then they created the website from scratch.

The technologies used include the .NET framework, SQL Server 2016, and Kentico. Our site has more than 150 pages, more than 40 screen types overall, and 20 screen types for mobile. We also gave them our design guidebook, which listed the colors and fonts that are and aren’t okay to use. They acted as content manager, developer, tester, and integrator.

There’s a custom application for video verification. Users can set up new bank accounts via video verification and can connect with us through their laptop cameras, scan IDs, and anything that’s required.

What is the team composition?

I don’t know how many people were used exactly, but it was more than 10.

How did you come to work with UNITY Group?

I went to the Kentico website after deciding it was a good solution and found 11 partners in Poland. I chose the best two, created an RFP, and made a choice between them.

How much have you invested with them?

It was around €120,000 (approximately $134,050 USD).

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with them in September 2018, and we’re still working with them. The website was launched in April 2019, and we’ll need some stabilization time.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We launched the website into production one month before the deadline, which isn’t typical for IT projects. The quality is very good, and the only issues we’ve encountered are typos, incorrect documents, and so on. Those are typical human errors, not technical ones. All the technical issues on the site were resolved during the first day after its launch. For me, it was a very good result and I’m very satisfied, as is our bank. We’ll recommend them as a solution partner. We like their flexibility and responsibility for the work.

How did UNITY Group perform from a project management standpoint?

The whole project was managed in the agile methodology. They have their own project manager, who was my partner there. Our product owner and I had daily standups with their team. We could discuss any issues on a daily basis.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They stand out in terms of price, quality, and agile work. Compared to our other partners, they were 20–30% cheaper. They also prefer the agile methodology, which is ideal for this type of project, and they provided multiple suggestions for improvements.

Every set of functionalities was tested by three testers, and the quality was very good. We worked in a single Jira instance, so we had access to those results. Everything was transparent, from the backlog to test issues and open tasks.

Are there any areas they could improve?

I don’t see any improvement points for them. If we have an issue, we can call them anytime and they have a resolution within hours.

Do you have any advice for future clients of theirs?

We had a fixed-price, agile arrangement. For our next engagement, I would go for time and materials. Now that I can see all their work in Jira, there’s no reason to work in a different way.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

We’re a real estate developer responsible for residential and commercial buildings. I’ve been the director of the company’s marketing department for five years. 

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with UNITY Group?

We wanted to provide our clients with a customer panel as a tool for creating a high-level service. It would be used for contacting us, ordering financial and other documents, and provide aftersales services. We also wanted to use it for recording changes in projects and to help clients solve problems with their homes or offices.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

UNITY Group developed a customer portal for us. We bought a Kentico license and customized it with multiple options specific to our niche. UNITY Group had to provide some solutions that weren’t available on the platform. 

It integrates with our Microsoft CRM and with a smaller tool. It’s a kind of customer portal which provides access to documents and project information, so it’s both a sales tool and a helpdesk. 

We collaborated with UNITY Group and another partner to design this tool. They’ve also worked on changes to our website. 

What is the team composition?

We mainly worked with three people from their team and expanded it when we needed additional services like copywriting. 

How did you come to work with UNITY Group?

We got a recommendation from another company in our market which had worked with them before. 

How much have you invested with them?

The project cost was above 500,000 Polish Zloty (approximately $131,410 USD).

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with UNITY Group in July 2017, and the collaboration is ongoing. The project will be finished within a few months. 

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

It’s been a successful collaboration and many business goals were achieved. Our customer service is at a higher level now. 

How did UNITY Group perform from a project management standpoint?

We’ve had some challenges with the team, but we’re generally pleased with the collaboration. Their project manager was helpful and had extensive knowledge about our market and its challenges. He helped us solve multiple problems in our process. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

UNITY Group is a partner that we can trust. They try to learn as much as possible about the customer and provide the most stable solutions to the business. 

We weren’t the easiest customer for UNITY Group given that we were using an older CRM. The challenge was to find a solution for joining these two tools and come up with something that was useful and not too expensive. We didn’t have such high-level IT solutions in our company, which made things challenging. Their ability to deliver within these restrictions was the biggest advantage of working with UNITY Group. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

We had problems with calculations at times. We didn’t know why the price was so high and why some steps took so long, but we were able to clear things up after a discussion. In my opinion, it should’ve been clear from the very beginning. This is an area where UNITY Group can improve in the future, but the collaboration was generally okay.

