FAQ

A wide range – from a single feature or a small internal tool through to full products and longer-term builds.

Most of our work is with startups, small companies, and growing SMEs – that’s where we’re most at home, and where being a hands-on, no-middleman team makes the biggest difference. But size isn’t really the deciding factor: we scale our involvement to fit, whether that’s a focused piece of work over a few weeks or an ongoing partnership over the longer term.

If you’re not sure whether your project is the right size for us, the best thing to do is just ask – we’ll be straight with you about whether we’re a good fit.

It depends on what you’re building – scope, complexity, and how clearly defined things are at the start all shape the timeline. A small, well-scoped tool and a full product with many moving parts are very different jobs, so rather than a one-size-fits-all answer, we give you a realistic estimate once we understand what you actually need.

What helps us answer that accurately:

• The Design & Discovery phase – scoping the work properly up front is what lets us give you a timeline you can rely on, rather than a guess.
• A clear scope – the better defined the requirements, the more precise the estimate.

And throughout the build, you’re not waiting in the dark for a single delivery date. We work in short cycles and release regularly, so you see the product taking shape as we go – and always know where things stand.

The honest version: we’ll give you a realistic timeframe once we’ve scoped your project, and we’d rather set an estimate we can meet than an optimistic one we can’t.

Yes – at every stage of the project, not just at the end.

• Throughout development – we track all work in Jira, which you have access to. This is your live, ongoing record of what’s being built and why: detailed enough to follow, flexible enough to adapt as requirements change.
• In the code itself – from day one, every part of the project (frontend, backend, tests) has a README. Early on it helps our developers set up and work efficiently; later, it’s what lets your own team pick the project up.
• In the tests – where we build automated and manual tests, we write them to be readable. Their names, steps, and expected results double as a clear, plain-language description of how the application is meant to behave.
• On delivery – once you’re ready for production, we produce full application documentation, including:
  • Setup and configuration guide
  • Infrastructure overview and diagram
  • Third-party libraries and their licences
  • Optionally: test scenarios and user stories

And if you later build an in-house team or bring on a CTO, we support the handover – so the project transitions to you cleanly, not dumped with a folder of files.

Not in place of payment, and not upfront. Building software takes real time and cost on our side, so we don’t take on projects for equity alone – especially at the idea stage, before there’s anything to value.

Once there’s a working product and real traction, though, we’re open to the conversation. At that point – typically alongside a retainer for ongoing development – a partial equity arrangement can make sense, because there’s something concrete to base it on.

So: not instead of pay, but potentially as part of a longer-term partnership once the numbers are real.