Interview with Alexey Florinsky, CEO - SimbirSoft

Alexey Florinsky  

CEO, SimbirSoft

Give us a quick overview on SimbirSoft. When and how did you begin this journey and what were your motives to be successful in app development?

SimbirSoft is an international IT company that has been developing turnkey software solutions for over 18 years. Today we have several offices, with headquarters in Russia and in the USA. The company's core services are custom software development and mobile application development. During our practice we have created more than 600 different software solutions for businesses: enterprise automation systems, highly loaded systems, mobile applications, machine learning & data science solutions, embedded software. We have accumulated experience in developing systems in such areas as management, finance, healthcare, education, telecommunications, construction, retail and, oil and gas.

The company was founded in 2001 by four engineers (including me), inspired to build an honest IT business focused on quality and long-term partnership, and not on hype. We began with a great willingness to change the world, through technology because we are big fans of it. That’s how SimbirSoft was established. For 7 years, we have been gaining more experience creating something new and developing traditional solutions. In 2008, we decided to designate the mobile application development as one of our main services due to a large number of orders that were received. That is how a separate division was created, which is now called mobile.SimbirSoft. We use Agile methods of development and modern ways of team management to achieve maximum efficiency.


What is your role in the management and development of SimbirSoft?

In May 2019, the Shareholders Council of SimbirSoft decided to appoint me as the Chief Executive Officer. So now I am involved in almost all the processes of the company in one way or another — from making decisions on key clients to adding young professionals to our team. Before this appointment, I was the Head of the company's Web Department.


Tell us about your biggest achievement in the industry.

That’s rather simple: I consider the whole great way we have come through these years and the ideas we were able to implement on this journey as our greatest achievement. We successfully managed the work of our professional development teams and that allows us now take part in more than 70 projects at the same time. Our biggest goal is to help our clients make their businesses better through our experience and complex approach, and not just develop apps. Developing an app or software, we always try to dive into the very essence of our clients’ business and help them manage the processes in order to make the IT solutions earn maximum income.


How do you schedule the development phases of the apps to promise the timeline to your clients?

I will say that everything is determined individually and depends on each specific situation. Despite the fact that it is quite difficult to point out the release date of a product at the initial stage in the development field, we try to make our business as transparent as possible and discuss all the details with our clients at the planning stage. In the great majority of projects we show the first adequate result in the first month of development. We consider transparency of development and our effective time to quality ratio as one of our greatest strengths.

In addition, we demonstrate the result to a client after each key development stage in order to make changes and adjust further tasks, whether it is the competitor analysis, MVP development, or CRM app integration. We conduct focus groups to estimate the features of a project and we perform UX-analysis before the release stage if it is required.

If the product has to be released quickly, we develop the MVP version and improve it after we receive the first feedback from the client, users and investors. This is especially important in industries like Fintech and Foodtech, which depend on time to market (TTM) reduction greatly. In that case we prioritize TTM and develop an app in a short time by automating routine processes — we use Continuous Integration (CI), automated testing and deployment in order to reduce human factor involvement. We also use a process overlap: analysis, development and testing are implemented in parallel and are not stopping each other.


How do you help your clients in choosing the right, yet profitable platform for app development?

We have a wide experience in app creation and more than 200 finished app projects. That allows us to advise our clients on the most useful solutions orientated on the needs of the specific companies and industries. Delving into our client’s business we learn its strengths, weaknesses and all important features by comparing that information with the required task and offer the best solution. Our business is arranged around the client’s main business goals, whether to increase sales or to improve customer loyalty.


Which would you suggest for a successful and profitable business progression, Native or hybrid apps? How do you define the factors that influenced you to make this choice?

Native applications have direct access to the functionality of the platform which they are designed for. As a result, the performance of such apps is much higher than the hybrid ones. For example, such applications have the ability to use built-in animations to improve User Experience.

Hybrid apps could be a great way to transform a web app into a native one. However, concerning complex applications, the abstraction levels do not allow the use of most of the functional features inherent in native applications. That can damage the reputation of the app and cause more problems than developing a native application.

In addition, the cost of hybrid application development is usually 20-30% higher than the cost of a native application for a single platform.

