Vakoms

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and position.

I am the Technical Lead of Blacklight Analytics AG

Describe what your company does in a single sentence.

Blacklight Analytics leverages interdisciplinary expertise in data science, health economics, law, and medical knowledge to provide data-driven invoice auditing, economic assessments, and tariff calculations, creating transparency through granular analyses and visualizations to support a high-quality, affordable healthcare system.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

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

Rapid Development

SOLUTION

How did you find Vakoms?

Online Search

Why did you select Vakoms over others?

• Pricing fit our budget
• Great culture fit
• Good value for cost

How many teammates from Vakoms were assigned to this project?

2-5 Employees

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

The scope of work involved the rapid development of a web application from scratch, with the first demo prototype delivered within three months. Key deliverables included the complete frontend development, which provided a user-friendly interface, and the creation of a robust backend layer to handle all necessary data processing and integrations.

Additionally, the project involved operationalizing a custom Python library to ensure seamless functionality and integration within the web application.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The measurable outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress and success included the delivery of a fully functional web application, the rapid operationalization of the system, and the application effectively fulfilling its intended purpose from day one of deployment.

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

The project management was excellent, with a great project manager who ensured that all deliverables were provided on or ahead of schedule. The team was highly flexible, accommodating changes and new requirements seamlessly.

Communication was transparent throughout the project, with clear distinctions made between in-scope and out-of-scope work, ensuring that expectations were consistently managed and met.

What was your primary form of communication with Vakoms?

• Virtual Meeting
• Email or Messaging App

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

What impressed us most about this company was their ability to quickly mobilize resources on short notice, combined with their professionalism and flexibility in adapting to project needs. Vakoms' fair pricing made them stand out as a highly reliable and value-driven partner.

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

Vakoms performed very well, though there is always room for growth. Enhancing attention to detail and fostering a more proactive approach to anticipating future needs could further strengthen their already solid offerings.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the CEO and founder of WRLDs, a Stockholm-based AI tech company that produces IoT motion sensors and Bluetooth-enabled products for analog consumer brands.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Vakoms?

We needed their team to support our research and development efforts.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

We've initially engaged their team for two separate and smaller studio projects. Vakoms has met our quality standards, so we've tasked them with supporting our different research and development pipelines. They continue to work as an extension of our team in ensuring the scalability and efficacy of our AI platform.

What is the team composition?

We've worked with at least 10 resources from Vakoms, including a project manager, two cloud developers, and five app developers.

How did you come to work with Vakoms?

We found Vakoms on Google while searching for potential IoT developers to onboard for this project.

How much have you invested with them?

We've spent about $50,000 so far, with an average monthly rate of $10,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

Our ongoing collaboration with Vakoms started in June 2021.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We've had three major deliverables with Vakoms, and they've unfailingly helped our team create robust and dependable solutions. From our team's perspective, they're a prompt and quality-oriented platform that exceeds most of our expectations every time. 

How did Vakoms perform from a project management standpoint?

We communicate via Slack and Google Teams and rely on Trello for project management. Vakoms has a dedicated project manager that relays our needs and queries smoothly to their entire development team. I also like their systematic setup, which works efficiently with our availability and timelines.

What did you find most impressive about them?

We're most impressed with Vakoms' transparent and service-oriented approach. We can easily integrate into their processes, contact their developers, and plan accordingly with their team because of their streamlined project management techniques.

Are there any areas they could improve?

We've encountered some staffing changes along the way — while these events have been worrying, Vakoms has made up for it by deploying more capable resources.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Be diligent in arranging meetings and maximize your communication channels to ensure that Vakoms is working towards meeting your goals. They're a very easy team to collaborate with, so you only need to match that proactive energy

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the founder and CEO of a company that operates veterinary clinics across the US.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Vakoms?

They developed the frontend of our customer-facing mobile apps and websites, as well as several booking systems and IT solutions.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

They used JavaScript and React to build our website. Then they used Java to build both our iOS and Android apps.

One of our apps is consumer-facing and allows users to book appointments, check-in, access their medical records, see a summary of their appointments, and view their upcoming appointments. The second app is used by the veterinarians to view and confirm upcoming appointment requests, view client locations, and contact the client.

What is the team composition?

We went through onboarding with Slavik (Head of Business Development), but we’ve worked directly with our project manager since then.

How did you come to work with Vakoms?

I’m familiar with a few Eastern European development houses and I asked them for recommendations. I talked to three different companies before choosing Vakoms.  

How much have you invested with them?

We spent between $10,000–$15,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with them in July 2020 and they finished development in January 2021.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We’re definitely satisfied with the end result. The iOS app was just approved on the App Store, and the Android app is in the process of being approved for Google Play.

