Wolfpack Digital

Please describe your company and your position there.

Transilvania IT Cluster is a not for profit, non-governmental organizational that represents the best interests of it more than 100+ IT&C company members from the North Western region of Romania. We offer support services in the field of capacity building, matchmaking, internationalization and digitalization, working at local, national and international levels.

For what projects/services did your company hire Wolfpack Digital, and what were your goals?

We needed a updated version of our organizational website, which was outdated and build on an old Wordpress theme that no longer had support and was painful to maintain and update.

We wanted a fresh, more attractive and actual version of our online presence and wanted a new solution for our organization's presentation website. We wanted to be more visible, offer better structured information related to our work and provide a allow new members registration via our website.

How did you select Wolfpack Digital and what were the deciding factors?

We've selected Wolfpack Digital upon presenting the need to refresh our online presence among our member organization. They've presented an attractive offer and way of collaboration, which we found that best suited with our plan.

Describe the scope of work in detail, including the project steps, key deliverables, and technologies used.

Upon reaching an agreement on our collaboration, we were taken over by Cristi Virciu one of the agency's senior UX/UI designers in order to understand our specific needs. We've developed together the website specifications, we were then presented several themes that best addressed our need using Wix.

We were presented then with a proposed designed, we've agreed on the types of sections we wanted in our website and then iteratively started the development process. We had weekly or every other week meetings, depending on the stage of development, in order to provide feedback on the progress.

By the time the structure was developed, we've prepared the content, which was also added into the website by Wolfpack. We've tested all functionalities and had the go-live.

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

We've had the agency's CEO responsible for the high-level discussions and a senior UX/UI designer in charge of the entire development process.

Can you share any measurable outcomes of the project or general feedback about the deliverables?

Analytics wasn't setup properly in our old website, but the user engagement and the number of visits on our new site has definitely increased.

Describe their project management style, including communication tools and timelines.

We've used weekly or bi-monthly online progress meetings and communication over email. For the complexity of our project, we were very satisfied with the setup that we used.

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

Very well organized, sharp and attentive to our needs. Looking into helping us identify our needs and choose the best solutions that addressed them. Their communication was efficient and delivery dates were on track.

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

Not really.

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am the owner of a beauty it platform, where we showcase available time slots within beauty service

For what projects/services did your company hire Wolfpack Digital, and what were your goals?

Our website is a prototype in beta. Based on the experience gathered from that, we needed wireframes for the next development phase of the platform

How did you select Wolfpack Digital and what were the deciding factors?

A friend had meet one of the owners of WD at a summit, and suggested that I contacted him. We had a call, and I immediately felt like he was a straight up guy. Looking at their website and previous cases convinced me to go with them.

Describe the scope of work in detail, including the project steps, key deliverables, and technologies used.

We had a meeting to discuss what we wanted, and our vision. From there we were sent a template of user stories, to fill out, to show them what functions we would like available.

Hereafter, they developed the wireframes, and we had a meeting where they were presented. We only had a couple of alterations.

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

We had the peber, Adrian, and a senior and junior front end developer work on it.

Can you share any measurable outcomes of the project or general feedback about the deliverables?

We haven’t implementer the chances yet, due to delayes on our side

Describe their project management style, including communication tools and timelines.

Very Good. I don’t think that it could have been any more smooth.

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

Their ability to think uset experience into all that they do was impressive.

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

No

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the head of technology at a logistics provider, in charge of technology procurement and requirements setting. We’re a logistics delivery carrier with an ecologically-sensitive approach, in that we use electric vehicles. The company is Irish, and I’m based in the UK.

What challenge were you trying to address with Wolfpack Digital?

As a startup, we wanted to go for modern technology rather than the old-school solutions used by carriers today. One of those was, of course, moving o ecologically-sound vehicles. Wolfpack Digital helped us develop a solution for our customers sending and receiving parcels, as well as one for our internal operations staff. They’re developing a solution that helps us with parcel sorting and tracking and tracing.

What was the scope of their involvement?

