Saritasa

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and position.

I am the Business Manager / Financial Secretary of Ironworkers Local 433

Describe what your company does in a single sentence.

Ironworkers Local 433 represents over 5,000 Ironworkers in Los Angeles, Las Vegas, and the surrounding areas. 

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What specific goals or objectives did you hire Saritasa to accomplish?

• creating an accurate experience, giving others a better understanding on the work we do.

SOLUTION

How did you find Saritasa?

Online Search

Why did you select Saritasa over others?

• Close to my geographic location
• Pricing fit our budget
• Good value for cost
• Company values aligned

Describe the scope of work in detail. Please include a summary of key deliverables.

The idea was to create a VR experience showing your first day on the job. Since our trade has various elements, the experience also has various elements. Each floor has a different scope of work that the user has to complete before continuing on. It was important to us that this experience be as accurate as possible and Saritasa delivered. 

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What were the measurable outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

Throughout the development of this project, we had weekly meetings to review the progress of the experience and answer any questions regarding the system. These weekly meetings were extremely beneficial, allowing both us, the customer, and Saritasa to stay on the same page. 

Describe their project management. Did they deliver items on time? How did they respond to your needs?

We always had someone from Saritasa there to answer any questions we had regarding the VR system. If a question could be answered via email, they would; if not, they would set up a virtual meeting where we would discuss the issue at hand in great detail and come up with solutions. 

What was your primary form of communication with Saritasa?

• Virtual Meeting
• Email or Messaging App

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

They knew how important it was to have this system be as accurate as possible, and they did everything they could to make that happen. 

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

Overall, we had such a good experience with this company that we would not suggest anything be done differently. 

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.
I'm the COO of a private contractor that provides crossing guard services across the US. We serve in 22 states to hundreds of school districts and elementary schools. 

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Saritasa?

We needed to develop a custom mobile application to manage our scheduling and communicate with our 8,000 guards across the US. 

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Saritasa has designed and developed a custom application for iOS and Android devices using Python and PHP. The app enables us to provide our staff with their schedules and generate a service matrix for our clients. When I started working at my company, the app's foundation was already built in terms of the framework. 

I started to work on the project three years ago, and my involvement was collaborating with Saritasa to enhance the app's different user profiles that work inside the app's system. The app has different access points for users depending on their job positions and titles. Saritasa has also supported us in the initial steps of developing our invoicing process.

What is the team composition?

We work with 4–5 developers from Saritasa. We also work with a project coordinator and Stan (Senior Client Partner). 

How did you come to work with Saritasa?

My company's engagement with Saritasa precedes my time working here, and I'm unsure how they initially found the team.

How much have you invested with them?

We spend around $100,000–$120,000 yearly on this project. 

What is the status of this engagement?

I began working with Saritasa in May 2020, and our engagement is ongoing. However, the team has a longer working relationship with my company.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Without Saritasa's development support, we would be at a significant disadvantage as a company. The team is an integral and important part of ensuring our software functions on a daily basis. Saritasa's work quality is excellent, and the team is a very strong business partner for our company. The team does a tremendous job for our company. 

How did Saritasa perform from a project management standpoint?

We have weekly Zoom meetings with Saritasa's project coordinator, who is very organized and responsive when we have questions for the developers. In these meetings, Saritasa gives status updates on any pending bug issues or new tasks. We don't communicate via email because Jira sends notifications when something is added to the Jira board, allowing instant visibility for Saritasa's team and ours. 

Whenever we encounter bugs or glitches in the team's work, we communicate it via Jira. We collaborate with Saritasa on Jira to share files and snippets of error logs, and the team fixes issues quickly. Regarding the budget, Saritasa provides us with reasonable quotes according to the enhancements we request. Some projects have been a little over budget, but on a holistic look, we're on target with the provided budget and estimates. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

I'm impressed with Saritasa's overall performance. Saritasa is a strong firm that has good key management, and all teammates I've interacted with are highly professional. The team meets their promises and follows through. I've been directly engaged with them for four years and haven't been disappointed at any time. 

Saritasa offers a positive experience and is a pleasure to work with. The team is a strong stakeholder for us and a strong business partner. We've had an instance when Amazon servers went down, and they threw their whole team at our project to get us back up and running even though it wasn't directly involved with them.

