Accedia

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

Sun Technosystems is a South African software development company, founded in Sandton, Africa, that specializes in software development and consulting services. The company also provides business facilitation services for large enterprise clients on the local market. Its portfolio consists of leading international Financial,Telecommunication, Information Technology, Marketing, Media, and Advertisement organizations.

The Managing Director of the company, my role is to facilitate the relationships between our subcontractors and business clients. This means that I help both parties achieve quality communication, unmatched service offerings, and on-time release of developed solutions. In addition, I consult our business partners and clients on the best approach to reach their goals and grow their organizations further.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

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

We and Accedia partnered around the common goal to deliver quality offshore software development services and resources. As a company with experience in facilitating business relationships for our local clients, we aim to assure the best outsourcing services and the best communication that are not deterred by the large distances. Since the beginning of our partnership, Accedia and we have collaborated on projects for different businesses in various industries. One of them is a leading financial institution in South Africa. Accedia has executed many projects for them, mainly in the spheres of enterprise application development and IT consulting services.

In general, Accedia has contributed to the successful implementation of both internal business and external customer-facing applications for our business partners on a group, department, and subsidiary levels. Our goals were and still are to allocate the best software development service providers that can support our clients in delivering immersive user experiences for business and end clients on the territory of South Africa. Thus, we are constantly on the lookout for technology partners that have expertise with the latest technologies and experience from particular industries.

Accedia’s track record of successful projects with global clients from manufacturing, finance, and energy, among others, has made them the perfect choice. I can honestly say that we have lucked out by having them as our partners and thanks to their dedication and professionalism, we have continuously reached and surpassed business objectives.

SOLUTION

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

We facilitate business relationships with carefully selected international service providers on behalf of our clients. Accedia had the highest success rate, previous experience with local businesses, offerings flexibility, and ability to respond on time to changing circumstances. Thus, some of our clients, picked them as a provider of choice and us as the company that can represent said provider on the local market.

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

Our team is collaborating with Acccedia on multiple projects that require different technology expertise, industry know-how, and have different durations. Thanks to our facilitation efforts and the great professionalism that Accedia showed, our clients received the support they needed to deliver innovative solutions. Currently, Accedia is engaged in multiple development projects through which the leading financial institution will be able to provide superb financial services to its end and business clients. Some of the projects involved the implementation of cutting-edge web applications with a Microsoft .NET stack of technologies. Their end goal is to optimize the contribution and investment processes. The platforms not only make them more efficient but also more flexible. The solutions save time and effort for users and enable them complete freedom in managing their finances, as well as a detailed forecast of their future investments and expenses.

Accedia is also engaged in the development of an innovative web portal that offers a responsive user-friendly channel through which users can access their whole financial data and projections for the years to come. The platform includes many stand-alone applications that are also integrated with the mobile application, allowing users on-the-go access to their financial data, comprehensive reports, and recommendations for efficient management of future expenses. In the course of our collaboration, Accedia has continuously demonstrated proficiency with Microsoft .NET framework, web technologies such as ASP.NET MVC and ASP.NET Web API, collaboration solutions (Microsoft SharePoint and Dynamics 365), data analytics (Microsoft SSRS, Microsoft SSIS, Microsoft SQL Server) and the Microsoft Azure cloud platform.

The company has proved to be an invaluable partner to our business clients with their Microsoft technology expertise and professional approach. The consultants at Accedia have supported and continue to deliver quality user experiences for our partners through the successful integration of enterprise knowledge, the latest data security standards, and cutting-edge technology frameworks.

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

Our usual setup includes designated Project managers (PM) who facilitate the relationship between our end client and the subcontractor they have hired through us. When working with Accedia, we also apply the same practice and so far it has worked well for all sides. The PMs on both sides – ours and Accedia’s establish a communication channel that delivers feedback quickly and efficiently.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Accedia’s commitment, expertise, and professional attitude have helped our partners in developing strong business and client-facing innovative solutions that offer quality services and address properly day-to-day user needs. As a clear indicator of success, I can offer the request of one of our biggest clients to continue the collaboration with Accedia and their preference to use this partner on bigger and more complex projects. The track record of successfully executed projects further confirms their value as our partner and provider of choice for our clients.

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

We sustained multiple communication channels to cover day-to-day questions and feedback pertaining to general objectives, projects-specific, and relationship-wise matters with Accedia. Thanks to the different means of collaborations and a dedicated PM on each side, I can say that we are upholding good workflow dynamics and so far have managed to deliver all solutions on time.

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

Accedia stood out with their dedication, professionalism, and agility to start immediately, undertake short-term engagements, and scale team up and down depending on our client’s business needs. Accedia has gone above and beyond to support all our clients in delivering innovative solutions for the local market. Thus, not only do they offer unmatched by local partners' development services, but also show an ability to stay flexible to our client’s changing requirements.

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

Throughout our collaboration, Accedia has delivered on its promise of quality services. They exceed our expectations, keep us informed of any changes, and are an essential part of the teams of our clients despite the distance, the cultural differences, and the work ethics. Currently, I am not aware of any areas for improvement that need to be addressed. On the contrary, I can confirm that they have quickly adapted their own team to the new “remote-only” way of communication and this has had no impact on our collaboration.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

My organization is a parent company of a number of local newspaper entities in the US and UK. I am the head of media engineering, so I drive the construction of digital products for our organization.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Accedia?