Do you have any advice for future clients of theirs?

They have knowledge about different businesses and can give advice on different approaches.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the product owner of Mainio. We’re a consulting organization, and we’re creating a self-service SaaS platform.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with UNITY Group?

We needed to build an MVP version of the SaaS platform in a set timeframe. We didn’t have any in-house resources available to work on the project, so we needed to outsource the development.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

UNITY Group took care of multiple technical tasks. They worked with ASP.NET technology to build the framework, and they programmed parts of the solution’s user interface and the relational database.

What is the team composition?

We worked with about six people from UNITY Group.

How did you come to work with UNITY Group?

A mutual friend referred us to them. We considered a few other vendors, but UNITY Group was the only one to offer full-service development assistance.

How much have you invested with them?

We spent around €200,000 Euro (approximately $229,000 USD) on this project.

What is the status of this engagement?

We worked together from March–December 2018.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

This was a huge project for us, and we had a very tight deadline. UNITY Group welcomed the challenge and worked professionally from start to finish.

How did UNITY Group perform from a project management standpoint?

They managed the project well. We followed the scrum methodology and tracked any issues as we moved through each task. We used Skype for most of our communication.

What did you find most impressive about them?

I’m most impressed by their approach and work ethic. They were very eager to discuss the project with us and wanted to create something great together.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, we succeeded in what we were trying to do.

Any advice for potential customers?

Clients should discuss skills and availability requirements with UNITY Group at the start of the project.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the head of development and technology at TIM S.A., a consumers’ electronic distributor in Poland.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with UNITY Group?

We needed to efficiently integrate our IT systems and with our partners'.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

They helped us integrate our system with our partners’ system, designing the communication between the two. The team also connected both of our CRM solutions and linked them with a product information management system. They used Enterprise Service Bus (ESB) architecture in all of their integrations. At this point, they've completed most of the work.

What is the team composition? 

There were 6–7 people involved, including business analysts, backend developers, QA engineers, and the project manager.

How did you come to work with UNITY Group?

We'd worked with them previously, so we were already familiar with their company. They're headquartered in our city, and they're experienced in working with big clients.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in October 2017, and the project is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

They finished the first integration initiative, but we don't have any measures of its success yet. The second project is scheduled to finish in December. 

Anecdotally, UNITY Group is an eager partner. They asked a lot of questions in initial phases to form a well-rounded view of our company. They chose the best technology and strategies to meet our needs and get us closer to our business goals. 

How did UNITY Group perform from a project management standpoint?

They're proactive, analyzing our business to better understand our goals, expectations, and requirements. The project manager was very helpful. We used Jira to track all of the tasks. UNITY Group like to communicate across a variety of channels, so we interact via Skype, phone calls, and in-person meetings.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Their team is experienced, professional, and eager to learn. They all have good communication skills, and the company's price model is pretty flexible.

Are there any areas they could improve?

They could improve their risk management, but generally, they do their job very well.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

No.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.  

I am the digital director and CIO of Souter Holdings, a multinational investment firm. 

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Unity Group?  

We needed a new, stabilized core system for two companies under our umbrella.  

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?  

We asked Unity to prepare a new custom central repository system to hold our customer information. They stabilized our entire processing system as well. Unity also develops new features and completes maintenance projects for the system. 

What is the team composition?   

The number of people we worked with depends on the stage of the project. We worked with eight people in the beginning, and during critical stages of the project, we had a team of 15 people. 

How did you come to work with Unity Group?  

We used to work with their competition and I met them on a business trip. I also heard several good testimonials from their customers. We went through a vetting process of ten partners and Unity provided us with the best deal. 

How much have you invested with them?  

I cannot disclose how much my company spent, but it was a large project. 

What is the status of this engagement?   

We started the project in April 2017 and completed it in March of 2018. 

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Originally there were several tiny problems but Unity decreased the downtime of our services by 90%. I can't disclose how much better they were than our previous supplier.

