Waterbear Cloud

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

As an independent consultant, I act as the CTO of an online SaaS company that tackles temporary staffing issues for our clients.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Waterbear Cloud?

They took on IT cloud consulting services. For a bit of context, all our components fit in the cloud. With any type of SaaS solution or web application, there’s a lot to consider when placing things in the cloud, especially as a small organization. Our primary goal was to find a partner that was a cloud specialist who could help build, configure, and maintain our cloud environment.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

We’ve chosen AWS as our cloud platform, and Waterbear provides a managed service layer on top of the AWS service through which they help us build, maintain, and automate our environment. The solution sits on Waterbear’s hardware as well.

They were quite involved in the design and implementation as well. They set up the entire network service layer, as well as the computer resource layer. They architected the solution for us and implemented it. On the application itself, they worked with our developer to configure the application deployment pipeline, so if we have code updates, they will be automatically deployed into our AWS infrastructure.

While they don’t provide direct cybersecurity services, they comply with all the AWS best practices to ensure our solution is secure.

What is the team composition?

I deal with Waterbear’s sales team, implementation team, and their owner.

How did you come to work with Waterbear Cloud?

I’m part of a local security group that directed me to them.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent around $10,000–$15,000 CAD (approximately $8,000­–$12,000 USD) so far.

What is the status of this engagement?

We’ve been working together since June 2020. The implementation took place around August 2021.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The main metric I would use is their deployment performance. Looking at other competing partners that provide cloud-based management, a lot of their setup and deployment will take a much larger effort than Waterbear has to perform, and at a much larger cost per month. The value we’re getting stands out.

The other metric I use to evaluate their service is our ability to deploy our web application updates and code without any interaction from them. Because they’ve automated everything in the deployment pipeline, code is up and running within 15 minutes of the developers pushing it and with only 30 seconds–1 minute of downtime. It’s a world-class deployment pipeline.

This type of setup usually requires a team of experts to accomplish, and Waterbear provides this at a low cost. They’re a tremendous value.

How did Waterbear Cloud perform from a project management standpoint?

They’re exceptional in terms of carrying out the tasks they’ve promised and meeting all objectives. These tasks largely rely on the development team to provide the proper code, and Waterbear has been able to step in and help troubleshoot human issues, even if it takes longer than anticipated. They’re exceptional.

We primarily communicate over collaborative tools like Slack and email. A specific Slack channel was created for us to communicate through.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Their automation capabilities stand out. Managing a cloud environment like this manually would be a lot of work, and the fact that Waterbear has been able to set up all the configurations and automate it with the script is their claim to fame. Not many people can do this.

Are there any areas they could improve?

From more of a startup standpoint, there are a lot of features that they continue to add on to provide us more value, capability, and visibility into what they’re doing in our environment. They’re going to grow into a more mature organization, although they’re already well above part in the market.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

I would definitely recommend engaging the Waterbear team. They provide a huge amount of expertise and don’t mind guiding you. Have a chat first to understand what the market is like and to see a comparison of available solutions.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the CTO of Loft47, a real estate technology company. We provide SaaS for real estate brokerages managing transactions, funds, and accounting.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Waterbear Cloud?

Before working with Waterbear Cloud, we had a pretty closed framework and were outsourcing our cloud assets and architecture to a vendor. We brought Waterbear Cloud on to help us rebuild our infrastructure and import it into AWS Cloud, giving us the ability to grow and deploy.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Initially, we met to discuss our plan. Then we spent three months replicating our production environment in a staging environment. Once we had that up and running, we spent about a month on QA testing. After that, we transitioned all of our services, starting with our data, application services, and other assets.

Now Waterbear Cloud provides maintenance support.

What is the team composition?

We worked with four people, including two engineers.

How did you come to work with Waterbear Cloud?

We connected with AWS, and they recommended Waterbear Cloud and a few other companies. We were looking for a partner who could kick start the project using specific DevOps tools and set it up so our in-house team could take it over. Waterbear Cloud was close by and one of our primary investors worked with them at one point. On top of that, they were the best fit for us based on what they’ve done before.

How much have you invested with them?
We were looking to spend between $5,000–$12,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with them in October 2020. We finished the transition in January 2021, but we’re still working with them.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We’ve measured between a 20%–27% performance improvement in our application. Before this project, we struggled to grow some of our services because of our infrastructure. Since we completed the transition, we’ve been able to improve those services.