Hybrid applications are best used for web applications without deep hardware or system integration, or for business automation when employees or clients already use the company's services. However, they cannot be used as messengers or social networks.

A native application is an obvious choice for branded apps that are expected to perform well and get positive feedback, which is a vital part of the project success.


How do you scheme your pricing model? How do you fix your budget?

Our payment model is also very individual and depends on the specific project. Some clients need only a minimal version of the product with future periodic support, and some ask for a full-fledged application with complex CRM system integration and weekly updates.

Our common practice is a T&M contract — payment model for the actual number of working hours. It allows us to be flexible at the preparation stage of any project development. For example, at the start of a project we create only a minimal team required for its creation, with strict division of roles, which means that at the beginning stage we involve only the specialists for the project development. Then we include more people for the specific. That dynamic team planning system allows us to speed up when it is needed and to adapt to the client’s objectives.

Talking about the budget fixation, it is commonly used in the case of MVP project creation. When a client needs to create a product but his/her budget is tight, we offer an MVP version and maximally adapt it to the business needs and possibilities of this particular client. Usually, an analyst fix the budget planning at the beginning stage in order to not waste it on the incomplete ideas, we create an MVP, the client gets his/her customers’ feedback and then we think about future releases. That allows both sides to work on the fixed price.


How helpful are the mobile apps developed by your team, for enhancing your clients’ business?

This is the main thing we implement in each app that we work on — it should be useful both to users and business owners. Sounds rather obvious, but this is the point that development companies very often forget about. This is not just a code a client asked us to write for some reason. This is a full-fledged work that begins with the customer's business study, defining goals, needs and opportunities for its improvement, based on these requirements. In order to do something truly amazing we draft our proposal to create the most business-friendly application, and we take into account all possible circumstances, including budget and deadlines.


What according to you are the best practices to attain client satisfaction?

A fairly large number of positive customers’ feedback about our work has appeared on numerous rating sites throughout the Internet since 2001. Based on the reviews, we realized that the main things our clients like are the ability to perform high quality work in time, and work as transparently and reliably as possible at the same time, as well as delve deep into each industry. The secret is out — everybody likes a job well done.

Our company has a high level management system and all decisions go through several stages before they are implemented. All communications in SimbirSoft are established in the way that project goals are carried out as quickly and as efficiently as possible. We have created the concept of the ideal management for our teams and now we use it quite successfully.


How do you update your business system to be in pace with the technological advancements?

We are responsible for training and skill development of our specialists, because we want to make truly high-quality apps and software. This is impossible if you use outdated technology. Therefore, our top management and other high-level specialists attend major conferences on a regular basis and improve their skills by studying modern methods of developing and IT project creation. The experience exchange in the company is also a rather common practice: that is the best teacher, I suppose.


What are your thoughts about AR, VR and Internet of Things (IoT)?

Augmented reality has great opportunities in almost any sphere: commercial, entertainment and social. Complementing the real world with virtual objects, AR-technology helps, entertains and trains. Augmented reality technologies are constantly being improved, so there’s no doubt: AR is the technology of the future.

As for VR, today this direction is firmly entrenched only in the gaming industry and is developing steadily. It is an interesting technology and it has potential, but it is still difficult to say how much it will go beyond gaming and whether it will be used by a wide audience or not.

The technologies of the so-called Internet of Things will change the world dramatically, and these changes concern not only high-tech industry or infrastructure, but also our everyday life. Safety, health and comfort — these are the basic elements of the Internet of Things, which means it will only become more successful, because these elements are important for everyone and will always be.

Our activities today are built in correlation with VR, AR and IoT. We are already working on several AR projects that we are developing urgently. Today it is necessary to keep up with the times.


What do you think will be the future of Mobile technology?

Statistics do not lie: mobile applications are taking over the world. The TOP industries now are gaming, business and education. Mobile gaming continues to evolve, along with the increasing productivity of smart-phones and tablets. A game that required a 7kg PC, 10 years ago, could now be launched on a 5” smart-phone screen. This is amazing.

We try to follow modern technologies and implement them in our clients’ apps in order to provide the most up-to-date service to end users. Today we are working on a lot of products and we are familiar with many industries whose businesses are built around the mobile apps: we create remote banking services and even apps for hunters.