We want to share with you an interview of our CEO Anthony Shaleynikov for GoodFirms, which is one of the leading B2B research and review platform for top technology software service companies.
Link to the original source
Please introduce your company and your role within the company.
Dashbouquet Development was founded in 2013 and we develop mobile and web apps, technically speaking, on Android, iOS, and JavaScript platforms. I am the owner and the founder of the company. I’ve been running several start-ups and utilizing and buying a lot of IT services. I noticed that modern companies don’t really meet my criteria of expectations that I have from a development partner. They should be flexible, on time, quick, highly educated, proper communication. However, I haven’t come across such a company yet. So, I decided to start an organization that caters to such expectations that a client has from their development partner.
What is your company’s business model– in-house team or third party vendors / outsourcing?
We prefer to keep the quality of work at the highest possible level so we cannot afford outsourcing our projects. Every single piece of the software is built inside the company by our internal employees.
How is your business model beneficial, from a value addition perspective, to your clients as compared to other companies' models?
I’m pretty sure other companies have great value addition from their end on the projects they deliver. However, the way we make ourselves stand apart is by focusing on the technology we use and specific problems that we wish to solve. Since we focus strongly on specific things, it has helped us gain the technology expertise in iOS, Android, and JavaScript platform. We also try to deliver the projects to our clients in the shortest possible time frame.
What industries do you cater to? What ratios of your clients are repetitive?
Our projects belong to different industries. We get a lot of projects from the educational industries and I’ve also been working with a lot of educational start-ups. We also cater to projects from the Entertainment Industry, Fintech Industry, and Social Network. So, whatever start-up you can imagine from any industry or vertical, if our skills and services add some real value to the project, we look forward to taking up the project. Around 72% of our clients have come back to us to work on another project.
Mention the objectives or the parameters critical in determining the time frame of developing an application.
I think most of our customers want something in the shortest possible time. And we are able to develop the MVP in a time span of 6 weeks. Based on the MVP, they decide about developing their business idea further, or what functionalities and features need to be included, and what is the time and budget that they need to dedicate for this.
How much effort in terms of time goes into developing the front end and back end of an application?
Basically, we do more of front end development as back end is already done nowadays. So, I would say, 80% of our focus is on front end and 20% of our focus is channeled towards the back end process.
What are the key parameters to be considered before selecting the right platform for an application?
It depends on the clients objectives. If it’s something real time or requires the user and system to interact with each other, we prefer node or cloud platform. If it’s something bigger, then we prefer to use Node JS platform. If the client requires something quick to test their idea and be in the market within 5-6 weeks, we use React platform to deliver web and mobile applications.
Which platform do you suggest your clients to begin with when they approach you with an idea and why?
If we see we don’t fit the client requirements, we suggest them to approach other developers. However, if their requirements match our skills set and expertise, we definitely suggest from our experience what would be the best platform to achieve their aims. If they want to be quick, or if they want to scale, or if they want to meet specific deadlines, we can help them do that.
Out of all the projects that you delivered in last 1 year, how much % of clients agreed with going first with the platform suggested by you?
As soon as they become our clients, 100% they implement our suggestions or advice on the platform to be used. I cannot recall a situation where in the client was unhappy with the choice and decision of the platform chosen by us.
Native or Hybrid — which platform is best to use to build your app? What are your recommendations?
We don’t build anything on the Hybrid platform because we don’t feel we can build something good out of it. We build 90% of our projects on native platform only.
What are the key factors that you consider before deciding the cost of an application?
There is a common measurement for deciding the cost of an application which is the number of screens. However, it mainly depends on the application itself. We usually work with apps that contain some complicated logic like Natural Language Processing or Image Processing. So, we decide the estimated cost based on the wireframe, designing every single screen, and every other action that is required to build the application.
What kind of payment structure do you follow to bill your clients?
We are trying to avoid fixed cost projects. There are clients that request to complete the project within a fixed cost and a fixed amount of time. In that case, we can vary in terms of features to be completed. So, we definitely will complete the main features but do not work on the third priority features. We work in the same way as the modern Agile team works. Overall, we are flexible with the payment structures so that we can meet the client requirements.
Do you take in projects which meet your basic budget requirement?
We take in all sorts of projects. It doesn’t depend on the budget rather it depends on the project itself. We work a lot with start ups. Sometimes small projects can be very interesting and can grow into something really big.
What is the price range (min and max) of the projects that you catered to in 2015?
Minimum was around US$7000 and maximum was around US$120,000.
Which business model do you suggest your clients use to generate revenue from mobile applications? Why?
I think the time when you earn only from the application has gone. You need to think about additional revenues that are out of the app store. So, we suggest our clients to think and plan on business models that can help them generate revenues apart from the app store.
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