Vault Innovation

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the founder of Lost Travel. It’s an adventure travel brand. We organize trips across North America, and we have a software product, Wayward,  that people can use to track and share their adventures. 

What challenge were you trying to address with Vault Innovation?

We developed Wayward as an internal tool initially. It worked in its state, but we wanted to revamp it so that we could make the tool available to people outside our organization.

What was the scope of their involvement?

We essentially rebuilt the software product which is available as a mobile application and web application. It now allows offline tracking and more capabilities for users to create itineraries for their own travels. They also provided design work for the app. 

What is the team composition?

I work with 2–3 people primarily, including the CTO. However, I’ve worked with as many as six people at a time. 

How did you come to work with Vault Innovation?

They actually reached out to me on LinkedIn. Originally, I was planning on hiring a full-time developer to join my in-house team. However, after talking to Vault Innovation, I decided to move forward with them instead. 

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in March 2020. The app launched in October 2020, but our relationship is still ongoing. 

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

I don’t have any quantitative metrics to share. However, I’m happy with the product. It’s easy to use and has a clean interface – especially compared to the competition.  

How did Vault Innovation perform from a project management standpoint?

We were able to work past any bugs that came up during development. We used Jira to manage the project. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

They’ve been really easy to work with. Their level of excitement around the product has been great. They proposed a budget, and they stuck to it, which I really appreciated. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

It’s hard for me to say. I’ve enjoyed working with them. There are some natural differences between working with a third-party versus an in-house team. However, I’m happy with the results. I wish I had clearly outlined deadlines and milestones, but I can’t fault them for that. It took longer than expected, but they did a great job. 

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Have a clear picture of what you want to achieve and communicate that. 

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the CEO of VoiceOder Solutions. The company provides innovative B2B voice technology solutions for the foodservice industry.

What challenge were you trying to address with Vault Innovation?

We needed to develop a software solution from an initial concept.  This was a completely unique idea that needed to be architected and developed from the bottom up.

What was the scope of their involvement?

We have leveraged Vault Innovation as our in-house software team. They have helped to refine the initial concept, architect the product MVP, and build the mobile/voice application. We provided them with our initial flow charts design and important features.  In addition, we required all open-source language development.

What is the team composition?

We work with a team of approximately five people. 

How did you come to work with Vault Innovation?

The Illinois Technology Association referred us to them as a great resource. I evaluated them against several other companies and felt very comfortable with their background and approach.

How much have you invested with them?

We have invested between $75,000–$100,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

The project started in July 2019 and is still ongoing.

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

Early success metrics include: hitting deadlines, working collaboratively, and the ability to iterate on the product design process.  Their team has consistently lived up to all of the standards I have laid out.

We have received very positive feedback on the concept and software functionality.  We are very pleased with the quality of their work.

How did Vault Innovation perform from a project management standpoint?

They use JIRA to keep track of the different elements of the project, and we schedule phone calls every two weeks to make sure everyone is up to date. It is always very easy to track their progress and make sure we are moving towards our larger goals at all times.

What did you find most impressive about them?

The reason I’ve enjoyed working and continue to work with Vault is their open communication. They are disciplined in documenting what’s going on and the output of everything they do, and they set really accurate expectations upfront in terms of the sprints and the costs associated with each of them. It is always clear the value that we’re getting for their work.

Are there any areas they could improve?

They’ve done everything I’ve asked to this point, so I don’t really have any room for improvement.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

My advice would be to be thoughtful about what engagement you are looking for them to work on. Do your research upfront so that you can share as much information and give them direction in a collaborative and productive way.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am the owner of a subpoena service. We issue subpoenas for records in these industries: medical, bank, school, police, and others. We also issue subpoenas on behalf of lawyers.

What challenge were you trying to address with Vault Innovation?

We initially hired them to perform some development of our website and interactive client portal. In the end, we partnered with them further to continue building the portal.

What was the scope of their involvement?

We needed a client portal that allows lawyers to provide us information on what subpoenas they need issued. Then, it would allow the lawyers to track the status of their subpoenas.

Vault Innovation built this portal from scratch. They had to learn how every step of the subpoena process worked, so it could be properly and legally tracked through the portal. The design of the portal had to take into account the different actors, vendors, and the issues that can arise with the various groups involved in the process.

