Itransition

Could you provide a brief description of your company?

We run a software business around duties and taxes. 

What’s your position?

I’m the founder and owner.

Could you describe the business challenges that you were attempting to address when you first approached Itransition?

We’ve been working with them for five and a half years, since I first founded the company. They’re responsible for our software development and system operations. We completely outsource our custom software development over to them. We have between five and 10 of their developers at any given time working with us. We have a very close relationship with them. 

Could you describe the scope of their involvement in greater detail?

They’re responsible for all of our technical development and the implementation of our solutions. Primarily, they’re using PHP, MySQL, and Java. They also handle some of the visual design and our quality assurance.

How did you select Itransition as your solution partner?

One of our investors had worked with them before, and referred them to us. We didn’t consider any other vendors. 

Could you provide a general cost estimate for their involvement?

We’ve invested around $10,000 a month for their ongoing services.

In terms of results, could you share any statistics, metrics, or user feedback that would demonstrate the quality of their performance?

Before any launch, they go through an intensive QA [quality assurance] cycle, and then we do an acceptance test. After launch, we monitor for any bugs, and deploy fixes as they emerge. All in all, we’ve been working with them for five and a half years, so we’re very happy with their services. The quality of their code is second to none. At this point we have a very effective workflow established, which is difficult to do with an offshore partner.

When working with Itransition, is there anything you’d consider unique about their strategic approach or development methodology?

I really can’t say because I’ve never worked with another offshore provider. I do really appreciate their attention to detail and how their project managers communicate so openly with us.  

In retrospect, are there any areas in which you think they could improve as a service provider?

I don’t have any criticisms or recommendations. Our experience with them through the years has been a very positive one. We’ve really grown our relationship, and it’s been very fruitful.

Could you briefly describe your organization?

I’m an independent contractor. I work across all industries. It’s just me, but I have a lot of subcontractors that do work with me, too. I primarily focus on large projects for Fortune 500 companies. I provide operational consulting, specifically in the realm of improving process efficiency. I take a look at existing processes, primarily in older departments, to re-establish more effective workflows. We identify the inefficiencies in the process, strip those out, and then offload what we can into automated processes, which is the capacity in which I collaborate with Itransition.

Could you describe the business challenges you were attempting to address when you began the relationship with Itransition?

When I was working on a project for a Fortune 50 company, their previous vendor decided that they weren’t going provide the development services they needed any longer. Their vendor was phasing our support for their solution. I put out an open bid on their behalf. Itransition was one of several vendors to bid on the project. They came in way under my max budget. They had the sustainability that I was looking for in a large company with a lot of developers. Their response to my bid document was very forward thinking. I could tell that they actually looked at the bid document, taking into consideration the caveats and contingencies and that might arise. Their proposal was pretty impressive. After the shortlist review process, they were the ones that were selected.

Could you describe the scope of the project in greater detail?

I generally perform business analysis, and that’s where I stopped. They do everything else. They do estimation on the technical aspects. They provide me with the price. Then once it’s agreed upon, they actually do the development, the QA/QC [quality assurance/quality control], the smoke testing, hosting, maintenance, and support. They took care of all of that. I validate the concept and provide strategic recommendations to my customers, and Itransition is responsible for the actual building of the applications and solutions. For this particular project, we used a LAMP stack, which includes Linux, Apache, MySQL, and PHP.

Could you provide a sense of the size of this initiative in monetary terms?

It cost between $175,000 and $225,000. It took six to eight months to develop the solution with three dedicated programmers.

When was the project completed?

Another phase of the project was completed in November [2013]. Since then, we’ve moved through almost 10 more phases.

In terms of results, could you share any statistics, metrics, or user feedback you’ve received that would demonstrate the effectiveness of their work?

With regard to this project, the first subsystem in the enterprise management solution we developed has saved the client significant man-hours, upwards of 600, across all stakeholders in the process, both internally and externally. Aside from the improvements in time and effort, almost all of their manual activities within their processes have been automated. The system was also designed to have history tracking, which allows their users to track significant changes and modifications to their formatting and content, without having the need to log their own changes manually.

As far as the stakeholders are concerned, both the employees and the external parties have been very pleased with the new system. The existing process was essentially preserved, which helped with a learning curve. So, really, the only learning process was how to navigate the new system and translate their previously disparate activities into a consolidated one. In fact, the workflows themselves improved so much that they’ve automated each aspect of their department. That’s what I was referring to with the additional phases. So, now, other departments are beginning to take notice and deploying the same strategy, using both business analysis and Itransition as the resource. It’s been an incredibly lucrative partnership.

When working with Itransition, is there anything you’d consider unique about their approach or development methodology that distinguishes them from other vendors?