Are there any areas they could improve?

I can't think of anything Saritasa can improve on.

Do you have any advice for future clients of theirs?

You need to have a clear idea of your requirements as a customer. Maybe not having a complete picture, but a clear idea of where you want to go and the problem you're trying to solve with your project. The better you define that, the better any service provider can support you. I recommend having a clear picture of your business case.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.
I'm the software and firmware engineering manager for a company that makes powersports aftermarket tools for tuning vehicles.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Saritasa?
We needed help with building an iOS and Android mobile app. Our ultimate goal was to improve our customer-facing app. We had already worked with other developers previously, but our app wasn't as good as it could have been. In a sense, we wanted a better app to improve sales.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?
Saritasa developed a pair of iOS and Android mobile apps for one of our devices. Initially, we provided them with our existing app, showed them how it worked, and showed some YouTube videos that further explained how it worked. Still, the existing app had some issues, so Saritasa built the new version from scratch. Their work also included a little design work because they stuck with the original design but enhanced it to make it better as well.

As for the technology stack, they used Figma for the design. The project also required some Bluetooth Low Energy development to communicate with our device. This app required a few features, including device scanning, so we also had to do a firmware update of our device. Therefore, device implementation was also involved in their work for timing optimization. Other development pieces included a lot of Rest API calls. The app's main functionality is the ability to reflash an engine controller.

What is the team composition?
We worked with a technical manager, a project manager, and an account manager from Saritasa. There was also a team working behind each of those managers, but I don't know how many teammates included each team.

How did you come to work with Saritasa?
I don't have a clear idea of how we found Saritasa. I believe our CTO contacted them.

How much have you invested with them?
We spent around $270,000.

What is the status of this engagement?
We worked together from September 2022–December 2023.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?
Our app has been launched, and it has around 2,500–3,000 users per platform. Unfortunately, we're sitting at about a 1.5-star review on the Play Store and the App Store as well. We've recently hired a new developer, who has looked at the code and told us that it looks pretty good, is well-organized, and is easy to take over. Therefore, the quality of Saritasa's work was good overall. Moreover, Saritasa worked pretty quickly, and the app worked very well, all things considered. 

How did Saritasa perform from a project management standpoint?
During the discovery phase, Saritasa did a good job of asking a lot of questions to get a decent idea of the app we needed. Still, they didn't get a full understanding of our app's depth. Therefore, they first provided a fixed estimate, but they then ended up doing a bit more work than initially thought. However, that issue was probably on us too for not the details as well as possible.

Sometimes, it was difficult to communicate well and get complicated features figured out. Saritasa was great about asking us for really detailed documentation, which we built. However, they didn't follow all of it, leaving out some key details or not implementing certain parts. Overall, they were great, but this seemed to be a complex project for them. We communicated via email and Microsoft Teams.

Are there any employees from the service provider's team that you would like to give a shout-out to in this review?
Thien (iOS Developer) did a great job on our Bluetooth code — it was excellent.

What did you find most impressive about them?
Saritasa's discipline was their biggest strength. Their work was well-structured; they required good documentation for everything and forced us to write that documentation, which was wonderful. Their way of working really changed our practices moving forward altogether. Moreover, they had great technical resources, so they were able to figure out just about anything we needed to do.

Are there any areas they could improve?
I wasn't very thrilled with Saritasa's project management. I usually wound up going through the project manager and talking directly to the technical manager because I didn't feel there was as much communication as it could have been. Additionally, I felt that they weren't well-prepared for everything. Whenever we jumped into meetings, they didn't have much to report, so our meetings usually were pretty short.

Do you have any advice for future clients of theirs?
Ensure that your project is well-documented and detailed upfront. Then, walk Saritasa through all those details before you begin the process.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the COO of US Gymnastics Development Center, a children-to-teenage-years gymnastics, cheerleading, and ninja training facility. We offer programs from mommy-and-me classes one hour a week to competitive programs in gymnastics and cheerleading for boys and girls that train upwards of 20 hours per week.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Saritasa?