They built the frontend for the clients and the backend for the administrators, and they made both interact properly. They also built us a mock-up of a sales portal, which was actually the first thing they did for us.

What is the team composition?

There were 3–5 working with us.

How did you come to work with Vault Innovation?

They’re in the same building as us, and I believe we first connected through mutual connections in our building.

How much have you invested with them?

We probably invested somewhere between $10,000–$49,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We began working in either late 2017 or early 2018 and the project was mostly finished by the fall of 2019, although our relationship is ongoing as they continue to make updates for our site.

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

Amongst the users we’ve demoed the project to, the reaction is nearly universally positive. We’ve had several clients looking to use our service more because of their work.

How did Vault Innovation perform from a project management standpoint

We communicated via email, video conferences, in-person meetings with their design teams, and web meetings with screen sharing. Other members of my team might have met with them more frequently and in other ways.

What did you find most impressive about them?

The amount of time they spent to understand our business before they even started to design anything impressed us. If you just jump in and start trying to design a client portal without understanding the business and the legal side of things, you’re going to have an inferior product. They spent a lot of time with us getting into the weeds and they fully understood the project by the time they began designing.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, I have nothing.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Spend the time upfront so they understand your business. I believe people don’t spend enough time explaining their business model. Explain your business model, and you'll get the product you're looking for.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the president and CEO of Endoscopy Now. We focus on medical education for professionals in the gastroenterology space. 

What challenge were you trying to address with Vault Innovation?

We had worked with two previous developers but needed a higher-end, professional app than what they had delivered. 

What was the scope of their involvement?

They developed iOS and Android applications using React Native. They assisted us with the design portion. We took about two or three months collaborating to flush out what the app looks like today. Their team also integrated several third-party tools including Opentalk, Mixpanel and Google Analytics.

What is the team composition?

We’ve had two main points of contact: the president and the lead developer. However, there have been an additional three or four people that we’ve interacted with over the course of the projects including a few different project managers. 

How did you come to work with Vault Innovation?

I believe we heard about them through a referral from a friend. We had interviewed three other vendors as well, but we didn’t click with them in the way that we did with the team at Vault Innovation. They understood our company, our budget constraints, and what we were trying to accomplish. 

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve invested around $200,000 with them for this project. 

What is the status of this engagement?

We began working with them in late 2017 and are still working with them for support and additional updates. 

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

At the beginning of this year, we had about 800 users. Now, we’re at around 32,000 subscribers. We also brought in about $300,000 in revenue. While this can’t be exclusively attributed to Vault Innovation’s work, they’ve certainly had an impact. 

How did Vault Innovation perform from a project management standpoint?

We’ve had some ups and downs with project management, but we are in a good place right now. There have been several project managers that we’ve worked with. Our company is typically more fluid with our management while Vault Innovation likes more structure. 

Overall, we’ve had a strong line of communication with them through weekly phone calls and emails. We also use Slack and Jira. It’s been beneficial for us to move towards having weekly sprints on Fridays and applying a more agile approach. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

One of the most impressive things about their team is how collaborative they are. They listen and can turn things around quickly if there’s a problem. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

The only issue we’ve had is a bit of misalignment with communication about priorities and project timelines. It’s an evolving process and we’re constantly working to improve. 

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

It’s been very helpful for us to come in with clear requirements and walking through it all ahead of starting the project. It’s important to implement structure as much as possible. 

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the founder and CEO of a tech-enabled amenities company that provides services to the real estate industry.

What challenge were you trying to address with Vault Innovation?

When we initially engaged with Vault Innovation, we sought to create a turnkey technology solution to optimize our team on the street. This team included dog walkers, personal trainers, and others across the United States, and the solution became an app build with Vault Innovation.

What was the scope of their involvement?

While I don’t know which specific languages they used, they worked on the back- and frontend design work and oversaw the initial architecture of the build. They built the app for Android and iOS. They also helped a little with a redesign of our internal website.

What is the team composition?

There were four members of their team.

How did you come to work with Vault Innovation?