We were going through some tremendous changes as we transitioned our organization from Print to digital. The specific challenge I was facing is that we have a team in India that we outsource some of our work to, and the offshore model requires a lot of time put into the communication and management of the work. I wanted to transition that engagement to a team that could operate a little bit more autonomously.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

What Accedia did for us was twofold: one is to provide specialized Java expertise to help us build enterprise backend services for our organization, and the other is to work as a full-stack engineering team that handles the development of entire products that we manage.

Their involvement with us has scaled over time to the point where we can give them projects to tackle and just handle the management of timelines and clarifications while they break down and tackle on the work within their own team.

What was the team composition?

At the height of our demand, we had nine of their engineers working with us, but we’ve scaled that back during the pandemic and are between 4–8 active resources for the most part.

How did you come to work with Accedia?

One of my peers was working with them and was very much enjoying the relationship, so he recommended that I explore the possibility of working with them. We have them a test project to begin with and have been working together ever since.

How much have you invested with them?

The total cost of the engagement has between $1 million – $2 million.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with them around February 2018 and the project is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The way we measure our success is against the roadmap that we build with our business partners, and we can see how each project moves us further down that roadmap and whether or not we fully delivered against our goals for that scope of work. We continue to work with them largely because of the significant benefit that they are able to deliver to our team in meeting those goals.

The other main metric we track is our revenue stream, which my general manager and I are constantly monitoring to see the impact of our various products and services. There are a number of smaller processes going on underneath that and we always hold retrospectives to make sure we are turning around individual tickets and things like that, but at a higher level we have seen more than the revenue growth we are targeting, so we’re very pleased with the results.

How did Accedia perform from a project management standpoint?

The model they follow is that they assign a technical lead who acts as the project manager. They liaise with the technical lead on our side of the business, and they work together to coordinate the flow of the work.

That management is part and parcel with their services and that level of proactivity has been reflected in the questions and clarifications they have for the context of our business problems, and the out-of-the-box solutions that they deliver.

Underneath the project lead, they have a number of engineers, QA, and operational resources who figure out how to break down and complete each of the tasks. Those team members attend all of our standups, which helps us to make sure that all of us are consistently on the same page.

What did you find most impressive about them?

The process that they follow in bringing on resources is incredibly rigorous and lasts beyond the initial stages of your engagement, so we haven’t had any issues with the people they’ve put onto our teams. The level of trust we’ve developed with them because of that consistency and performance is a huge asset to the work. They have built a partnership with us that goes beyond just the terms of a contract, and that has worked incredibly well.

Are there any areas they could improve?

We constantly discuss what they can be doing better or differently, and they are always incredibly willing to learn and improve no matter who’s fault the issue may have been. Given that attitude, I really don’t have anything I wish they were doing differently.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

You have to approach it as a partnership. Do your due diligence, and really take the time to figure out how you’re going to communicate your goals and walk through the process with them so that they understand what you are looking for and have a chance to deliver that.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the systems support manager at a financial institution that provides administration for pension and provident funds. This includes good healthcare, insurance, and investments.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Accedia?

We needed them to build a fund accounting system that could generate and audit working papers and financial statements. Then these papers and statements are submitted to a financial services regulator.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

We’re a big company, and I’m only speaking from my experience and on behalf of my specific division’s project with Accedia. Essentially, we had an existing system that was developed in-house, and Accedia had to build on top of it. They added several new features and increased functionality so users can navigate and utilize the solution. These additional functionalities relay important information that wasn’t there before.

This has been an evolving project. Many things have been deployed, and we’re continuing to build the system. The more we use it, the more requirements are needed and developed.

What is the team composition?

There have been several different people over the years.

How did you come to work with Accedia?

I can’t speak to my company as a whole because I’m just one small cog in the wheel. Our group, the IT department, was looking for developers to come and assist because we couldn’t find the right resources.

How much have you invested with them?

I’m not the one who makes the payments. We’ve probably invested around $5 million so far.

What is the status of this engagement?

Our ongoing partnership began in May 2013.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

My role is on the support team for business users who use the system we developed. Since its deployment, we've seen an increase in efficiency. What’s more, the turnaround time for producing financial statements for the board of trustees and the regulator has been optimized. Doing the submissions used to be a very manual process, and now it’s completely within their hands. Users can do it as they please, bringing flexibility and efficiency to the process.

How did Accedia perform from a project management standpoint?

Accedia is always clear, precise, and reliable. They consistently deliver what they say they will. There has never been a time when they’ve said something can’t be done. When I ask if something is possible, they come back and give me the solution or an alternative.

What did you find most impressive about them?

I’ll reiterate that their efficiency is excellent. What’s more, they’re up-to-date with technology and everything new in their industry. If they come across a problem, they research it and find a solution for us.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, I can’t think of anything.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Be clear and concise in explaining what your requirements are. If you’re transparent about your objectives, Accedia will achieve them.