We have over 700 families and students in the gym, and we needed a CRM system that could process payments and where customers could see the schedule and register kids into the classes and see the schedule.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Saritasa provides us with development services. The project has had two phases; in phase one, they built a website. We told them the information we needed to see when registering a student and asked for a parent section linked to that profile. We also gave them our requirements when creating a class; the page should show the cadence and whether the class is hourly, multi-hour, or mandatory. They designed the site from scratch. 

On the site, we can log in to add students and classes and view or schedule. Parents can call us, and we can register kids for classes, input family data into the program, and add students to attendance lists to print for coaches. After the initial development, Saritasa worked on the website updates for 1–2 months. 

From there, we started phase two, which involves the payment and pricing system. The team has worked with us to create our custom system with specific and niche pricing based on our programs. We offer programs from 1–20 hours a week with early, sibling, and employee discounts. If there’s credit on a customer’s account, the system applies that. We also have an annual membership fee based on the day each customer joins us. Saritasa uses AWS for both the site and the payment system.

What is the team composition?

I work with one main point of contact from Saritasa. 

How did you come to work with Saritasa?

Around April 2021, our company’s CEO engaged online to find a provider and stumbled across Saritasa. After she reached out to them, they set up a call with us and talked through what they had done and what they could do for us. 

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent around $330,000. 

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in May 2021, and they finished phase one in September 2021 and phase two in August 2022. Our engagement is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The program has completely transformed our ability to do business better for our customers. Before working with Saritasa, we were operating as if it was the 1980s. Now, we have a system where we can see customers’ data, add their credit card information, and store it safely. We can also run automatically instead of manually. 

How did Saritasa perform from a project management standpoint?

Overall, their project management skills have exceeded expectations. From the start, we had a tight deadline to get the site live in September 2021, and Saritasa has fully delivered everything they said they could do. When we started phase two, we had bumps in the road. However, we got back on track, and they’ve met deadlines according to our expectations since then.

Our main point of contact is outstanding;  I meet with him weekly for a half hour or longer, and he gives me a status update. We email throughout the week if anything comes up. To organize, we use a spreadsheet to track all outstanding items and provide Saritasa with weekly status updates. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

I’m most impressed by how Saritasa has achieved our vision, which no other company was willing to do. Our pricing is complex, so most providers told us to use existing programs for payment. However, we knew our specific system worked for us, so it was important to custom-build our system, which Saritasa has done, changing how we do business. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

In the planning stage, it might have been helpful for me to connect with more than just my point of contact. They’ve had to redo some things that they had already finished. Mapping out the pricing phase would have saved some time and bumps on the road. 

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

They should request the same contact as web developers who work with me – I have the best of Saritasa!

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the CEO of Generosity, an online payment platform for churches and charities. We help facilitate donations electronically, including online, in person, or any other medium involving a credit or debit card transaction from the donor to the nonprofit organization.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Saritasa?

We were working with one developer on our platform, but our engagement didn’t work well, so we started looking for a new development company.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Saritasa has helped us engineer, architect, and design our software from the ground up. The first step was scoping the project and outlining what we were trying to accomplish with our platform. Once we finished the scoping process, we divided the development process into two parts: UI/UX and frontend development and backend development.

During the design phase, Saritasa created sketches and different design elements to define what we wanted from a design point of view. As for the development side, they helped us architect our servers and databases to ensure we were compliant with the security standards involved in credit card processing and payments.

We already had a website, so Saritasa helped us link the login and signup buttons on it directly to the backend of our software. Additionally, they helped us organize and integrate our platform's screens into a generosityonline.com URL, and they also created an API with Wells Fargo.

Currently, we continue to develop new features every day. Saritasa has helped us navigate through changes so that we can stay competitive and have our software updated. Additionally, they help us maintain our software.

What is the team composition?

Initially, I worked with two people from Saritasa, but their team quickly escalated. Once we started the development process, we worked directly with a project manager and indirectly with an API developer and a design team. In total, we worked with around six people during the development process.

How did you come to work with Saritasa?

We found Saritasa online during a Google search and reached out to them to explore how much time it would take to set up, architect, and design our software platform.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent around $250,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together around June 2020, and our engagement is ongoing. It took them six months to complete our software, but we’ve kept improving it and redeveloping it since then.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Saritasa has done their job perfectly. Our software works as intended, and everyone loves it.