I’ve already mentioned sustainability earlier. They can really scale up, take on multiple large projects, and not have to risk a decline in development performance, which is very important because I work with several departments at the same time. They’ll all be running off of the same database. One department may understand that three products might slow them down. But, two projects for two separate departments want full performance, and Itransition can give that to me.

Flexibility was my next concern. Because I work with large companies, they’re still made up of individuals and they all have deadlines. Sometimes, we’re working on six or seven projects simultaneously, and each one requests enhancements, maybe for two different customers, maybe within three different departments. It can get extremely complex. Itransition is extremely flexible with how it deals with incoming change requests.

The last was being solution-oriented. It’s not easy to find a developer that’s solutions-oriented. What I mean by that is most developers are only thinking about the technical implementation. But, Itransition, the way they’ve structured their product team, it’s pretty clear that they’re more concerned about delivering a usable product than focusing on the technical aspects. There’s a good mix of business strategy, project management, and technical competence.

In retrospect, are there areas that you think they could improve on as a service provider?

Not for me. We haven’t experienced any issues with them. They do a fantastic job. They’ve spent years honing their business practices and recruiting top talent. It’s definitely paid off.

Could you briefly describe your organization?

The organization is in procurement services. We sell software solutions to procurement organizations.

What is your position?

I’m the CTO.

Could you describe the business challenges you were trying to address when you initiated the relationship with Itransition?

We were initially trying to get a first version of our product out. It was a fresh start-up at the time. We didn’t have the technical chops to build it ourselves. We had the conceptual design, but we needed a team of engineers to come in and actually build it for us. 

Could you describe the scope of the project in greater detail?

We hired them for custom software development and project management. We received three dedicated engineers for about six months of side-by-side work. We worked closely with them on the custom build and deployment.

How did you select Itransition as your solution partner for this endeavor?

We’d worked with them in the past, about 10 years ago. I knew the guys personally, but the developers assigned to us were all new to me. I had been impressed with the quality of their services before, so they were quickly one of the top choices for us when we began considering vendors.

Could you provide a sense of the size of this initiative in monetary terms?

I believe the cumulative cost was somewhere between $50,000 and $100,000.

When was this project completed?

The deployment was completed in early 2011.

In terms of results, could you share any statistics, metrics, or user feedback that you’ve received that would demonstrate the effectiveness of the work they’ve delivered?

The culmination of this project, we had our first live, paying customer use it. We’ve continued working with Itransition as we build a profitable, scalable, hybrid business. We’re still working with them on the next iterations of the program. They’ve really been invaluable.

When working with Itransition, is there anything you’d consider unique about their approach or development methodology that distinguishes them from other vendors?

One thing that's impressed us the most of the ownership they take over their work. If it’s half past eight or nine in the evening where they are, it’s more than likely that they’re working on our features or improving something for us. They don’t nickel and dime you for their time. 

In retrospect, are there areas that you think they could improve on as a service provider?

On balance, they’re been great. There’d been a few times where I’ve had to get really chatty with them. There’d be some moments where things get a bit fraught, but everything gets sorted out and the relationship comes out stronger on the other side. We started off with a small piece of work, and here we are, three years later. We invest nearly four times as much on their services now than we did when we first began. We’ve consistently awarded them more work because we’ve been impressed with what they deliver to us. We’re definitely looking to increase that investment further.

Could you briefly describe your organization?

I work for a company called IP Navigation Group, or IPNav. It’s a patent monetization firm that helps organizations and inventors figure out how to make money from their patents. The group I work with is responsible for devising a platform that can analyze our patent data. 

What is your position?

I’m the CTO.

Could you describe the business challenges you were attempting to address with you initiated the relationship with Itransition?

There didn’t exist in the marketplace an automated way to go through millions of patents granted around the world. It was a very human-intensive process to go through a portfolio of patents in order to understand which patents might be valuable. Our business challenge was to create a computer system based on our tacit knowledge that would effectively automate the process. This was a very complex challenge, to say the least.

Could you describe the scope of the project in greater detail?

Itransition is essentially our go-to development partner. We handle all of the backend data aggregation on our end, and Itransition is responsible for all of the user experience work and custom development. They also built the analytics engine that drives the platform. 

How did you select Itransition as your solution partner?

Our founder introduced us to Itransition. We began originally with a very small Web development project, which was an intellectual property portal that allowed people in different industries to post valuable media and blog content for others. That was our dummy project. We were comfortable with their development and their project management, so we decided to move forward with them.

Could you provide a sense of the size of this initiative in monetary terms?

This is a continuing effort that needs consistent and continual improvement and enhancement. At this point, we’ve probably invested around $10 million into the effort with Itransition.

In terms of results, could you share any statistics, metrics, or user feedback that you’ve received that might demonstrate the effectiveness of the work they’ve delivered?