How did Vakoms perform from a project management standpoint?

We use Monday to collaborate with them, and they communicate well. They’re able to manage multiple tasks at the same time. Even when they’re working on several different things, they meet all of our deadlines.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They’re resourceful and flexible. They don’t get hung up on anything and keep the project moving forward.

Are there any areas they could improve?

There’s not much they need to improve. They’re a solid team.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the co-founder and director of Quodit.io, a UK-based company working in the data science and survey research field. We have designed a platform that allows researchers to create interactive and smart questionnaires so that they can collect data.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Vakoms?

We have a tech lead and full stack developer in-house, but we don’t have a frontend web developer. We decided to look for a technical partner because it was strategically more flexible. Doing so would also enable us to cut some costs and avoid potential issues with internal staff.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Vakoms provides frontend development and QA resources. They’re our preferred development partner — we don’t consider them a supplier. We do the design in-house, but they help with design sometimes. Our platform’s backend is Python-based, and the frontend is Angular.

We work with them almost daily. We have a pretty flexible statement of work (SoW) and engage Vakoms on a monthly arrangement. The scope has gotten bigger since we began working together.

What is the team composition?

We work with Slavik (Head of Business Development), who is a very nice guy. We have also been in contact with Ihor (Project Manager), two frontend engineers, and a QA person.

How did you come to work with Vakoms?

I previously worked with them on an AR-based project. I put an advertisement on Upwork. We did the first task on Upwork, and then we moved off of that platform.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent £80,000 (approximately $110,000 USD). Their monthly rate depends on how much time they put into the work.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in November 2018, and the work is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Vakoms provides us with a weekly report on their work, which indicates how much time they’ve put into the project versus the time estimates. They’ve been very transparent and clear. We have a very strong relationship, and I’ve recommended them to other companies. They work with some friends as well. They’re very good, and we’re happy with them. 

How did Vakoms perform from a project management standpoint?

We do daily standups with their project manager and senior frontend developer. The project manager is very good. They use Jira internally.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They’re solid and reliable. The team is always connected — if there’s an issue, they always reply. They’ve even worked on weekends to resolve last-minute issues.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No — we like them.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

I recommend Vakoms whenever there’s an occasion to.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m a product manager at a software analytics company, in charge of the app development department. I’m working on several apps, two of which are in collaboration with Vakoms.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Vakoms?

They’re providing software development services to us. We have in-house developers, but we’ve preferred to work with Vakoms on two specific projects.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Vakoms is providing front- and backend development services. We’ve also hired one of their QA engineers and a designer.

They’re helping us develop B2C apps with paid features. One of those is an Android launcher that allows users to customize their phone’s UI, app drawer, folders, wallpapers, icon colors, and so on. The app was built in Java.

What is the team composition?

We started with a team of three developers and one project manager. We stopped working with two of them after shifting our focus to the second project. Now, we have a main team of four people, plus two that we use on occasion.

How did you come to work with Vakoms?

We gave the same project to four design and development companies, including Vakoms. All four started development on the MVP, and the three companies that we didn’t continue with were the ones who told us they couldn’t complete the task. Only Vakoms was able to actually build it. The other ones said they could, but Vakoms actually delivered. 

We continued developing features and epics with them, and they were very honest in telling us what they could and couldn’t do. This is a benefit of working with them: when they say they can do it, we feel we can trust them.

How much have you invested with them?

So far, we’ve spent about $50,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with Vakoms in late-March 2020, and it’s ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The apps are still in the pre-product phase. Everything was built from zero, so tracking metrics for specific features was more difficult. We’re now at a point where we’re analyzing data and learning exactly how our users behave with the products.

Regardless of whether a feature is good or not, Vakoms built what we asked them to build. We’re not using their services for product management. They don’t consult with us on how to build the product. We build the blueprints and handle planning and research, and Vakoms executes the product.

How did Vakoms perform from a project management standpoint?

I think Vakoms is one of the best teams out there. Their communication is very good — better than we expected. They always follow through on what we ask, which means that neither of our sides is wasting time. The second benefit is that they provide good quality work for competitive prices.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Vakoms is fantastic with deadlines. I’ve given them a few hard deadlines that we couldn’t move, and they went above and beyond to meet them. When they couldn’t meet a deadline, we found a workaround. They told us about it upfront, and we planned different deadlines or made adjustments. So far, they’ve delivered.

They’re nice and easy-going people, and it’s comfortable to work with them even though there’s a distance between us and we don’t know them personally. Some people aren’t easy to be with in these kinds of circumstances, but I think that Vakoms puts an emphasis on this aspect.