How did Saritasa perform from a project management standpoint?

Saritasa’s development process is very organized, and they help us see what is happening at all times. They move very quickly, and they’re completely professional. Our project manager is amazing, so I’ve never had to bring anyone else into the equation. He understands my needs and always does a great job. We used Jira for project management and Slack for communication.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Saritasa works really well with us on our hours. During the discovery and scoping phase, a lot of their hours weren’t billed, which was very helpful for us. We felt they were very fair regarding their quotes and work hours.

Additionally, once we launched the software, I talked with Saritasa’s CEO, who gave me a lot of insight regarding best practices moving forward. They offered a lot of launch support, and having a conversation directly with their CEO was a phenomenal addition to that support.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No. I couldn’t imagine a better partner for this venture.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Build your content and know exactly what you want your software to do down to the most detailed and complex scenario. Having everything mapped down will help facilitate the process.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the EVP for Nationwide Rail Services, Inc., a transportation company in the Chicago area that moves loads to and from intermodal or railroad facilities for transportation and logistics companies. We pick up inbound and outbound loads from the railroad and bring them back to the customer or the other way around.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Saritasa?

We needed a customized software solution to track our loads coming in and out of the railroad for our customers in a time-sensitive manner. Our goal was to streamline the process and put information into a database where we could track loads and stay on top of things better.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Saritasa has built a customized software solution for us to track our loads coming in and out of the railroad. They’ve also built tools for invoicing tied to the dispatching solution so that we can tie loads in as soon as they move instead of inputting information manually, which all of our dispatch operations implement. The team has also built a driver-tracking solution for us. 

The dispatch solution lays out all our loads and highlights loads ready for us to pick up in one color and uses another color for loads coming in that day. Currently, Saritasa offers maintenance and hosting. 

What is the team composition?

I’ve mainly worked with three teammates from Saritasa, including a project manager and Peter (Technical Project Manager). 

How did you come to work with Saritasa?

I found them on Google looking for software development companies in the Chicago area. I called a few different companies, and when I called Saritasa, I felt comfortable with the conversation and the rapport we established over the phone. Therefore, I felt confident they were the right company for us. 

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent around $350,000. 

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with them in September 2020 on the dispatch program, and then we re-engaged them in February 2021 for the invoicing and driver-tracking solutions. Our engagement is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Saritasa's work has helped streamline our process. We were looking to save time, cut manual hours, and utilize our teammates' time elsewhere, and that's exactly what we've gotten. Before this engagement, we were inputting our dispatch manually on an Excel spreadsheet and using an outdated manual to track loads coming in. Saritasa has turned that process digital, and now we can just log in and immediately see where everything is.

Moreover, we've cut our invoicing time from 10 to 3–4 hours a day. As a result, teammates who were doing all those tasks can now use their time on different tasks. This result saves us money, making our company more profitable. 

How did Saritasa perform from a project management standpoint?

They're great at project management; they deliver everything on time and respond to every email. They take care of everything we ask for and enact any change we want in a timely manner. We primarily communicate through Zoom calls, and we've also used email. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

Saritasa's communication skills are impressive. They're on top of everything and ask many questions to get to know us really well. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

I don't think they need to improve anything; they've done everything well. 

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Saritasa has taught me a lot, so my advice is to listen to what they say.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the global product line director at Industrial Physics, a physical testing equipment manufacturer that serves a wide range of manufacturing companies.

We sell testing equipment for QC to markets ranging from food and beverage to advanced composites and defense industries and everything in between. Our company has American and European divisions. As part of my role, I have a team of line-specific product managers that report to me, each of whom manages anywhere from 1–3 different brands and the products that lie within them.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Saritasa?

The challenge involved one product brand of our company that specializes in testing equipment referred to as universal testing machines. We acquired the brand in late 2017 and recognized that their existing control, electronics, and software packages for equipment were commercially obsolete, if not functionally obsolete. The software had been developed for a DOS system and patched to work in Windows, which was a competitive disadvantage. 