How did Unity Group perform from a project management standpoint?  

Unity has a long history of completing projects. They managed the project using GitHub and were completely professional throughout the project. I was the head of the steering committee that directly led the project once a month. We also communicated weekly through calling or in-person. 

What did you find most impressive about them?   

They strived to understand our business and derived creative solutions to developing our new system. Their fair price was equally impressive. Unity properly assessed risks and took charge of the communication between our companies. 

Do you have any advice for future clients of theirs?  

Unity is a good fit for a company that needs an objective partner. They do more than just waterfall planning. Their team is flexible and have strong internal management. Their effective communication helps the customer overcome any technological challenges.  

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

Our company builds and maintains a mobile telecommunication network for two major mobile network operators in Poland. As the IT development manager, I am responsible for software development and development integration layer between our IT systems and systems of our business clients.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with UNITY Group?

We needed to build an integration layer between our IT systems and the IT systems of our clients.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

UNITY helped us implement a system for building integrations between our IT systems and the IT systems of our clients. They implemented an integration layer using the Mule enterprise service bus technology. They migrated our old code to Mule.

How did you come to work with UNITY Group?

We found their team online. We sent UNITY our requirements and entered them into our bidding. Eventually, we chose them because they had competitive pricing and good specialists.

How much have you invested with them?

The cost of their work was around 200,000 Polish zloty ($55,000 USD).

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with UNITY in October 2017. They delivered the work in January 2018.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

It was a good collaboration. I don’t have any metrics, but I’m generally happy with UNITY’s performance. The work was smooth and satisfying. My team was also impressed and satisfied with their work.

How did UNITY Group perform from a project management standpoint?

We typically communicated and reviewed their progress through email. We didn’t experience any problems.

What did you find most impressive about them?

UNITY did not have a lot of time to do their job because our decision-making process took a long time. Despite the tight schedule, they managed to deliver everything on time without any hidden costs. This made them stand out from other companies we’ve looked at.

Do you have any advice for future clients of theirs?

They are a good company. I would recommend them to others.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the e-commerce director for Publio.pl. We’re a business unit of Agora SA, one of the largest newspaper and online content publishers in Poland. As a result, we’re the biggest online platform in the country that sells e-books, audiobooks, and electronic newspapers.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with UNITY Group?

We needed to develop our e-commerce platform from scratch.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

UNITY Group was tasked with designing and developing our JavaScript platform from scratch. They delivered everything related to the front- and backend of the platform, except for brand design and app development.

The platform serves as a catalog of our products, along with sample texts for each e-book. There’s an integration with a payment provider to facilitate quick purchases. The search functionality was a significant challenge to code, but the final product enables users to get reliable results by searching book titles or author names. Our marketing efforts are connected to the technology, so UNITY developed functionalities to put surveys on the front page.

In a subsequent engagement, UNITY redesigned the site without negatively affecting our Google ranking. We’re currently working with them on a responsive version of the site for mobile.

What is the team composition?

They assigned a team consisting of one frontend developer, one backend developer, a tester, and a project manager. We worked directly with both developers and management staff.

How did you come to work with UNITY Group?

They were referred to us.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent around $3 million for development and support services across our group.

What is the status of this engagement?

The initial e-commerce development project took place from 2010­–2012. However, our relationship with them is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

UNITY’s team is supportive and flexible. We rely on solutions they’re building for us. Users appreciate how the platform delivers content with large covers and descriptions. Beyond providing technology, they’ve also introduced us to new technologies and tools, including marketing automation. We discuss not only daily tasks with them but also the future direction of the platform. We feel safe working with UNITY in this area.

How did UNITY Group perform from a project management standpoint?

We meet at the beginning of each quarter to discuss our business needs. We also meet at the end of every year to discuss tasks for the upcoming one. We enter every task into a project management tool, which facilitates communication between their team and us. We used more resources initially, but have reduced the team size for ongoing work.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They’re constantly looking for new technologies and functionalities to benefit us further. They even organized a conference we attended to communicate their ideas and way of thinking. For example, our business is based on recurring customers and UNITY advised we utilize similar principles found in the fashion industry to increase sales. The big advantage of working with them is learning the latest technology trends. They invest a lot of time and money to have expert-level staff.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No. I don’t have any significant recommendations.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am the commercial director of Prasos, a company concentrated on cryptocurrency services. We are the largest Bitcoin service provider in northern Europe.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with UNITY Group?