How did Waterbear Cloud perform from a project management standpoint?

We wanted to take the time to build the infrastructure the way we wanted, and Waterbear Cloud has bought into our vision. They’ve accommodated our requests and they’ve stuck to our budget.  

For most of the project, we’ve worked closely with them; it’s like they’re a part of our team. We include them in our weekly scrum meetings and planning sessions.  

What did you find most impressive about them?

They are very flexible. We’ve been able to present them with some of our more difficult engineering problems, and they’ve been able to find solutions.

Are there any areas they could improve?

Their prices vary a bit, so it was difficult to determine an approximate cost before the project began.  

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

We’ve found that it’s best to bring them in as additional team members. By providing full access to our project, we’ve been able to ensure a smooth partnership. I would definitely recommend that to other partners who work with them.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the president and CEO of a company that produces industrial wireless sensor technologies. We focus on SMEs who are being left behind in the industrial revolution, or what’s called “Industry 4.0.”

We remove barriers to sensors, gateways, and cloud applications to maintain and monitor these companies’ machines. We work to allow them to take advantage of state-of-the-art predictive analytics technologies.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Waterbear Cloud?

We don’t have the internal expertise when it comes to cloud development. We’re primarily a hardware engineering company, so we don’t focus as much on software. We hired Waterbear Cloud to build out our initial platform which allows for the secure transfer of our customer’s data through our gateway.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

The first phase of the project was to build the architecture that allows us to house companies’ data. You have a customer and a gateway (which is connected to a number on one of our wireless sensors). The system has to be able to ingest that data and recognize which gateways they’re coming from. They’ll then categorize that data, which feeds into a larger database.

The second part of the project revolved around UX/UI. We wanted to show this data in a way that’s meaningful to people who are operating and servicing these machines. On top of that, the challenge was to establish alarms to thresholds, when the system alert the operator or maintenance member to preempt a failure of some kind.

We’re currently in the initial steps of getting our key customers rolled over to the platform we created. We’ll be monitoring some water turbines using municipal water supply systems, as well as forestry facilities where the risk of explosion is high. Hopefully, by the end of the year, anybody can pick up one of our sensors to use as a plug-and-play for industrial systems.

What is the team composition?

We primarily engage with 3 people. There’s the lead developer, the architect specialist, and one of the partners, who oversee project management.

How did you come to work with Waterbear Cloud?

I’ve known one of the founders for a long time. We were employees at the same company a long time ago, back when we were developing Linux operating systems. I knew that he had extensive technical skills, and so when he started his own company, I kept him in the back of my mind.

When we decided to look for a partner, we explored several options. We chose Waterbear Cloud since a few of their teammates had the exact technical skills we were looking for.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve probably spent around $45,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in January 2020, and the project is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We’ve been very happy with them, as they’ve seamlessly integrated into our team. They’ve had no problem understanding and adhering to all of our deliverables and milestones. I think we’re more or less ready to deploy the solution they helped us build.

How did Waterbear Cloud perform from a project management standpoint?

They’re quite flexible. I’ve worked with vendors who insist on following their own processes and methodologies, but Waterbear Cloud have been able to modify their workflow to suit our needs.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They were quick to grasp our needs and challenges. We didn’t have to explain at length what we’re trying to do and why. I’ve worked with software companies who focus too much on what they do, without understanding how their output fits in with our hardware, firmware, and embedded systems. We were able to bridge that gap quite smoothly with them.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, nothing really comes to mind. They could always invoice me for less, but I think they operate at a very fair rate. I don’t mind paying what I do for the quality of their support and service.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I'm the Chief Technology Officer at Corridor Interactive Inc.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Waterbear Cloud?

In 2019 the Corridor online learning system was migrated to a cloud infrastructure on Amazon Web Services (AWS). With only a small IT team on staff the infrastructure it was difficult to manage and support the infrastructure and there were no in house staff available to implement additional improvements like automatic scaling and no downtime deployments.

Managed service providers were extremely costly. Waterbear Cloud's services were very competitive on price and met our needs for managed services to support, enhance, and maintain our AWS infrastructure.

After the initial migration to Waterbear Cloud's managed server infrastructure on AWS, Waterbear Cloud implemented automatic scaling, automated server upgrades, and no downtime deployments.

What were your goals for this project?