Initially, we thought we might be able to solve the issue through another acquisition. Still, when that was unsuccessful, we had to return to first principles and introduce a new software and electronics platform. We had the competency in-house to develop the control electronics and the firmware. Still, we lacked the number of engineers with the competency to manage both those things internally. We decided to partner with an outsource provider to develop the PC-based interface, including the graphic UI and the code to drive the instruments and the firmware.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Saritasa has developed a Windows-based custom software platform for us. We had already done our initial scope of work internally to determine the requirements from a deliverables standpoint. Our team decided what the product needed to look like, its primary functionalities, and the boxes it would need to check to meet the expectations of the market and our customer base. 

The team started by focusing on the graphic UI. They determined the user flow and mapped it out with the screens for the users. They also built an if-else diagram to show what would happen when users choose each option. As for development, we requested that Saritasa develop the code using commercially available and relatively off-the-shelf tools. We wanted the option to either bring the product in-house or move to a different partner. The team has built features for data acquisition, manipulation, export, and reporting using a typical SQL database architecture. 

There are three primary areas of functionality within the software product. The first area involves a graphic UI that enables users to input instructions for a piece of equipment. Our in-house embedded software and firmware control the command requirement. However, laboratory technicians or managers need a user-friendly graphic UI residing on a Windows PC, where they can input the commands in a way that makes sense to them, which is what Saritasa has built. These commands go down to the electronics and are converted into actionable instructions. 

Companies use our sizeable testing equipment to test the physical properties of raw materials of finished components. For example, we make testing frames that can weigh up to a ton to test large sections of underground pipe for crushing performance. The program tells the equipment how much force to apply and how rapidly and then measures the resulting responses of the materials. 

Once the commands are initiated, the second function involves moving to a data acquisition and analysis mode. The software solution takes signals from our testing equipment to measure resulting displacements, displacement rates, forces, and stresses. The signals come back into the software, which then databases them. 

The third feature is between the first two areas: a real-time graphic presentation and analysis of the data. The program shows a real-time display that shows results as they occur and provides some functionality to analyze or quantify them. Their software doesn’t directly control our instrument; it works through an intermediate USB controller and provides the instructions to our electronics, which are the machine code they’ve translated into actionable language. 

Although we’ve already launched the product to market, we have continued development with Saritasa. They continuously add features and expand the capability of the product. 

What is the team composition?

We’ve worked with different teams from Saritasa according to the project phases. In the beginning, when they were focused on the graphic UI, the team had about 5–6 engineers. Of them, 2–3 teammates have continued to phase two, and we’ve had another 2–3 people come in and out depending on their expertise and the project’s demands. Throughout the development, we’ve mostly worked with 3–4 people at a time and 5–6 people at most. Within this team, we’ve worked with Konstantin (Managing Director) and Stan (Client Engagement Manager). 

How did you come to work with Saritasa?

Our team shopped around for a partner and looked at over half a dozen potential providers over a 6–8 month period while we developed the scope. We learned about Saritasa through referrals from other vendors we’ve worked with. 

How much have you invested with them?

By the end of this fiscal year, we’ll have spent $435,000–$450,000. 

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together around August 2020, and our engagement is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The quality of the product is fantastic and has exceeded our expectations. Saritasa has been exceptionally good and is often ahead of us. Although we've struggled to hit deadlines, these aren't Saritasa-specific metrics because the delays have been due to supply chain issues. We've struggled to scale prototypes when it comes to buying enough components to build beta units; this is something the industry at large has dealt with for the past 12–18 months. Any time there's a hold-up in the part we control, the whole project runs late, no matter how well Saritasa is on target. 

How did Saritasa perform from a project management standpoint?

They're excellent to work with from a project management standpoint. The lead project manager is superb; they're extremely organized and has a well-developed process. They use boards on Jira to chart the process and development, and that's been great. Even thorough we'd been using our own tools, we've adopted theirs for this project because we like them so well. 

Since we have product groups and factories in the US, Germany, the Netherlands, and the UK, and because we've grown through acquisition, everyone within our company has their own culture and internal engineering and product management tools. We've been trying to create some standardization, so we're also using monday.com. 