Wolfpack Digital developed a user web portal and Android and iOS apps, along with a combined app for our different types of operations staff, which is Android only.

We put forward a very high-level PowerPoint document to start from, describing some of the steps a user would go through in order to deliver a parcel, along with functionalities for our agents. Using an agile methodology, they went through an iterative process to get to more and more detail.

What is the team composition?

I’m primarily dealing with their product owner and manager, QA person, and chief architect. I meet with them weekly, and I’ve dealt with many of the developers as well.

How did you come to work with Wolfpack Digital?

The initial selection was done by my predecessor. I believe he’d dealt with Wolfpack Digital before. They had pretty good references, and we saw some examples of their previous work. I think there was also a recommendation, but I can’t say for sure.

How much have you invested with them?

The cost is in the multiple hundreds of thousands of euros.

What is the status of this engagement?

I’ve been working with them for the past few months. I was brought onboard at the point when the demo version was completed. Wolfpack put in a lot of extra work to hit some deadlines and allow us to show it to investors. We’ve been using the demo version since April 2020.

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

The demo version they’ve completed is actually the app set we’ll actually use, and we just need to take it further in terms of features. We could call it an MVP. It’s been used both to take to investors, so there’s been a big impact there in getting interest and getting funding. We’ve also used it in shopping for potential partners. As a delivery business, we need to work with retailers.

How did Wolfpack Digital perform from a project management standpoint?

There’s a lot of good work being done on their side, and I’m very happy with my main contact. He’s not exclusively dealing with us, but the majority of his time is dedicated to our project. They’re very good organizationally and in terms of understanding what additional work needs to be done. They’re proactive in organizing events for their team to understand our business, getting into what happens when a parcel arrives at our warehouse and how it gets moved about. They’re proactive in terms of technology suggestions and proposals for improvements, down to power usage in phones. Change requests and control have been working very well for us.

We’ve talked about using Slack, but my company is using Teams at the moment. We have regular meetings with them over Skype, and we speak to them daily.

What did you find most impressive about them?

I’ve mentioned their proactivity, and I would add flexibility to that. Our early stages as a startup have been very up and down in terms of the amount of work we might request them for, so Wolfpack Digital has had to expand and contract the team with not much notice, and they’ve done this very well. They’ve also been good in terms of change control and delivery quality.

Are there any areas they could improve?

We’re always talking about what we could improve together, and that’s been good. It’s a back and forth process, and one thing we’ve concentrated on is being clearer with requirements on our side, and Wolfpack being more prone to feedback when we’re not giving them enough or accurate-enough information.

Do you have any advice for future clients of theirs?

We need to go to any company with a good understanding of what we need to do. We didn’t have a lot of documentation for Wolfpack Digital initially, but they worked with it very well. My advice would be to be open to their advice and for the client to really plug in their processes to the agile development ones used by Wolfpack Digital. 

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the director of an NGO.

What challenge were you trying to address with Wolfpack Digital?

They helped us build an app that facilitates buying tickets for shows and expeditions.

What was the scope of their involvement?

They developed a mobile app on iOS. They did some work for Android as well.

We had a predetermined theme, but they worked from there. They brought a lot of improvement to the product.

What is the team composition?

We had an account manager and several programmers working on our project.

How did you come to work with Wolfpack Digital?

It was a really good recommendation.

What is the status of this engagement?

The project lasted from July–December 2019.

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

It was a really good experience for us. We were really happy with what they did and how they did it. They provided really good work. Unfortunately, the app didn’t go to market as we planned. Still, we’re happy with their work and plan to partner with them again.

How did Wolfpack Digital perform from a project management standpoint?

They were really good. We had excellent dialogue, they were prompt, and they provided great feedback.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They were really flexible. They worked hard to understand the project so they could enhance the product and deliver a great product.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, they were wonderful.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

No, they were really straightforward. They act like a partner. It’s easy to work with them to find solutions.

Please describe your company and your position there.

Transylvania Trips is a travel agency where you can book authentic (private) local experiences for 2 to 15 people and all you have to do is to tell us what you'd like, and we will make sure to customize everything based on your interests: the destinations, restaurants, walks, traditional dinners, nights out in town and everything in between.

