Please introduce your company and give a brief about your role within the company?
We are Cyber Infrastructure (CIS), one of the most prominent IT solutions and services provider in Central India. As a CMMI Level 3 certified IT company, we provide high-quality and innovative technology solutions to help our clients achieve their respective business goals. We have a global footprint across five countries: India (our headquarters), USA, UK, South Africa, and Singapore.
I, Abhishek Pareek, am the co-founder and CEO of Cyber Infrastructure. I look after the corporate and financial development aspects for CIS and lead decisions and strategies that foster our growth.
What was the idea behind starting this organization?
Our journey started long back in 2003 with a simple idea. The idea was to help businesses of all sizes and scales to succeed using our capability to develop top-notch software solutions, offer exciting work opportunities to talents who are passionate about technology, and contribute in the economic development of our country, India.
What are your company’s business model–in house team or third party vendors/ outsourcing?
We have a large in-house team of 650+ employees, and we are consistently working on adding more and more skilled professionals to our team. Our team is quite wide-ranging since we have experts in practically every field of technology. From software developers and designers to digital marketing specialists and virtual assistants, we have qualified and experienced professionals working in-house to serve our clients.
How is your business model beneficial from a value addition perspective to the clients compared to other companies' models?
Since our team is in-house, we have complete control over the quality of solutions and services delivered to the clients. Our team follows clearly defined, effective processes and practices to design, develop, and deliver solutions. This means that we can ensure quality for every project that we undertake.
What industries do you generally cater to? Are your customers repetitive? If yes, what ratio of clients has been repetitive to you?
We work across an extensive array of industry domains. So far, this has included education, travel, hospitality, fintech, retail and e-commerce, transportation and logistics, manufacturing, gaming, healthcare, media and entertainment, and so on.
Yes, we have a good percentage of repeat customers.
Mention the objectives or the parameters critical in determining the time frame of developing a mobile app.
The most critical parameter is obviously the Scope of Work that the client has agreed upon. However, a few more parameters must be taken into account while calculating the development time frame. We emphasize on the preferred technologies as well as the targeted platforms like mobile phones, tablets, and wearables, etc. In addition to this, the timeframe also depends upon the number of resources & their preferred experience by the clients, etc.
How much effort in terms of time goes into developing the front end and back end of a mobile app?
The efforts for developing front end and back end is completely dependent on what is required to be developed, how rich the user interface is going to be in terms of animation mainly and what kind of calculations will be required on the server other than just storing the information (database). Therefore it always varies app to app.
Also, since users interact with the mobile app through graphics and animations, therefore we consider the user interface as one of the most critical parts for a mobile app, and hence we give an excellent weightage to the front end while estimating the development time.
What are the key parameters to be considered before selecting the right platform for a mobile application?
Selection of the platforms is basically the choice of the client. Though, if required or asked by the client for suggestions, we check the purpose of the app, targeted countries or areas, audience type, age groups, etc. Based on this information, we suggest our clients the best platforms the app should support.
Which platform do you suggest your clients to begin with when they approach you with an idea (Android or iOS) and why?
In addition to the previous answer, the main criteria to pick one of the two is the popularity of the platform (iOS or Android) in the targeted audience. You must choose the platform that covers most of the audience. So if the major user base prefers iOS then it will be iOS, else it will be Android. Moreover, if both the platforms are equally popular, then going with both platforms can also be a good idea.
Android or iOS, Native or Hybrid — which platform is best to use to build your app? What are your recommendations?
Every platform has its pros and cons; thus the choice varies depending upon what is to be developed, what purpose it would serve, for whom it would be designed, who is the target audience, and last but not the least, what’s the budget. Our recommendations also vary based on these criteria, though in a typical case we always prefer the native technologies to utilize maximum resources of the devices, smooth animations, vibrant designs, and great controls. After all, the app must have a great impression on its users.
What are the key factors that you consider before deciding the cost of a mobile application?
We consider the following two factors that decide the cost of a mobile application- a) The duration it would take to develop the app, starting from Planning and Requirement Analysis until the Deployment and Maintenance part, & b) The number of resources that would be engaged throughout the development. The former depends on the complexity, and the latter on the client’s requirement or whether you have time constraints.
What kind of payment structure do you follow to bill your clients? Is it Pay per Feature, Fixed Cost, Pay per Milestone (could be in phases, months, versions etc.)
We offer mainly three payment structures to our clients based on the project types. Following are the details:
Project Basis (Fixed Price): This model is best suited for the requirements or projects for which our clients have a clear vision. For such requirements, it is always easy (and possible) to define the scope of work and hence give an estimate for the projects. For the payments, clients have options to make payments in installments which is usually after completion of phases or milestones as agreed upon.
Dedicated Basis: This is another model which we offer to our clients who want dedicated resources for their projects. Based on client’s requirement (skills and experience of the resources) we provide them the best resources and help in planning the development of the projects. Clients have the option to make payments on a monthly or bi-monthly basis. We are also flexible with client’s convenience.
Hourly Basis: This is another model where clients can purchase hours in bulk (e.g. for a duration of one week, two weeks or one month) and we can utilize the time working on the projects. One of the best situations this model can be utilized is for maintenance work. Some clients bring projects that are already developed, and they ask us for maintenance, bug fixing or implementing new features. For such projects, we offer this model and our clients happily accept this model.
Thus having the above payment options provide our clients with greater flexibility for varieties of projects.
Do you take in projects which meet your basic budget requirement? If yes, what is the minimum requirement? If no, on what minimum budget you have worked for?
Yes, we do with a minimum budget of $10,000.
What is the price range (min and max) of the projects that you catered to in 2018?
The minimum price was $10,000 USD and the maximum price was $6,00,000 USD.
Which business model do you suggest to your clients enabling them to generate revenue from mobile applications? Why?
There are various models that we suggest to our clients to generate revenue, depending upon their needs, the purpose the app is intended to serve and the audience types. The major business models include subscription-based access, commission-based model, advertisement, donations, etc.
Kindly share your feedback on how Goodfirms has been doing so far in increasing your visibility among potential clients.
Having our company profile listed on Goodfirms has proven excellent for us so far. This is a highly credible and renowned platform, and our presence on the platform has undoubtedly served us well.
