An Interview with Daniel Andor, Founder & Lead Product Designer of Durran
1. Let's start with some personal questions. How are you and your family doing in the COVID era?
We are fine. Thanks for asking. We are trying to stay on the safe side and reduced in-person gatherings to essentials, but otherwise, we are ok.
2. Can you tell us about how you founded or joined this company?
I founded Durran in 2020 - during the Covid era - transitioning from freelancing, which I've done for the last couple of years. Also, I wanted to do something more fulfilling because I wasn't that happy with how things were going back then. I even wrote a short article about the whole thing here: https://www.durran.co/blog/goodbye-freelancer-say-hello-to-agency-owner
3. What makes your company unique from others in the field?
What makes Durran unique - that's an excellent question. Durran is a product design agency focused on helping startups go from a product or feature idea to validation with real users in just a few days and design awesome digital products by running workshops like the Design Sprint.
Our target is to partner with our clients and create successful digital solutions that solve their users' needs. So, when somebody reaches out for an app or a platform design, we won't go away for two months, jump straight into one of the cool UI Design apps to do something. We'll work closely with the client to make sure that everything is clear, and both of us know why we do what we do, what we try to solve with this solution, and how success looks.
Also, I'm still 100% involved in client work - so there is that personal touch as well. Having a good relationship with my clients is really at the core of how I like to work, so if there isn't a good fit or can't help, I'm very open about it.
4. Has the coronavirus pandemic affected your business and if so, how are you adjusting?
Well, it affected my freelancing business but also pushed me to move in a different direction and set up the agency. If we talk financially, 2020 wasn't my best year - I lost some projects due to the pandemic - but there were some exciting things as well, like Durran.
5. What do you think are the major trends in your field?
Given the whole Covid pandemic, everybody moved remote, which in a way was a plus for us. I think this trend - of working remotely - will continue in a way in the future as well. This trend can be a massive boost for companies that are not located in those major c...more
Empathy is the key to customer success. An insight by Péter Illés, Founder and Managing Partner of Further Digital Solutions Team
1: Let's start with some personal questions. How are you and your family doing in the COVID era?
Quite busy actually! We just finished construction on our family home and moved in. So we kept ourselves occupied during the lockdown. Painting walls instead of meeting with friends...
2: Can you tell us about how you founded this company?
A classic story really: I started out as a freelancer, working on smaller projects. Websites, e-commerce, and the like. It just grew from there. When work was beginning to be too much for me, I started bringing in other people to help and soon enough we formed the company as it is today.
A couple of years ago we decided to cut back on small projects. We have always felt we have less of a creative and marketing focus that was needed in website development, but a much more business and technology focus instead.
Nowadays we focus our efforts in two areas: digital transformation and custom business solutions (ERP, supply chain and inventory, HR, etc.) and digital product development, mostly for start-ups.
3: What makes your company unique from others in the field?
We spend a lot of time to deeply understand the needs of our clients, finding the best solutions, and actually educating them. We’re not afraid of turning them down if we feel what we can deliver is not what they need.
We also do a lot of collaborative work with clients, when preparing a project, borrowing techniques and methodologies from fields like UX design or service design.
4: Has the coronavirus pandemic affected your business and if so, how are you adjusting?
Fortunately, we have been able to actually grow the company during 2020. We increased both our revenues and team size.
The most challenging aspect was the uncertainty of last year. Our usually busy months were scary quiet. Instead, we signed a couple of major clients right before Christmas, which never happened before.
5: What do you think are the major trends in your field?
Of course, you have your usual suspects, such as AI or IoT. The pandemic brought us IoB (Internet of Behaviours) which is really interesting, but also raises lots of privacy and security concerns.
The biggest trend we see in our field though is no-code solutions such as Amazon Honeycode or Google AppSheet. I believe that in a couple of years these solutions might revolutionize business software in the same manner as Squarespac...more
TechGenies’ Transparency- A Revolution in IT Staff Augmentation
TechGenies
When it comes to IT staff augmentation, whether your business is employing nearshoring vs. offshoring, the bottom line is transparency.
For many startups just beginning to scale and grappling with limited resources, the lack of resources to find IT talent and a growing need for IT talent can become an innovation-halting conundrum – unless businesses turn to experts to handle this process for them.
Read more: https://bit.ly/3eyBsM1
...more
An Interview with Victor Dornescu, Co-Founder and Head of Innovation at rinf.tech.
1: Let's start with some personal questions. How are you and your family doing in the COVID era?
Fortunately, the pandemic has not harmed my family.
2: Can you tell us about how you founded or joined this company?
I had some knowledge on recruiting and some expertise in IT. We thought it would have been a good idea to start recruiting for the IT industry. During the years we spent as an IT sourcing company, we have developed several technical clusters until we became a technology services organization.
3: What makes your company unique from others in the field?
Along the way, we have invested and developed technical skills that position us as a one-shop partner, capable of developing and integrating software, hardware, human resources, and robots.
Last year, we have launched our first product on the market. It is a testing robot capable of simulating complex interactions between humans and touch-screen devices.
4: Has the coronavirus pandemic affected your business and if so, how are you adjusting?
Rinf.tech has kept growing at impressive speed despite the Covid-19 outbreak. We have kicked off new partnerships and increased the number of employees.
In order to keep our people safe, we have organized our teams so that most of the people can work from home.
5: What do you think are the major trends in your field?
We are already seeing a rising demand for hyper-automation and AI-powered robotics (for manufactories, retail, logistics, etc.) on Edge and 5G. It is an exciting moment for smart technologies, as we are witnessing a dramatic acceleration in the development of new tools and products.
6: What are the keys to customer success and satisfaction and has that changed in the era of COVID?
In short, companies are expected to increase their efforts on the End-User Experience and Customer Success journey. It’s all about care and reliability.
Another important element is represented by the ability to acquire a deep knowledge of your clients’ needs, together with the capabilities and the drive to proactively suggesting what the next steps are, in order to remain modern and competitive on the market.
7: How would you see your company ten years in the future?
Rinf.tech will be where disruptive innovation is, it could be autonomous robotized equipment, it could be mining on meteorites.
8: Your f...more
Social Media Platform Case Study
TechGenies LLC, a global leader in delivering highly skilled IT staff resources and developing cutting-edge, custom applications, has been named the key technology partner for a geolocation video-sharing social media platform that allows users to create and share their adventures freely within their respective communities.
Read more: https://techgenies.com/social-media-platform/
...more
The Basics of Network Security Management Every Business Leader Should Know
Are you ready to step up your network security management or kick it off? Our Genies can support your organization wherever you are in the process, whether we need to lay a foundation or revamp an existing practice, we want to give you the peace of mind that comes with knowing your invaluable business documents and information is safely on your network.
...more
What is Data Science? The Blurring Line Between Humans and Machines
Since this is such a quickly-moving field, it is vital to learn from others and share information. Here, TechGenies’ leading minds discuss the answers to commonly asked data science questions.
Learn more: https://bit.ly/2PMzYnr
Webinar Replay
Missed our last webinar? Or looking to watch it again?
TechGenies examines common technology delivery and project management challenges, and how to deliver projects on time and under budget.
Watch our webinar here: https://bit.ly/3pUolam
#SoftwareDevelopment #ProjectManagement #DeliveryManagement