Thought Leadership From Industry Peers

How to Identify Top Bespoke Software Development Companies in the UK

Joseph Olassa Co-founder & CEO Ignitho Technologies

The UK CIOs, IT Directors and Programme Managers we talk to on a regular basis at Ignitho, tell us that they are often caught between the lack of attention from the big boys and the sea of boutique nearshore & offshore vendors. this is acute for  IT Directors, who tell us that they would rather stay focused on outcomes than worrying about the logistics of making IT outsourcing work with Custom Software Development Companies in the UK or offshore.

If you are a UK CIO or IT Director looking for a partner for your Bespoke Software Development needs, the search can be daunting at times. Unless you are very large corporate and sitting on few million pounds to spend on software applications needed for the digital economy, the options are typically a UK boutique software house or a nearshore / offshore vendor. However, if the need is for Rapid Application Development and Scalable Application Management, many of the boutique shops struggle with the programme rigour and approach to quality which is the norm with the big boys. This doesn’t mean that there aren’t any Software Development Companies in the UK who fills this gap.

For example, Ignitho’s co-founders having previously led business units for the likes of Accenture, Mindtree, Cognizant and HP, as well as other senior professionals who have joined Ignitho from the likes of Capgemini and Infosys, enables us to deliver for our customers with the same programme rigour and approach to top quality, without the engagement overheads of bigger industry players.

Following are our recommendations while Identifying Top Bespoke Software Development Companies in the UK for your needs:

Leadership Team

Does your partner have a leadership team that has the pedigree to jointly plan for growth and scale, bring the best practices in the Industry? In addition to this, look for a partner who has their leadership team based in the UK, so that key discussions and regular program/project steering committee meetings could be done face to face at least occasionally

Local / UK presence

Many UK software houses have a skeletal team onboard and manage with contractors. Some even subcontract some of the work to an offshore company. While getting some of the development work done from offshore gives a cost advantage, with multiple organisations involved, this is bound to create many issues over time. When identifying a partner, check for their local presence and local development capacity. For example, at Ignitho, our Leadership Team and programme/project management team are based out of our London office; this is in addition to the local development centre/innovation lab we have in Brighton at the Sussex Innovation Centre

Leveraging Offshore

If your partner has a strong local presence and a local development capacity in the UK, next key criteria is the partner’s ability to keep development costs down through the partner’s nearshore or offshore development centre. The ability to integrate the local/onsite model seamless with an offshore model will ensure that stakeholders jointly associate with each other during every stage of the engagement lifecycle, guaranteeing rapid turnaround times from concept to solution delivery, allowing you to build or retain competitive advantage

Ability to start small

The UK CIOs, IT Directors and Programme Managers we talk to on a regular basis at Ignitho, tell us that their preference is to engage with partners in a small way, see quick results within a limited budget and then scale up the engagement. A model we promote at Ignitho and already have many success stories, where we have started some of our initial projects for a budget range of £50k to £100k. We also had instances where we did the initial project for even budgets as less as £10k to £20k. We can do this by integrating our development capacity at Brighton, UK and our Offshore Development Centre in Kochi, India

The above points are still only at a high-level. If you are interested to know more on identifying Bespoke / Custom Software Development Companies in UK, please do connect with us here.

More about Ignitho

We are rapidly gaining recognition as a market leader in Frugal Technology Innovation for Enterprises – the ability to do more with less. Set up with a mission to transform enterprises, Ignitho has been ‘igniting thought’ since its inception in 2013 through new models that disrupt the existing order with efficient value propositions. Ignitho is recognised by industry analysts like Bloor Research and TechMarketView on Ignitho’s disruptive new approach. Headquartered in the UK, Ignitho services its customers through its offices in London, UK, and San Jose, USA, and its development centres in Brighton, UK and Kochi, India.

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Joseph Olassa Co-founder & CEO Ignitho Technologies
Joseph brings a track record of two decades of fast paced business growth in the Software Industry across USA, Europe and Asia. Prior to Ignitho Technologies, he was with Mindtree for close to 14 years and was part of the core team that grew the Europe & US businesses through multi-million dollar contracts, besides kick-starting Mindtree’s Middle East business. He is a charter member with TiE (The Indus Entrepreneurs) and is on the Forbes Business Council and the Fast Company Executive Board. He is an active proponent of technology innovation with a focus on Frugal Innovation methodologies and is a speaker at multiple enterprise innovation conferences. He is also an early advocate of software product start-ups and is a seed investor with multiple angel networks.
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