A venture capital (VC) we were pitching to referred us to them as they were working in that VC’s incubator lab. The communication and transparency shown by Jeff (Founder & CEO, Vault Innovation) sold us.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started work with them in June 2019, and the work is ongoing. 

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

There’s no user feedback yet, but their team is very engaging and flexible.

How did Vault Innovation perform from a project management standpoint?

There’s always going to be some sort of technical debt in a project like this. But Vault Innovation hit the majority of their deadlines and is great at communicating with us. We mainly communicated over Slack and met 3–4 times in person.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Their customer service is extremely well handled. Their communication style and response time earned my applause and is the reason I would recommend them to another company.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, not at this time.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Be very communicative, and be open with your expectations. 

Please describe your company and your position there.

We produce an appliance for growing food indoors and provide open-sourced outdoor modular farm technology as well. 

For what projects/services did your company hire Vault Innovation ?

Front end website development for our site.

What were your goals for this project?

Develop a user friendly ecommerce website to sell products and subscribe to our consumable subscription service. The website also included a responsive web application to allow our customers to easily update their subscription and monitor their products.

How did you select this vendor?

Networking through Purdue University startup community. They had very competitive pricing and a good portfolio of successful projects.

Describe the project and the services they provided in detail.

They designed and developed the front end of our custom website. The website contained a home page, product page, checkout pages, about us page, support page, and a user dashboard interface. Vault also provided graphic design services to make logos and icons for the website.

What was the team composition?

The Vault team included a project manager, website developer, graphic designer who worked with our CTO and lead software developer.

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

We are a startup company using the website to attract investors, corporate partners, and customers. Working with Vault has allowed us to acquire new customers raise additional funds to sustain the company.

How was project management arranged and how effective was it?

Project management was great. We never had any issues with communication and all tasks during the project were completed in a timely manner.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

We were most impressed with Vault's ability to quickly understand our needs and provide a design that clearly correlated with our mission.

Are there any areas for improvement?

There is little room for improvement. More detail on the hourly billing invoice would have been helpful. Overall I was satisfied with the project.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

Our company builds audit management applications. I'm the founder.

What challenge were you trying to address with Vault Innovation?

We're a new company, and we hired Vault to build our application.

What was the scope of their involvement?

The product is a web app. I went to them with wireframes and specifications for what I wanted to build. They reviewed my specifications, set the scale of the project, and developed an MVP. They took out some of the unnecessary features I wanted and created something I could finish and sell on my budget.

There are workflows and automations on the app that change to fit the users' needs. There is also a file storage feature. The app is built on a Laravel PHP framework.

What is the team composition?

I communicated with their CEO, a project manager, and a team of coders.

How did you come to work with Vault Innovation?

I found them through my attorney. I spoke with a handful of developers, but Vault was the only team that challenged my ideas and made suggestions for improvements. They acted as a partner, which is exactly what I wanted.

How much have you invested with them?

I spent around $50,000 on this project.

What is the status of this engagement?

The project started in October 2018. The MVP is complete, but we still use them for minor enhancements.

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

We just moved to production and only recently launched. We don't have any metrics to speak of yet, but we hope to have more results within a few months. They turned my wireframes into a functional application that fit my budget. They were involved and interested in getting my business off the ground, and they continue to provide advice.

How did Vault Innovation perform from a project management standpoint?

They're very responsive. Most of our communication is through email, but we had weekly meetings to go over where they were in the process and to answer any questions. Whenever I email them, I usually hear back from them within a couple of hours.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They're invested in my success and act as a real partner. As a first-time entrepreneur, their support has been extremely helpful.

Are there any areas they could improve?

In the beginning, the time frames ran a little longer than we expected. It didn't impact anything on my end, but they could be more accurate with their estimated timelines.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

They're great partners, but they don't do the end to end testing. Make sure you have a team member to work on QA before the app goes to production.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

At the time of the engagement, I was an entrepreneur with a tech startup.

What challenge were you trying to address with Vault Innovation?

I had an idea for a product, and I engaged Vault Innovation to build a prototype to serve as a proof of concept. I wanted to test a product with some small potential clients to test its viability in the market.

What was the scope of their involvement?