Are there any areas they could improve?

Sophisticated, hard research is something I feel they could be better at. With most other development companies I’ve had the opportunity to work with, we wouldn’t pay for the research they did. We’d ask them if they could develop something, and they’d go and research it. Some wouldn’t do the research and simply tell us that they couldn’t perform the task, while others would tell us that they wouldn’t do the research, because it was time-consuming. 

There was one occasion with Vakoms where they said they couldn’t do it, and I told them that I’d pay for the research. They researched it further, and they did it. At other times, they said that they could do it, and they did it.

Do you have any advice for future clients of theirs?

I’ve already recommended them to two people in the industry who were looking for development teams. The only point is that communication has to be clear, but this isn’t specific to Vakoms. Clients should be very clear with requirement documents, epics, and user stories. The key to working with external teams is to have everything written down.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

Founder & Managing Partner of a young event tech start-up developing digital experience marketing technologies for brands & agencies.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Vakoms?

Take over software development from our former software development company. The project consists of several components, including a custom Windows App with peripheral devices and a cloud platform for us & our clients. Technologies range from web to Windows to image processing, including external hardware devices.

What were your goals for this project?

Develop a platform that allows scalable but also customisable usage of our technologies, products and services. The initial challenge was taking over an existing project from our former developers an Vakoms did that very well.

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor?

I compared several companies that provided suitable services, experiences & technologies for our existing project. Vakoms convinced us with a perfect combination of company size, skills, price and good communication.

Describe the project and the services they provided in detail.

Vakoms is working continuously on our project and provides the whole life cycle of software development, including project management, testing, maintenance and support. We work in scrum-like sprints with daily stand-ups and backlog refinement sessions via Skype.

What was the team composition?

Our current team consists of 6-8 people - most of them have been at the project for a long time already, but certain developers come and go based on the required skills. The team is very engaged, motivated and we grew into this project together. We always try to find the best solutions as a team and anyone can suggest ideas or improvements.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Our solution could only be launched after working stable enough, but was still launched in an early phase. Features, improvements and fixes were developed on the go and by now we've built a software ecosystem that allows us to easily manage our business operations, products and services together with our clients on one single platform. As our products and services are custom, a custom solution was needed and this allows us now to provide better and more efficient services to our clients than ever before.

How was project management arranged and how effective was it?

We have one project manager at Vakoms who manages the software development. From our side we provide features of various granularity along with UI/UX designs, then refine the features & backlog together with Vakoms before they are developed in our 2-4 week-long sprints.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

Definitely the team. We have interaction with both the project manager and all developers, all communication is direct, live, and integrated in our systems (Jira, Slack...) and everyone is super involved and engaged. It's not "just" a service they provide, but it feels like we really are in this project together. Also, we try to help each other as business partners to ensure a great long-term partnership.

Are there any areas for improvement?

It took some time until we had introduced efficient routines, communication channels and also some reactions to new problems could have been earlier/faster, but building such a large and complex product in a very custom environment & niche industry requires a lot of learning, too. And if there was a setback, Vakoms always compensated for it.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I'm a CTO at MMP business travel company. It's a startup with B2B business model.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Vakoms?

We needed MVP Web solution for listing, organizing, rating MICE-related vendors for simplifying the work of business meeting planners.

What were your goals for this project?

Our goal was creating usable web-application with intuitive interface. The solution had to include useful tools for meeting planners. The application had to be scalable, reliable, with API for mobile and other systems.

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor?

We already worked on some small projects with this vendor before. And this time they were faster and more precise in estimations than other vendors.

Describe the project and the services they provided in detail.

We started from analyzing the functional specification for the project. Then Vacoms proposed the design for the web application and architecture for the back-end. After several design sessions we agreed the design and the team started the development. The development was done in phases. The team prepared two demos during the development. They also provided user testing at the end.

What was the team composition?

The project team consisted from Project Manager, 1-2 software developers, web designer, QA engineer. At the beginning there ws involved the system architect. Project was developed using SCRUM framework.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We have developed the MVP which still needs some improvements. It's functional and we demonstrate it for potential customers and users. Collecting feedbacks now. Anyway, it's an important impact on our business.

How was project management arranged and how effective was it?

Project management was compliant to Agile, we used stand-up meetings, skype calls, ticketing system Jira. The project manager always resolved process-related issues.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

The team was enterprising, they proposed different useful approaches and features to be implemented. They share experience and this helps to make your product better.

Are there any areas for improvement?

