Our Philosophy
Our goal is to maximize the extent to which your win is our win.
Around 50% of software industry projects fail. The main causes are a lack of early feedback to catch mistakes, poor negotiation of scope changes, and poor communication of budget and quality expectations.
These issues are all directly caused by the standard practices of big upfront scope plans, billing via large deposit/delivery payments, and not offering different options around speed/quality/reliability.
To address these issues we have developed a flexible subscription-based model that gives you the ability to select an intensity of development and completion quality that best suits the lifecycle stage and goals of your product.
We still have product plans, milestones, and organise work via product roadmaps, but instead of stressing over scope changes, we continuously prioritise your roadmap and tackle the top tasks at the intensity and quality level you require.
Our Pricing
Our pricing can vary all the way from $25,000 to $312.50 per month depending on your specific needs. You can calculate your price in two simple steps:
Step 1: Choose a completion quality tier
| Quality | Description | Price |
|---|---|---|
| Enterprise | Full testing, full analytics, 24/7 support | $5,000 / month |
| Startup | Strategic testing, key analytics, 12 hour support turnaround | $2500 / month |
| Prototype | No testing, no analytics, 48 hour support turnaround | $1250 / month |
Step 2: Multiply your selected price by the intensity of development needed at each stage of your product's lifecycle.
| Intensity | Description | Price |
|---|---|---|
| Active development | Implementing your roadmap with all available resources. | x5 |
| Steady improvement | Steadily implementing key improvements based on user feedback | x1 |
| Stable support | Updating software packages, fixing bugs | x0.25 |
- Before we start, you will get a product plan that indicates of how many months your project could expect to spend at each intensity level.
- If you ever wish to take self-custody of your system, we can set it up for you to take over.
- Instead of massive upfront deposits, we bill you as we go, so you can stop at any time.
- Invoices are sent monthly, but calculated by week, so you can chop and change your plan anytime.
We believe that this model is the most efficient use of time and budget and gives your product the best shot at success.
Our process
Step 1 - Get in touch
We'll need to get a little more information about your project before we can give you an accurate quote, so please contact us and we'll make an appointment for a call or face-to-face meeting.
Step 2 - Call or face to face meeting
We'll discuss your project, and explain what we can do for you. We'll also ask you a number of questions about your goals for your product or service and discuss how to create the types of features you'll need.
Step 3 - Product Plan
After the meeting is over, we'll create a plan and email it to you for review. The plan will include:
- The estimated cost of the project, in terms of monthly subscriptions
- A rough timeline
- The team we'll use
- An outline of features to be built
Step 4 - Get started
If you're happy with the plan, we'll set up a product roadmap and get started.
The product roadmap will include:
- Strategy & requirements
- Solution architecture
- User interface design
- Software development cycles, build, test, deployment and feedback
Our principles
We follow the following principles:
- We prioritize tasks by risk elimination not sequentially. We'll isolate and solve the hardest problems first and then put everything together once we know how they can fit nicely.
- Evolution, not assembly. We don't just check off features on a checklist once they "work", we evolve products flexibly over several iterations to get them working beautifully.
- Conversation of complexity. For every improvement of user experience, there is an equal and opposite increase in the complexity of the code. Making something work mind-blowingly well often takes 10x more effort than just making it work.
- The paradox of choice. The time it takes to make a decision is a result of the possible choices. Therefore, the more narrow user requirements, the easier to use a product will be.
- Principle of least effort. The adoption of something is exponentially proportional to how easy it is to use. Software projects fail often because they try to do too much and run out of momentum before they reach the tipping point for ease of use/adoption.
- 80/20 Rule. 80% of a software system will be written in 20% of the time, the hardest 20% of the code will take up 80% of the time, and 80% of users will only use 20% of the product. The single most cost-saving activity in a software project is the refinement of the scope through prioritization and elimination.
- No design by committee. Engaging all sorts of stakeholders is great but someone needs to be the Product Owner and take full responsibility for the outcome. Focus on your customer and their most important problem, hold the full vision yourself, and we'll back you all the way.
- Van Loon's Law. The amount of mechanical development will always be in inverse ratio to the number of slaves that happen to be at a country’s disposal. Innovation only happens when constraints put enough force on something to be improved. Make sure you ask the right questions from the right people.
- Communication paradox. Communication is best improved by eliminating the need for it. Instead of endless emails, meetings, and calls, we should try to build self-serve resources like FAQ pages and product roadmaps that show the status of tasks.