Their responsibility was relatively straightforward. I expected Vault Innovation to build a bare-bones prototype that I could use for client tests.

What is the team composition?

I communicated with Jeffrey (Founder/CEO, Vault Innovation) up until the point that I engaged his team.

How did you come to work with Vault Innovation?

I learned of Vault Innovation through a referral. I had 3–5 meetings with Jeffrey over two months before we came to an agreement.

How much have you invested with them?

Once we agreed to work together, I paid $5,000 upfront. In total, I spent about $10,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

The engagement spanned August–November 2017.

How did your relationship with Vault Innovation evolve?

I stopped the project about a third of the way through because I didn’t believe it was on the right track. Up until that point, they had only assigned some product designers to work with the prototyping tool Axure.

About a year ago, I had become a software developer, and I engaged them to say that I wanted to take on the project and build out the rest on my own. I discovered that they had only used prototyping code generated by the tool. They had made no effort to produce code that was worthy of a testing or production environment.

Ultimately, I decided to engage what I thought would be the target clients, but I never had an actual prototype for them to test. The experience with Vault Innovation ended up being a waste of money.

How did Vault Innovation perform from a project management standpoint?

Their team as a whole lacked the core competencies to serve as a technical lead or project manager.

What did you find most impressive about them?

The team at Vault Innovation is likable outside of a professional role. They’re much savvier on the social side, but I wouldn’t trust them with my technology project again.

Are there any areas they could improve?

Vault Innovation should re-examine what their value proposition is because it’s not working with entrepreneurs. They might be able to deliver for more mature companies, but I don’t think they are suited for anyone looking to bootstrap a project or a business.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

If future clients have a more robust budget, they might be better off by hiring a full-time employee.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I'm the founder and CEO of InquirED, which supports schools in moving towards an inquiry-based approach by providing curricular resources for building teacher practice.

What challenge were you trying to address with Vault Innovation?

We needed a firm to build our technology from scratch. We’d already done a few iterations of an early wireframe prototype. We'd also done several focus groups, interviews, and surveys with educators.

What was the scope of their involvement?

The first scope we did with Vault Innovation was a discovery phase. They reviewed the initial learnings of what we'd heard from our potential users. They helped us map out how the UX should flow for users. They pushed us to think about the best way to lay out our curriculum builder. At the end of the discovery phase, their team created a new set of wireframes. The second scope was a development phase, which is when they built the backend. Our third scope of work together was moving from an early beta version to a version 1.0 of the solution.

What is the team composition?

We work directly with six people from their team, though other engineers have worked on our project. The main point of contact is our project manager.

How did you come to work with Vault Innovation?

I was searching online for firms in the Chicago area. We also wanted to work with a smaller firm in order to get more personalized attention. I found their website and had a phone call with Jeff (CEO, Vault Innovation). It was a really interesting and engaging conversation. I interviewed around 8 companies but Jeff was the first person who didn't just jump to talking about the scope of the project. It felt like he would be a real partner in the work. I was upfront about being an early stage startup where funds are tight. Jeff said that he wanted to make the most of whatever we can spend.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent between $115,000–$120,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started work in November 2017. The big development phase was done in May 2018, and the second development phase was completed a couple of weeks ago. We’re currently in a maintenance contract with them as our key technology partner.

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

We get the most compliments on the solution's design and usability. People love how it looks. They want to be on the platform, or playing around with the app, because it's easy to use. They like the simplicity of it, and that they can find what they’re looking for.

While we had a clear idea of what functionality we wanted to offer, Vault Innovation helped us map out how to make simple for teachers to navigate. I’d assumed that the technology was going to be a barrier because it's a new way of building curriculum. They did an amazing job in building it out in a very user-friendly way. They really pushed us to not include a bunch of bells and whistles on our first development phase. They thought through every aspect to determine if we need to build it now or if it’s something to consider adding down the road.

How did Vault Innovation perform from a project management standpoint?

Our project manager is phenomenal. She's always on top of things and quick to respond. She’s excellent at defining what needs to happen during each phase. If she doesn't understand something, she doesn’t hesitate to get us on the phone with the engineers so we can speak directly. Having her serve as the liaison streamlines the process and makes it easy to work together.