For what projects/services did your company hire Wolfpack Digital?

transylvaniatrips.com

What were your goals for this project?

To develop a simple presentation site that would also allow the customers to book our travel offers with a couple of clicks.

How did you select this vendor?

I've worked with a lot of vendors in the past from the travel industry, but Wolfpack Digital has a thing for supporting authentic businesses and they were the most capable of delivering a stunning branding for us and a simple, but reliable well-designed site/platform for us.

Describe the project and the services they provided in detail.

Wolfpack Digital developed web-based travel management and online booking platform to help us present the beauty of our region and ease the booking for our travelers with just a couple of clicks. They helped with branding, UI/UX, site development, and maintenance.

What was the team composition?

We had a great Product Owner (PO) to manage the project and the communication with the design and development team.

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

We just launched the product, but the site allowed us to easily manage our content online, promote our services and book experiences with just a few clicks.

How was project management arranged and how effective was it?

We got the PO assigned right from the beginning and everything was clear and transparent during the entire process. They also provided us with feedback and improvements to make the site even more appealing!

What did you find most impressive about this company?

The team really enjoys their work and they really care about the end product. Also, their UI/UX team is amazing.

Are there any areas for improvement?

...

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am the founder of HealSoft Factory, a start-up with the mission to improve patient medic communication. We are developing a mobile and web application, HealMate, through which patients can monitor their symptoms and habits to find their way to a better overall health. They also have the possibility to share the recorded data with their medic through HealMate Web application. We believe that effective communication between patient and medic is essential to treat and control disease around the globe.

For what projects/services did your company hire Wolfpack Digital?

We hired initially Wolfpack Digital to create the HealMate mobile app UI/UX interface design. We were so satisfied with the collaboration that we extended the collaboration and hired Wolfpach to implement from scratch the HealMate Web application.

What were your goals for this project?

The main goals of the project were: - Design an UI/UX for the Web application which is transparent, modern and easy to use - Implement Front-end and back-end functionalities - integrate the whole application within our Microsoft Azure infrastructure in a secure manner

How did you select this vendor?

We selected this vendor based on recommendation. We considered several companies (2-3) but they proved to be our best choice. The deciding factors were proven experience, previous work, progressive innovative thinking and professional attitude. The final decision within the selection process was made by the Founder and Co-Founder of HealSoft Factory (HealMate)

Describe the project and the services they provided in detail.

After the selection process we provided a list of desired features, branding information and several use-case diagrams to transmit the main idea and scope of the application. Wolfpack Digital analysed this request and answered with a detailed work breakdown and effort estimates together with a proposal for UI/UX design. A brainstorming session was organised for the whole team to set priorities and define technical details. Main responsibilities for Wolfpack were: UI/UX design, data charting functionalities implementation, user account management, error management, proprietary API integrations and development, mobile app handshake implementation, application security, SQL database definition and implementation, application integration in Azure ecosystem, product owner responsibilities, application testing and validation.

What was the team composition?

There were 3 people involved from Wolfack Digital side to realize this project, one product owner with the responsibility to find ways to improve the product to contribute with new perspectives and new ideas, and also has the project management, coordination responsibility. Two developers had as main responsibility to provide implementation according to plan and design.

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

The mobile app design provided by Wolfpack is something we consider a success, this was the main reason we renewed the contract to implement the Web application also. We believe that when we release the web application it will be a great success. We like to work with Wolfpack they exceed our expectations in terms of professionalism, pro activity and creativity. I would happily recommend their services to others.

How was project management arranged and how effective was it?

Our collaboration with Wolfpack was effective, we used to communicate through e-mail and phone. Weekly progress reports were provided through e-mail and we solved issues, and made decisions together through phone or video calls. They proven to be highly responsive and addressed any issues immediately.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

Wolfpack has a unique young energy, full of creative people and ideas. They are flexible and they adapt fast to new situations and challenges.

Are there any areas for improvement?