Like all startups in Finland, our challenge was finding programmers. We tried to recruit directly, but the results were not positive and the process took too much time. We had worked with remote teams but not in the model we have with UNITY Group.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

UNITY Group provides coding for our Coinmotion web services, enhancing the components we already have. They’ve been involved in several projects, including a new service on our platform. We have a campaign for expanding abroad and needed to do test marketing. Their frontend developer created landing pages for cryptocurrency investment.

What is the team composition?

We are using a PHP developer and a frontend developer from their team as well as a project manager. We plan to expand the team in the future.

How did you come to work with UNITY Group?

I received a recommendation to try their services and we got in touch. Our CTO and CEO approved the CVs for each member to interview. We had conversations with each one to check their English skills and general communication abilities. After that, we did a test engagement, which was risk-free for us.

How much have you invested with them?

We spend €5,000 per month for one full-time developer and a part-time one who works with us on an as-needed basis. We are expanding the second developer’s hours to full-time.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with UNITY Group in September 2017.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

They work very quickly. Their backend developer’s first task was to audit the code of one of our services. We thought that it would take one week but we received a complete report in two days. Everything that UNITY Group has done was completed with the same speed. Our expectation level has been satisfied from this point of view.

How did UNITY Group perform from a project management standpoint?

The conditions for changing developers or even finalizing the contract were flexible from the beginning. We found this to be an advantage to not have large barriers to overcome if things didn’t work out.

Currently, project management is our focus. They perform well in this respect, and our CTO is responsible for planning and delegating tasks to UNITY Group. We maintain good communication and are in touch directly with the developers.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They deliver very good work at a competitive price compared to other companies in the sector. UNITY Group also has good flexibility and they have good English skills.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No.

Do you have any advice for future clients of theirs?

Clients need to know what kind of expertise is required in-house. We had the chance to select different features and coding languages based on our company’s needs. With UNITY Group, the service optimization is at a maximum when there is a good organization of the tasks to be done. It would be quite impossible for them to work well otherwise.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

My company is the biggest consumer electronics retail chain in Poland. We have 250 brick and mortar stores across the country, as well as the biggest online store in Central Eastern Europe. We run two websites: the omnichannel euro.com.pl (an extension of our main brand, RTV EURO AGD), and a pure player brand called OleOle.pl.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire UNITY Group?

We hired UNITY Group to create our online presence by launching our first e-commerce business, euro.com.pl. For more than 10 years, UNITY Group has been responsible for development and maintenance of our e-commerce websites.

What were your goals for this project?

The goal was to launch and develop the largest Polish e-commerce website. Now we are working to introduce this e-commerce presence to our brick-and-mortar stores.

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor?

We were trying to find stable vendors with experience running e-commerce sites. UNITY Group was a very reliable, engaged partner.

Describe the project in detail.

We launched our e-commerce website in 2006, when buying through the Internet was completely new to the Polish market. By this time, however, UNITY Group already knew how to build a functional, attractive online store. We also built our second store, OleOle.pl, which handles 25 million sessions per month. During that project, we transitioned from a waterfall method to the scrum methodology. 

What was the team composition?

UNITY Group operates a dedicated development team, which includes more than 10 developers, testers, and scrum masters, along with a project manager.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Between 2006 to 2017, we came a very long way. We built the biggest online store in the Polish market in terms of unique visitors. We have also developed a great development team that can very quickly adapt our websites to suit market needs.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

Very effective! We work with an Agile methodology, which enables us to communicate openly and bring development to life very quickly. UNITY Group is a part of our team.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

UNITY Group is very honest. Our cooperation with them is built on trust, open communication, and mutual understanding. They are very engaged in our project.

Are there any areas for improvement?

We still need to work on communication. Both companies are large, which sometimes creates confusion about responsibilities.