The workflow is efficient and doesn't require a lot of check-ins. We’ll do quick talks to share progress reports and updates on when things are done. We had in-person meetings during the discovery phase, but generally we communicate over phone and email.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They make us feel like we have an internal technology team. It’s not just about creating the largest scope possible, which would cost a lot of money. Their whole team is interested in how their technology can help us meet our business goals. It's been an amazing experience, and I would highly recommend them.

Are there any areas they could improve?

There was some miscommunication and other issues at the beginning of the engagement. However, they’re incredibly responsive any time I've had an issue. Jeff will get on a call with me right away and try to fix it. Any problems are addressed immediately, and shifts are made to make sure they don't happen again.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the CEO of Leaf Trade. Our platform is a wholesale, B2B marketplace for the licensed cannabis industry.

What challenge were you trying to address with Vault Innovation?

We had limited resources as a startup and were trying to scale our tech and development resources in an optimized way. We needed to find a high-quality, full-time developer who we could leverage to meet our needs around scalability.

What was the scope of their involvement?

Vault has addressed many of our technical needs as a company. They’ve provided additional developers to supplement our CTO and also filled that role in a seamless way since they already had the in-house leadership resources. We brought in another product manager to handle the technical aspects, which gave us the flexibility to scale up or down. They’ve also provided designers for some intermittent needs.

They’ve used PHP to build the first version of the product on top of an open-source, Django-based e-commerce platform. They’ve also been great at assisting in discovery phases and creating wireframes. They help us evaluate what we want and what gaps we need to fill. They consult with us on what direction to take and provide guidance on what we need or don’t need. I truly appreciate that and it’s inspired me to pursue a long-term relationship with them. I can really tell that they don’t just want to make money off of us.

We have a lot of big integrations (e.g., accounting software) and features that we’re getting feedback from customers on, which is extremely valuable. We’re really excited about integrating automatic payment processing, which is something Vault has been incorporating and building into the platform. They’re also great at coordinating and planning with third parties in order to implement big-picture solutions.

What is the team composition?

Our team scales according to what phase we’re in, but I usually work with between 2–6 people: senior engineers, developers, frontend developers, and backend developers.

How did you come to work with Vault Innovation?

I met Vault through my brother’s company. I could tell they had high-level capabilities and work dynamics from their service with his company, so I decided to go with them.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent between $100,000–$200,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in July 2017 and the relationship is ongoing.

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

Our original interface was a simple, clean, and functional MVP, but our users were looking for a much more powerful marketplace regarding e-commerce functionalities. Vault, through a discovery phase, figured out the best way to move forward. We chose to revamp the platform with a powerful open-source, e-commerce platform.

There were a lot of design elements they were able to utilize, coordinate, and customize for our specific industry. We released the 2.0 version in January and the customers loved it. They think it’s a beautiful product compared to the simplicity in the first version. They love the aesthetics and the built-in functionality, as well as the power of the platform.

How did Vault Innovation perform from a project management standpoint?

I have an internal product/project manager, so it hasn’t been an issue. There have been periods where they’ve needed to take care of stuff during times of transition, but it’s been relatively painless. They’re great at self-management. They make sure that there’s good communication and a feedback loop so that nothing goes amiss.

They have two offices: one in Chicago and one in Springfield, Missouri. I work with people from both offices and they make themselves available for our daily scrum meetings. We use video to share screens during those meetings. They’re comfortable with using your internal tools as well, whether it’s Jira, Trello, or something similar. They have the capacity to adapt to your workflow, which I’ve always thought was pretty cool.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Another reason I chose them is because their developers are onshore. Many agencies utilize foreign resources because of cost, but I’ve personally had issues with language barriers and work dynamic in those situations. The price ultimately doesn’t justify the loss of communication. Vault sources their team in the U.S. and everyone has great communication skills. They use a comprehensive process to onboard people, sometimes requiring months of vetting. They want to ensure someone is a good fit for the team before hiring them.

Are there any areas they could improve?

There have been periods of rapid growth within their company, so it may be beneficial to grow their internal team appropriately. They do a good job of that, but sometimes rapid growth puts a strain on their resources. However, it hasn’t negatively impacted our business.