No.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am the founder of Gloat which is an online betting platform. We specialize in E-Sports betting. This was an idea created about nine months ago in response to the legalization of the sports betting environment in the United States.

What challenge were you trying to address with Wolfpack Digital?

We were looking for someone to help us with mobile app development.

What was the scope of their involvement?

Wolfpack Digital is our dedicated mobile development and backend shop. The app was designed to take advantage of a very specific opportunity in time. We aimed for one platform at the time because it was cheaper and Apple was a bit more particular. 

We also knew that once we were regulated, there would likely be changes to the app, so it would be a lot easier to make changes to one app rather than both at the same time. Once the app is refined, the team will develop it for iOS.

The team has done the backend and the mobile app. Our product is a little more complex than most. It is essentially a fintech app in the sense that we need to maintain user account balances and update their balance after an event completes. 

Furthermore, it is like an exchange. Traditional betting platforms present the odds, and a user can choose to either place the bet or not place the bet. Our exchange allows customers to place their own odds, and only if another individual is willing to take the opposite of the trade does the transaction go through. 

Wolfpack Digital created the app such that it’s peer-to-peer (P2P) or, rather, a betting exchange. They did all of the UI/UX design. We worked together from day one to design the feel and the UX. This is the first version and we just launched at the beginning of June.

What is the team composition?

We have been working with about four teammates. Gabriel (Head of Client Experience) has been our project manager. 

How did you come to work with Wolfpack Digital?

Clutch was one of the references I looked at. I tried my best to reach out to a lot of development agencies in Eastern Europe, South America, and India. I chose Wolfpack Digital mainly for the level of trust that I felt with them. 

Everyone here in Canada asked how we could be certain that they don’t just take our idea and run with it, so trust was essential. They had a level of excitement around the idea. At the very early stage, they went a lot further than anyone else did in showing me that they wanted to work together.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started sketching designs back in September 2019 with the goal of our first line of code to be written in January 2020.

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

Wolfpack Digital has done a great job of building a backend for what I believe is a rather complex app. It has been out in the wild for almost a month now. It is still early so the majority of reviews are from family and friends.

So far, everyone is pretty impressed especially some people who I know work in tech are impressed with how far we have come in such a short time. Right now, due to certain legal requirements, it is a free to play app only because in the US especially, we have to be licensed in each state in order to accept real dollars. 

Now that we have a functioning app, we are now going through the regulatory process and trying to become licensed in each state, and then we will modify the app again to accept payments for clients in that state. 

The app will have to become a little more complex in the future and will need to have geolocation functions. This was something that was all thought out before with the team.

How did Wolfpack Digital perform from a project management standpoint?

They are really great. Gabriel ran the project management and he absolutely killed it. I don’t know if the experience would be the same if it was another project manager. He has been working with me from day one and has done an excellent job. 

He has thoroughly understood what we have been trying to do right from the start and has been able to really understand how this exchange was going to work, which was crucial. 

It is like the stock market where people are buying and selling, there are market orders, limit orders, and if orders from the exchange come at the same time, there needs to be a priority. It’s complicated but the team has done a fantastic job of turning it into reality.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Wolfpack Digital does a great job of understanding where their responsibilities are and where ours are. For instance, they understand that I am not a technical professional so they had to do a lot more work. 

All the backend work was theirs and so were the technical decisions, the platform, the code, and the language. They did a good job of bringing me up to speed and educating me on the choices. Additionally, they internalized the idea very well. 

Building an exchange is difficult. If I needed to explain every single concept, or if we had to wireframe every single detail, I think it would have been exhausting, much more time consuming, and more expensive. 

At a certain point, I could tell that Gabriel and the team understood the idea. They corrected me when I was wrong, especially when it came to describing the market maker or the order flow. 

Knowing that they really understood the app made me feel more comfortable that we didn’t need to wireframe or document everything; we were okay to move quickly.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, nothing comes to mind. The team has done really well. If anything, it would be nice, generally speaking, to get more updates from them in the form of a monthly email list about what is going on at Wolfpack Digital. 