Additionally, Stan has been fantastic to work with. He's managed and smoothed things over when Saritasa is ahead of us, and we've struggled to keep them busy. We couldn't have asked for a more professional, understanding, and collaborative partner. Moreover, their turnaround times are very fast. As for communication, we meet with the team once a week at a minimum. Overall, I would highly recommend the way they run their projects. Our exposure to their higher-level project management has been excellent. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

I've been really impressed with Saritasa's ability to listen to the information we give them to educate them about our product, customers, and vision. They had never built software like ours before and had no previous background in its end applications. We gave them a lot of competitive examples to provide them with a flavor of what a customer would expect, then gave them our ideas of how we could do better than that. Still, our project was very conceptual, and they've been able to take these abstract discussions and create concrete examples.

In most cases, what they've built has been exactly what we imagined, and in some instances, even better. Saritasa is very good at anticipating other ways to approach something. The team excels at relating to the graphic UI, and they've also helped us a lot in this respect. With this project, we've gone straight from DOS software to the coolest-looking Windows app in a relatively short time, which is remarkable. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

We've had to work through a few things with them, which is natural when working with two groups of engineers and programmers coming from different ends of the spectrum and age groups. While Saritasa has seasoned teammates, they're on the younger end of the spectrum, and our engineering team isn't. Therefore, we've had to work through our cultural differences. 

Additionally, we've struggled with their internal testing. When they release a new version, it's been relatively buggy, and we've done a lot more debugging than we'd like. However, this is due to us watching our spending after blowing our budget during the project's first phase. For our second phase, we've co-managed our spending well, and more testing on their side would mean more hours we'd pay for. Therefore, the testing issues are an artifact of Saritasa trying to help us be budget-conscious. Still, when we find the bugs, they're responsive and fix them instantly, so that's the other side of the coin.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the co-founder of Versus Poker, a website that replicates the live poker experience as if people are playing in their houses with friends and family. My dad and I started it during the pandemic when we couldn’t play with our regular partners.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Saritasa?

We didn’t have any experience in web development or the nitty gritty details of coding. We needed help to build our website from the ground up.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Saritasa developed our website from scratch. We initially met with them to go over the art and flow of the website. From there, we met with the engineering team to hash out bugs and specific tools. All in all, we told them what we wanted, and they brought it to life.

The main feature they built was the poker engine, which allows users to play Texas Hold’Em. At the table, Saritasa implemented an integrated video and audio chat, a statistics tracker, and the ability to customize settings. Users could tweak the different dollar amounts, time settings, and everything in a usual poker table. Additionally, they created the regular flows and menus of the website.

What is the team composition?

We worked with an account executive, the CEO, the CTO, a designer, an engineering team, and a project manager.

How did you come to work with Saritasa?

We were vetting a couple of companies. We were first introduced to an account executive; then, we met regularly with the CEO and the CTO. They walked us through how they typically went about projects and their general workflow. We clicked well with them, so we decided to move forward. 

How much have you invested with them?

We spent around $100,000–$250,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with them in June 2020 and launched the site in August 2022. We don’t have any development projects going on, but we still touch base with them to squash any details we’re dealing with.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Everything works well. It took a lot of time of fixing, problem-solving, and work with the engineering team, but the navigation aspects, the video and audio chat, and the poker game were seamless. We’re actively trying to get feedback, so it’s still a work in progress. However, we have between 200–300 people signed up so far, so we couldn’t be happier with Saritasa’s work. They understood our vision and spent a lot of time working on it. 

How did Saritasa perform from a project management standpoint?

They were great all throughout the project. They were responsive and attentive; Saritasa was always quick to come up with ideas and suggestions we didn’t think of in the beginning, and their ideas made it to the final product. Moreover, everyone we worked with was fantastic, and they definitely cared about the project. When we started, we gave them the scope and vision; they proposed a budget and stuck to it even when we went overtime. Overall, it was an excellent experience.

We communicated through emails about the little things. We also touched base at least 3–4 times a week on Zoom and about 1–2 times a week with the project manager. Additionally, we used Jira to organize everything we were working on.

What did you find most impressive about them?

In the beginning, we vetted many companies trying to find someone who could do this project for us. One of the things that originally stood out about Saritasa was the way they chronicled their code and kept it organized to make it easily transferable; it was attractive to us because if we ever decided to part ways with them, we could take it elsewhere.