The best metric would be in the mid-2000s, around 2007 or 2008, we were a five- to 10-person team that went through this process manually. It was extremely cumbersome and time consuming. We knew it wouldn’t be cost effective in the long term. It just wasn’t sustainable. Because we built this platform that automated most of that work, it allowed us to look at larger portfolios in a more timely fashion. The company’s grown to be a worldwide organization with dozens and dozens of employees. A considerable portion of that growth can definitely be attributed to the system we built with Itransition.

When working with Itransition, is there anything you’d consider unique about their approach or development methodology that distinguishes them from other vendors?

The one thing that’s been great about Itransition is the way they treat our relationship. They've gone out of their way to be flexible with us, and they really take ownership of their work, which is reflected in its quality. They’re totally ingrained and embedded in our development process. We talk to them on a daily basis about what things are going on, how we can make improvements, and what our long-term strategy should be. We’re very comfortable delegating items to them that we know are in their area of expertise. They’re just as comfortable questioning our judgment and tactics, often posing insightful recommendations.

In retrospect, are there areas that you think they could improve on as a service provider?

I know that they have a business analyst group that comes in and deals with requirements gathering. We haven’t used that group very much. We’ve mostly worked with the group that’s out of Belarus, and that’s easier to do from a technology perspective. I’d say if they could build their business analyst group here in the States, that’d be ideal. Outside of that, I can’t really provide any recommendations for them. We’ve been extremely pleased with their work. They’re fantastic.

Could you briefly describe your organization?

My company name is called Fee Technology. It’s based on a patent that I was awarded in 2007. The patent is a mathematically based accounting solution for measuring profits. It’s a verifiable solution to profit measurement. Not only is it a custom solution, it's a universal solution. 

What is your position?

I’m the president and founder of Fee Technology.

Could you describe the business challenges you were attempting to address when you initiated the relationship with Itransition?

At the time of receiving the patent for my solution, I didn’t have the resources or the capability to build it. I knew I needed to find a technology partner to build my software using the conceptual design. I needed to hire expert developers and strategists to bring the solution to life.

Could you describe the scope of the project in greater detail?

Itransition basically did the complete build of my patented solution. All I had was a proof of concept, the mathematic formula, and a basic layout for it. I had nothing else besides the intellectual property. I strategized with them the best approach for deploying my solution, and they worked with me to figure that out. We gathered missing requirements and scoped the project out before they began to create it. They also dealt with some of the infrastructural elements of the software, and handled the QA/QC [quality assurance/quality control] testing, too.

How did you select Itransition as your solution partner for this endeavor?

At the time, I was located in Tulsa, Okla. I was in the process of moving to Austin, Texas. I must have contacted and requested bids from at least 12 different developers in Austin. Itransition offered the most economical proposal in terms of value for cost. I was impressed with their capabilities and their previous work, so I felt confident in their ability to deliver my solution.

Could you provide a sense of the size of this initiative in monetary terms?

It cost anywhere from $40,000 to $60,000.

When was your solution successfully built?

We finished about two and half years ago at the beginning of 2012.

In terms of results, could you share any statistics, metrics, or user feedback that would demonstrate the effectiveness of the work they’ve delivered?

Last year was our breakout year. Our revenue grew from $147,000 to $1.45 million. We’ve now deployed our solution in more than 600 veterinary hospitals around the nation. Our solution is able to find over 120 percent of the profit that companies are looking for. To put that into terms, we’re probably adding, in the veterinary industry, 5 percent of sales. It’s all up to the doctor in the end because they can see where they are making money and where they’re not. That’s the whole point of the solution.

Itransition was instrumental in the whole process. The first time we did this, they stayed on schedule. I was able to launch this thing on time. We were actually in close negotiations with Pfizer as we were building it, which added another layer of pressure to the whole project. But, as soon as we’d gotten this thing on the cloud, I could mathematically prove to them what we were talking about, which was great. Now, we are exclusively with them.

When working with Itransition, is there anything you’d consider unique about their approach or development methodology that distinguishes them from other vendors?

They were able to build my dream when others couldn’t. What makes them unique is I was able to provide the concept and they built it from scratch. They have an extraordinary talent pool to draw from, and their project management style is very effective that, at least in my situation, they were more likely to hit their marks ahead of schedule than come up late. 

In retrospect, are there areas you think they could improve on as a service provider?

I really don’t have any criticisms. I can’t even begin to tell you how appreciative I’ve been of their work. They’re excellent partners, and they’ve been responsible for building my wildly successful solution.

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am the project manager for an app company.

For what projects/services did your company hire Itransition?

For monitoring and maintenance of the already-existing app

How did you select this vendor and what were the deciding factors?

We used Itransition for QA services earlier in this project.

Describe the project in detail and walk through their service package.

Monitoring and maintaining the existing App and transitioning it from a previous developer. This involved fixing many bugs and operational issues due to the transition.

