Collaborative Product Development is different from IT Outsourcing

More and more ISVs are realizing that selection of a development partner who can augment their R&D function capabilities and capacity is different from choosing an IT services vendor. Whereas the IT services selection is more driven by Service Level Agreements, measurement of tangibles – ROI, response time, productivity etc, the selection and measurement of an R&D and product development vendor includes measurements like Architecture capability, ability to develop products from concept, intangibles of product like usability, performance, architecture stability, product shelf life, product technology maturity, cost of product, cost of product development, collaboration with existing R&D team etc. Product company’s revenues depend on their product quality, features and technology bandwidth and so the agility and mindset needed is entirely different from IT services mindset.

Comparable size vendor and management focus

Product companies and ISVs size in terms of number of employees goes into hundreds and working with a large consulting or IT Services Company does not gives the management focus from the partner to do justice to R&D and product development. At Appulse, CEO, CTO and core management team is accessible, and gets involved in the success of the product. Management team remains accountable for success of the product company.

Focus on product development

As Appulse is focused on product development, right from internal processes to organization structure is aligned to make Appulse a product engineering ecosystem, our teams continuously focus on new platforms, open source components, design and architecture patterns, design methodologies, collaborative development. Our engineering team is structured in such a way that architects, technology specialist have decision making powers and at par with the program managers. This makes an open environment for innovation, depth in technology and less hierarchical environment where teams collaborate to produce great products.

High end requirements elicitation and workshops

One of the challenges in product development is to transform market needs into product features which have high usability, and therefore the first challenge is to understand completely how the end user product management team sees the product and help in articulation of these features and vision in such a way that all the stake holder’s can understand it unambiguously and see the same picture. Appulse’s product analysts are trained to follow interviewing techniques, requirements elicitation techniques, storyboarding, use case approach.

Architecture centric

Product development’s key is arriving at an architecture which is extendable, stable, takes care of future needs of the product as well as performance, scalability, fitment into existing systems of the target user segment and is such that the cost of product license remains within the bounds to make the product saleable and competitive.

Appulse’s architects are experts in Pattern oriented architecture, Service oriented architecture, Enterprise architecture and our architectural teams are focused on being on top of new architectural concepts.

Ex-VP R&Ds, CTOs and Entrepreneurs as consulting partners

Appulse has consulting partner’s who are ex-VP R&Ds, ex-CEOs and senior management who have been successful in ISVs and product company setups. This ensures that Appulse fully understands the needs of a product company and maps them in its services definition, delivery and consulting.

Nearshore and offshore R&D and distributed product development

Appulse’s working model combines teams at ISV’s location, teams at Appulse’s development center near ISV’s location, coupled with an offshore team, to maximize the success rate and balance the cost of product development.

Turnkey product development

Appulse provides turnkey product development service where Appulse seamlessly integrates with the founders and Product Management team of an ISV and takes end to end responsibility. Appulse provides success guarantee on turnkey product development and also provides flexible pricing models like payments linked to product license cost, startup equity etc.

Excellent pricing models for reducing burn rate

Appulse understands the needs of product companies to reduce burn rate especially at the time of first generation product development. Our pricing models ensure that ISV’s burn rate is lower and follows success linked payment models.

Agile, Rational Unified Process and Extreme programming methodologies

Our processes for product development and engineering are light weight and industry live. Appulse adopts the processes and working methodologies used by the ISVs R&D departments to integrate seamlessly to create an extended team environment.