Although I follow them closely on LinkedIn where I can see all their photos and their growth as a team, I still think that a newsletter with updates would be nice.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Make sure you understand what you are doing before starting this process and spend a lot of time working with the project manager. We took an approach where we invested a lot in just talking about how this was going to work. 

I sent over Wikipedia pages on certain topics of the stock market because we were going to be mimicking them and I wanted to make sure the team knew what this was going to look like. I also showed them lots of different apps. 

I would advise potential customers to invest the time upfront. People might be excited to start and may be too quick to pull the trigger sometimes. Take your time at the very beginning and talk about everything.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m a software engineer at Goalplay, an athletic training company. The trainers go to clubs or federations and give hands-on training.

What challenge were you trying to address with Wolfpack Digital?

We needed help with mobile app development and UI/UX design.

What was the scope of their involvement?

Wolfpack Digital developed an Android mobile app that we use to control and get the data from our wearable technology. We chose Android because there are more people around our office that have Android. In Germany, the percentage of users is higher with Android than with iOS.

The app is used to start the sensor, start recording, and stream the data to the mobile device to display the information. We gave them the freedom for the look and feel. They also designed the UI/UX of the app. 

On the algorithm side and Bluetooth protocol, it was more set in stone. These algorithms were designed before that in a specific way. They had to work around that algorithm. Wolfpack Digital also created an iOS app that is a video platform with training videos.

What is the team composition?

We work with two developers and a part-time project manager.

How did you come to work with Wolfpack Digital?

We had another developer who did some work for us here in Germany, but we had communication issues and the prices were high. I looked for an alternative and found them through Clutch. 

I took a couple of months to choose which company to work with. From the first contact, Wolfpack Digital was the easiest to communicate with and they had the fastest response time.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent $60,000 so far.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in May 2019 and the work is ongoing.

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

The app hasn’t launched yet. It impacted us in the sense that it works and everything is fine. We’re using it for these controls. The iOS app was launched in Saudi Arabia for now and it works well. 

Wolfpack Digital was helpful with the iOS launch. Even though we had a few issues with the review process on Apple’s side, they really helped us and made some small changes to the app for free to help it launch.

How did Wolfpack Digital perform from a project management standpoint?

Their project management is good, and the team has a high level of transparency. We have access to their Trello boards, and we can contact the developers directly if needed.

What did you find most impressive about them?

We are impressed with their communication and transparency. Everything is good on the development side too.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, we’re happy with their work.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Be open with them. Have an initial discussion about what you want to do. Once they understand your vision, they will be very helpful. However, they do have some limitations. 

For example, we had a backend part for one of the apps and it was done by another company initially in PHP. Wolfpack Digital was honest from the beginning and told us that they didn’t have PHP expertise and didn’t feel comfortable providing those services.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the co-founder of a company focused on minimizing food waste.

What challenge were you trying to address with Wolfpack Digital?

We needed an external partner to help develop a mobile app.

What was the scope of their involvement?

We worked collaboratively to come up with wireframes, mostly prepared by their design team. They developed the mobile application for Android native, as well as the web application that has the back office. 
The app is geolocation-based. There is a map, and a list of merchants the user can buy food products from, showing their nearness to the user. 
They also did the integration of third-party payment capabilities for the app. They helped in designing the logo for us, as well.

What is the team composition?

Initially, we interacted with Georgina (Chief She-Wolf & CEO) to discuss finances, and workflow processes. The project manager was responsible for managing information flow, beginning with the workshop we had with the design team for making wireframes.

How did you come to work with Wolfpack Digital?

We were referred to Clutch, which is where we found them. We considered six companies. We chose Wolfpack as our solution partner because of their quality of work and customer service.

How much have you invested with them?

We spent between $5,000–$6,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We began working together in February 2020, and it is ongoing.

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

The app hasn’t launched yet. We’ve had to pause the project due to COVID-19. 
We had an idea for our logo, which we changed after feedback from the team. Our expectations were exceeded by the finished product. Regarding design, we had almost no iteration, and we are very pleased with their work.