They also had an office nearby, but overall, our conversations with the team were outstanding. We got along well, and they understood what we were trying to do pretty quickly.

Are there any areas they could improve?

At the time, the engineering team was out in Russia, so there was a bit of a language barrier. Also, poker isn’t an intuitive game, so they had to learn about it. We definitely had moments where we explained the rules and had to iron out some things. However, it was just a tiny blip; everything else went well.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Stay active with the communication. They’re readily available, so if you need to ask a question, just pick up the phone and give them a call. Overall, they’re great to work with.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

As the president and owner of a large home care & home health agency my main focus is bringing innovative and expanding ideas in healthcare. With my experience in the industry I helps design and implement new solutions. I've seen the struggles of the industry, so I make it a priority to make an everlasting impact in the field.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

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

We approached Saritasa seeking a professional custom software developer to help in the planning, design, development and launch of a new employee application app and back-office platform designed to increase hiring efficiency, reduce internal overhead and streamline the process for new applicants and back-office personnel.

SOLUTION

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

We Chose Saritasa over other developers due to their dedicated team. they are very client centered and focused very heavily on client satisfaction. They work with you on every angle and are very professional and experienced. We did not have much background in software development and they helped us pinpoint even better ideas and workflows that can enhance our software

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

We utilized them for full stack development including:

• Applicant mobile apps (native iPhone, Android)
• Back-Office Admin Web Application
• PM Kickoff, collaborative planning
• UI Wireframes (UX)
• Graphical Designs (UI)
• Design specifications for Client review and approval
• Database and server architecture and planning
• Frontend Development
• Server Development
• Database server and application server development
• API development for web application
• External API integrations
• Live video streaming, chat
• QA/Testing
• Production Deployment Assistance

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

Richard Brown was our account Representative and has been amazing throughout our Journey! Vadik was the Lead developer. He is extremely well-versed in his work!

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We were able to get our Base app developed in the exact way we imagined it to turn out.

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

Supportive and professional

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

They work with you according to your budget and prioritize items to help with the cost.

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

Very satisfied

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the operations manager for a smart telematics solution company.

When we started working with Saritasa, I was the project manager, and I’m now the operations manager for the Asia-Pacific area. It’s a slightly different role, but I’m still heavily involved in the technical side.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Saritasa?

Our company used to be based in Australia, but we migrated our focus to the US and moved across. We had some full-time developers in-house, but it made more financial sense to use a third party to do the development work for us because we couldn’t move everybody across.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Saritasa essentially provides us with staff augmentation. They offer the whole package of set up, development, maintenance, and upkeep  — they take care of the whole lot. For example, we hosted our server, and they helped set it up. We initially gave them all the technical specs we needed, and they executed them. Now, our server is up and running. 

What is the team composition?

I work closely with 2–3 people, including a senior developer and a project manager. However, I’ve been in contact with 5–6 other team members.

How did you come to work with Saritasa?

My boss found them. His wife knew someone at Saritasa, and they introduced us to them — essentially, it was word of mouth. They were based in California at the time, so they were local, and it worked out well.

How much have you invested in them?

We’ve easily spent $500,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with them in October 2017, and our engagement is ongoing. There is no end date in sight.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We’ve done some code review of their actual work, and it’s been pretty tidy. Moreover, Saritasa’s team responds quickly. We haven’t set metrics to measure their performance, but they’ve delivered fast and good quality.

How did Saritasa perform from a project management standpoint?

Communication is excellent, and they’ve met deadlines. Overall, they stay true to their word.

All communication is via email. We haven’t used any specific project management tools, and it has worked fine for us.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Their skill set is extraordinarily broad, which is excellent. We started off doing a particular project, but now we’ve had different requirements along the way. They’ve done Android development and helped us out with some hardware stuff.

Are there any areas they could improve?

We’ve been happy with Saritasa so far. The most considerable improvement would be the pricing. They do charge a premium price compared to competitors but considering that we can keep it all in one place, it’s worth it. 

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Be very clear with your requirements. If you’re clear, they’ll execute flawlessly.