Our goals for the project were to implement managed services to provide support and maintenance of our AWS server infrastructure and to implement automatic scaling, automated server upgrades, and no downtime deployments of our online learning system.

SOLUTION

How did you select Waterbear Cloud?

We solicited a quote from a local provider of managed services that and the costs was significantly higher than Waterbear Cloud. We also talked with several other larger providers that wouldn't deal with a smaller company of our size.

We gave up on it for awhile assuming that there wasn't a provider that fit our requirements. Sometime later Waterbear Cloud reached out to us and they proved to be a perfect fit for our business and requirements at a much more reasonable cost than the larger providers.

Describe the project in detail.

Once we selected Waterbear Cloud we had several meetings with them to discuss our requirements. Waterbear Cloud created a Statement of Work and developed a migration plan with pricing.

Over the period of a month we worked with the staff at Waterbear Cloud to migrate our systems to their managed infrastructure which is a layer on top of AWS that simplifies management of our AWS resources.

After completing that migration, we started a second phase of the project where Waterbear Cloud implemented automatic scaling of our infrastructure, automated sever patching, and no downtime deployments.

What was the team composition?

The Sales team and a founder were involved at the start of the project to define the Statement of Work and migration plan. During the implementation phases of the project, we worked primarily with one technical infrastructure staff member with additional support from a second staff member.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

After migrating to Waterbear Cloud we were able to refocus our technical staff towards platform enhancements and away from infrastructure support and maintenance allowing us to pursue new initiatives to grow and develop our unique service offerings.

In addition, the implementation of automatic scaling allows us to position our business for variable growth without incurring new capital expenditures or needing to add internal IT & DevOps staff.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

Our team and the Waterbear Cloud team worked very effectively together. The communication was exemplary and the technical knowledge top notch.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

Waterbear Cloud provides top notch managed AWS services for a very competitive price.

Are there any areas for improvement?

Waterbear Cloud's daily management and support of our infrastructure since migrating to their platform has been excellent. Although we have no to date experience any issues with support, I do suggest that Waterbear Cloud ensures there is sufficient technical transfer between various staff members to ensure the support levels remain superior when staff members are on vacation.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the founder of the Green Channel, a streaming service that streams environmental content around the world.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Waterbear Cloud?

We wanted someone with expertise in AWS to create an interface between our service and AWS.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

We needed to broadcast our service around the world. Because we’re a small startup, we needed to piggyback on the servers of AWS, so there would be no lag when subscribers from international markets were streaming our content.

I found that Kevin (Co-Founder) had that experience, so we enlisted him to take care of the coding needs of the channel to make sure our service was stable, scalable, and usable around the world.

What is the team composition?

Mainly, we work with Kevin and Karen (Co-Founder). Karen acted as the technical coordinator between Kevin and our WordPress expert and our app developers.

How did you come to work with Waterbear Cloud?

It was a bit of a fluke. I was at a friend’s party and was introduced to them.

How much have you invested with them?

I believe around $100,000–$150,000 so far.

What is the status of this engagement?

Our engagement with Waterbear Cloud started in June 2016.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

It’s been excellent. The team continues providing AWS support as we expand the channel. If there’s a problem with the service, Kevin’s very quick to determine what it is and implement the fixes.

There are always so many moving parts with a streaming service. Every time we do an upgrade or redesign, there’s a whole host of things that could go wrong. Kevin is good at pinpointing what that is. Generally speaking, it’s been pretty stable, and we’ve had little issues. Typically, when we do testing and catch most things. More often than not, it’s something else impacting the system and not something we’ve done.

How did Waterbear Cloud perform from a project management standpoint?

I haven’t had any angst about anything. I’ve trusted Kevin right from the beginning. We communicate through emails and texts. They’re both effective channels. If I text, it’s usually more urgent. We have that unwritten code between us.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They’re reliable and trustworthy. If a client isn’t tech-savvy, they need someone that’s able to pinpoint and communicate clearly what they need to do and give a relatively clear idea of cost.

Are there any areas they could improve?

It’s more on my side. Having enough capital to execute everything would make things go smoother. I went in a bit undercapitalized and still managed to get quite far advanced with where we’re at. We’re close to breaking out.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Be well-prepared. The projects that involve technical requirements are usually a lot bigger than you think. I know I went into this thinking it was going to be a straightforward website, but it soon became clear to me that the scope was going to grow substantially. Be prepared for that.