How did Wolfpack Digital perform from a project management standpoint?

Communication has gone smoothly, with very little misunderstanding, which can happen when working with offshore providers. We communicate mainly via email, and some phone when we need to discuss things in more detail.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They were proactive and full of ideas. The experience is much better than I have found with other offshore vendors. We’ve been very satisfied with the quality of their work, and their customer service really sets them apart. They also have a very positive company culture.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the CEO and founder of Ideacracy. It’s an iOS community app that allows users to share online content of the latest news on progressive issues like climate change and politics.

What challenge were you trying to address with Wolfpack Digital?

I needed them to do the entire design and development of the app. I had initial ideas, conceptual drawings, and user stories but needed their design expertise.

What was the scope of their involvement?

We started the project with a kick-off, two-day meeting. Their team and I walked through and completed the wireframing of the app. Because I’d already drawn a lot of it out, they wanted to go in-depth and hash out the details together.

Adrian (CTO, Wolfpack Digital) was personally there for those meetings, as was their product manager and designers. After that kickoff meeting, we had about a month and a half of conference call meetings. We’d discuss the progress of the app and comment on the design aspects. After they put it together, the design was finalized in the summer.

The next step was development and that took about two and a half months. Their team developed a clickable prototype on InVision. They used Swift for the frontend development, and Ruby on Rails for the backend. The whole process ran through their personalized product roadmap. Upon completion, the app was launched in mid-October.

What is the team composition?

My main point of contact was Gabe (Product Manager, Wolfpack Digital). I also worked with Adrian, Gina (CEO, Wolfpack Digital), and their team of designers.

How much have you invested with them?

I’ve spent about €60,000 (approximately $65,100 USD) with them.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started the project in May 2019. Although it’s wrapped up, we still roll out small technical additions to the app. Our partnership is ongoing.

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

For the past few months, the app is available in the US App Store. It’s intuitive and cleanly designed. I’ve received wonderful user reviews expressing that the platform is seamless, even for an MVP. Its functions are straightforward and performance has been great.

We had a small technical snag at one point, but after that hurdle, it’s been smooth sailing. I’m very happy with it and so are the users.

How did Wolfpack Digital perform from a project management standpoint?

Throughout the project, I received regular progress updates. I was very pleased with how responsive Wolfpack Digital was. They kept me involved during the entire process. I knew the status of completion for the app features and when things would be delivered.

Although the planning was effective, some aspects of the development process are inevitability difficult. Overall, they still delivered everything in a short amount of time. It took four and a half months from concept to actual product—that’s really quick.

Our teams communicated through Slack. Their designers provided constructive feedback on my design comments. If I had any significant or large-scale feedback, I’d email them or directly comment on the InVision prototype. I usually got a response within the same day or next business day if it was the weekend.

What did you find most impressive about them?

The most impressive thing about Wolfpack Digital is that they cared about delivering a good product. That is the biggest thing that won me over. When we encountered difficulties or I was worried about certain things, they took on the responsibility and ownership of wanting to deliver and make things right.

Right after launch, we hit an unpredictable technical issue. At that point, their CTO and CEO got personally involved to make sure we came back on track. A fix was rolled out in a short amount of time. That really reflects their project management style, and I really appreciate how they took personal responsibility for that.

Are there any areas they could improve?

As for expectation management, I would’ve liked to see more communication. As a non-technical person, I didn’t grasp that they were following their own product roadmap for the project. I wasn’t made aware that they’d address some of my feedback toward the end of the process.

So, when I’d provide feedback and didn’t hear back about it, I was left confused. It would’ve been nice to know that it was on their radar, but wouldn’t be addressed until the end. That would’ve helped a lot with my planning and understanding of where the focus was.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

I would advise them to be hands-on. I found that to be the biggest thing I enjoyed. Being on the call each week, collaborating on Slack, giving and receiving feedback, all the things helped me see how things were going.

Ultimately, I was really happy about the product because I communicated exactly what I had in mind. This approach is more effective than telling them to take care of it and then being unhappy with the end results.