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

Igor is the primary technical contact and technical team lead on the Itransition side. Maksim is the primary business contact and oversight on the project on the Itransition side. Additional team resources for monitoring, QA, development, and IT operations.

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

The app is up and running and the persistent login issue since transitioning from the previous developer was fixed. This is a big deal for the project.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

Very effective - great communication between myself and Igor and Maksim.

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

Smart, responsive, skilled technically, super nice, and enjoyable to work with and speak with.

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

The time difference with Belarus is a bit difficult at times but manageable. Perhaps better communication with the previous Itransition QA team would be better but I do not know the corporate structure at Itransition.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the Founder & CEO of MyAutoData (MAUD). We're building the first worldwide platform for vehicle owners to make money and save money by using vehicle data.

What challenge were you trying to address with Itransition?

We needed web development and design that would be highly secure.

What was the scope of their involvement?

They completely developed a complicated and comprehensive website for us. That included deciding upon programming languages, databases, how to make it scalable, etc. As far as design, they handled the mockups and layout of the website. The programming was done in PHP and JavaScript.

There are 4 phases; we're currently in the second phase, which is development of vehicle generated data. We'll work on our integrated marketplace and a comprehensive query center for market research and benchmarking shortly.

What is the team composition?

Oksana (Project Manager, Itransition) was the main point of contact.

How did you come to work with Itransition?

After deep discussions with other software companies in the UK and Germany, I selected Itransition because of their abilities and enthusiasm for the project.

How much have you invested with them?

We spent about $220,000 on the project.

What is the status of this engagement?

I began working with them in October 2018, and it is ongoing.

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

It was done well, and they were very organized. Following their rounds of testing, we did beta testing. They didn’t find any bugs, which speaks to the quality of their work. When we went live, there were no issues. 

How did Itransition perform from a project management standpoint?

They're very keen on sticking to the timeline and budget. We mostly communicated through emails because they wanted requirement specifications documented. We had bi-weekly conference calls, as well. I got a monthly report on progress.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Their enthusiasm for the project and their ability to bring input to the table set them apart. I appreciated their understanding of the not-so-simple project and interesting suggestions and recommendations. They're very smart and do their best to make the project a success.

Are there any areas they could improve?

While having everything documented helps avoid misunderstandings, it can sometimes slow the process down.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Be fully involved with the team. They're committed.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the president and CEO of a 501(c)(3) nonprofit research and education organization.

What challenge were you trying to address with Itransition?

We do most of our work through our website, so we brought them in to do a complete site rebuild, which includes backend work with the membership system, education and credentialing system, project review system, and fairly complex invoicing system.

What was the scope of their involvement?

While the design was largely done when they came on board, they’ve visually augmented our previous solution. They managed the front- and backend for our traditional site. That includes the informational end as well as account management. Within the platform, users are able to take courses, track their progress, and maintain credentials through the site. Companies can also create corporate accounts for individuals. 

There’s also a section of the site that allows us to review and structure projects. Project teams can submit and upload documents, while reviewers can score and interact with the teams. Our invoicing is also done on the site. They were responsible for making this work on the backend. To do so, they conducted an analysis of the existing site. We provided them with a list of changes and features we wanted. Then, they mapped everything out for us.  

What is the team composition?

Their team has grown and changed since we started about a year ago. We started with a project manager and a business analyst. Then, we have contributions when needed from UX teammates, graphic design specialists, and QA people. 

How did you come to work with Itransition?

I originally found them on Clutch after having a negative experience with our previous developer. We didn’t have backgrounds in web development, so we used Clutch to assess the quality of developers through reviews. They were ranked highly on the site at the time. 

How much have you invested with them?

We spent about $190,000 to date. It’ll be closer to $225,000 when we complete the project.

What is the status of this engagement?

They’ve been rebuilding the site for about a year. We started in April 2019 and are looking to finish in April 2020.

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

While we haven’t launched yet or received user feedback, they’re a very professional team. I appreciate that they document everything very carefully, telling you exactly how much time they intend to spend on a task and how they will complete it. Their willingness to map everything out and track feedback has contributed to my positive experience.  

How did Itransition perform from a project management standpoint?

They’ve been on track. Any delays have been our fault because we changed to the scope of work part way through the project. They’ve incorporated those changes and taken everything in stride. Their team used Jira to document and track the project. It served as our database for decision-making. We also have Zoom calls that get recorded, so they can refer back to decisions.  

What did you find most impressive about them?

With our previous developer, we’d find errors in their work and report them to their staff. Itransition has found errors that we didn’t even notice at first and proposed improvements on their own. They take direction from us but can propose their own solutions that might be better for us. I found that to be very helpful. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, I think they did a great job.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Knowing what you want in advance is helpful. It would also benefit a customer to understand the amount of work and logic that goes into a complex app development project. Be prepared to spend a lot of time figuring things out.