My little suggestion is the next: Try to warn the customer asap if things could be going out of the schedule or other possible risks, even if probability is small. Thanks.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am the Founder & CEO of Beam Authentic, Inc, a consumer-facing producer of wearable SaaS solutions.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Vakoms?

We had invented these wearable digital displays called BEAMS. Though we had a consumer solution, we wanted an enterprise solution that would allow companies to control thousands of BEAMS across multiple locations and send content to them.

So, we hired Vakoms to build a SaaS platform that would drive content loading, deployment, and publishing to devices across multiple time zones.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Previously, they developed a desktop app for us, but for this project, Vakoms built a SaaS platform from scratch that’s hosted on AWS. They created content loading so that any design content from a laptop or desktop, such as Photoshop or Illustrator files, can be uploaded onto the platform. They also built a feature that automatically sizes the content, as well as other features that auto-publish content onto calendars or slideshows. Users can then build campaigns and set the start and end dates.

The content comes in the form of animated GIFs, PNGs, JPEGs, and static. Vakoms also incorporated functionality that allows content to deployed onto thousands of registered devices in different locations. 

How did you come to work with Vakoms?

We were working with a company in Chicago that was building our hardware and Vakoms had worked with them. We had originally hired Vakoms to build the consumer app and when that went well, we knew they would be a natural go-to for this project.

How much have you invested with them?

We spent about $300,000 in total.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with them in April 2017 and we’re still finishing up the project.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The product has been in the field for a while and we’ve been adding more features. The feedback for both the app and the SaaS platform has been very good. They’re reliable and functional and customers are happy with them.

Working with Vakoms has made our business more efficient. We’ve been able to work with a number of large national and international companies that otherwise wouldn’t be able to use our services so, our partnership with Vakoms has opened up doors for us and our customers.

How did Vakoms perform from a project management standpoint?

They’ve performed really well. They’ve been very diligent, available, reasonable, and focused. There’s always a learning curve when it comes to working with companies abroad but we got to know each other during the app development project. We use Skype and Jira to communicate and they’ve been very responsive.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Although, we mapped out exactly what we wanted to build, it was always changing and elements were constantly being added. Even so, the team was reasonable and took a very collaborative approach to the project.

Are there any areas they could improve?

Even though it’s hard to predict, Vakoms should have a clearer path of how changes and additions will impact the time and budget of the project. We would be more efficient if we could have an upfront conversation about this.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

The clearer you are about what you want, the better. Give them a defined product testing path.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

CumulusPro helps businesses to rapidly transform to digital enterprises by connecting people, process and application. Our cloud-based Business Process Management Platform-Straatos is designed to revolutionise how organisations and public institutions digitally communicate and collaborate with their customers, citizen, and partners.

Digital enterprises typically improve their customer experience, increase customer satisfaction, business efficiency and productivity while reducing cost and time to market. I am the VP of Product Management.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Vakoms?

We were looking for offshore web developers to augment our development team on a remote & long-term basis. The additional team members would support the ongoing software projects and develop new functionalities. The main challenge was to provide a user-friendly web application for large volumes of complex business data in the back-end.

What were your goals for this project?

The project was to create a web based UI in Angular for users to view and update task and task details. The UI needed to be configurable in the backend and provide the user with the flexibility to adjust the UI to their needs. For example by removing or adding columns.

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor?

We have been working with Vakoms in an previoius project and knew their qualification and development processes which work well with our existing teams.

Describe the project and the services they provided in detail.

Vakoms web developers have been working as a part of CumulusPro development team. Vakoms web front-end developer created a new UI with some specific requirements.

For example reactive custom table with the following functionalities:

- Reactive columns (a user can add or remove any columns, change the width etc)

- Tasks displayed by types (assigned to me, created by me, reports, process documentation)

- Filtering option (by column value or by task type)

- Multiple select for table rows and making actions with selected items

- History of task and comments

- Viewing task details (such as invoice, supplier information, pdf viewer, else)

What was the team composition?

The team varied during the project. There was mainly one web-front end developer. At certain stages of the project we also had developers creating automated QA scripts and do manual QA on the deliverables.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The created web platform simplifies business process management and increase our customers productivity. The new web interface was well received by our customer and we look at a fast adoption rate.

How was project management arranged and how effective was it?

Project Management was coordinated from our side. We used Azure DevOps to assign and update tasks as well as collaborate on issues. In addition, Skype was a major tool for screensharing and calls.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

The team members we worked with were very skilled and experienced for what we needed. They could also rely on their team at Vakoms to give additional input in challenging parts of the project so that we received a high quality product.

Are there any areas for improvement?

There is very little I wish to improve. One area that could improve is a more active role in finding the root cause of bugs.