Code & Pepper

Flex Funding is a peer-to-peer lending and investment web platform, an alternative to corporate bank loans. It matches investors with established businesses looking for affordable loans, ensuring that both parties get optimal deals.

Code & Pepper’s product architect and UX/UI designer helped Flex Funding when it came to the redesign of their app’s interface in the end-to-end model. The client also needed skilled front-end web developers but didn’t want to recruit in-house, which is why Flex Funding decided on our team augmentation model.

After analysing the behaviour of current users, our team proposed a more intuitive design. The visual language was Google’s Material Design. We followed the best practices and used Angular Material. We created the software with accessibility and high performance in mind and made it available in English, Danish and Faroese.

For security, we used industry standard (OAuth 2.0/Open ID Connect, JSON Web Tokens, Multi-factor Authentication) as well as Content Security Policy, other security HTTP headers, HTTPS (TLS), and Cross-Site Scripting. To ensure the app’s high quality and maintainable code, every developer created unit, component, and integration tests.

To learn more, read the full case study.

LUSID is an asset management platform launched by Finbourne. It streamlines data analysis and processing, helping companies discover actionable insights concerning their investments.

While LUSID’s team of experts in business intelligence and financial data analytics came up with a remarkable technical solution, they lacked product design and Angular front-end development know-how to fully execute their idea.

That’s when our team of product and UI/UX designers, product owners and developers joined the project in the team augmentation model to frame LUSID’s technology in a user-friendly web interface, using Angular and .NET. 

Our team delivered a highly customisable platform. Its design was based on an extensive style guide we developed to ensure product quality and visual coherence.

To streamline communication between cooperating teams, located both in Poland and the UK, we established clear project management patterns, following Scrum methodology. When the redesigned product proved to require more engagement, due to the team augmentation model we could quickly support LUSID with more team members to meet the client’s needs.

Check out the full case study and our Behance profile.

Nimbla takes invoice insurance for small and medium businesses to the next level. Apart from quick insurance proceedings, companies can check potential customers’ credit rating to prevent losses and ensure safe cash flow. Nimbla is a cloud-based platform, accessible on web browsers and mobile (iOS and Android).

Code & Pepper’s cooperation with Nimbla started with delivering UI designs to make all invoice codes and policies accessible in one place within the platform’s monitoring solution. After that our team of 6 – including full-stack and front-end developers as well as DevOps and cloud experts – was tasked with building the whole app architecture and code from scratch.

Our team implemented reusable UI components using React and ReactStrap. We chose a tailor-made technology stack that would best serve Nimbla’s business objectives. This included introducing new solutions: GraphQL as a more flexible API, Koa as the next-generation framework for Node.js, and TypeScript to catch bugs as early as possible.

To ensure swift communication between the client and the team, we followed Scrum methodology. The daily updates, sprint planning and retrospectives helped everyone with smooth project coordination.

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NoMo is a mobile app for personal finance management, a 24/7 private finance assistant available to everyone. It recommends daily spending limits and shows financial performance based on the customer’s bank data.

Code & Pepper got involved to resolve NoMo’s struggles with the back-end and the existing version of their iOS app. Our team of a mobile solution architect, iOS developer, back-end developer, and project manager delivered a high-performing app that can process banking data quickly and securely.

Our development work on the app included rewriting the Java back-end code in .NET and programming it in C#, integrating the app with the client’s banking data aggregator, and adding new features and improvements to the existing iOS code written in Objective-C.

We also upgraded the monolithic architecture to the Ports and Adapters pattern (hexagonal architecture) to improve the clarity and quality of the app. The new architecture was deployed to Microsoft Azure with Azure Notification Hubs used for sending push notifications to iOS devices.

Get more details about this case study here.

Pluto is a web application that makes travel insurance easy to understand and more tailored to customers’ needs.

The company tasked Code & Pepper with end-to-end web application development as they wanted trusted developers to deliver a product that met the high requirements of the industry.

Based on Pluto’s style guide and design library, our team created reusable components, which we incorporated into the product development stage: customer journey, product flows, and mock-up screens. We also optimised several aspects of the app, including lazy loading and GZIP compression (React, WebPack, JavaScript, Express, Heroku). We chose React due to its efficiency in processing real-time data.

The app development also involved integration with Starling Bank and Monzo Bank. Due to the authentication process, integration with Starling Bank required several changes to the back-end and front-end of the application. To integrate the app with Monzo Bank, we created a separate service with Quote API, using Koa, TypeScript, Mongoose, JEST as well as integration and load tests with Artillery.

To find out more about this case study, visit our website.

Smart Pension is a UK-based workplace pension platform. It offers automatic pension schemes based on a defined contribution plan.

After Smart Pension’s success in the UK, the company wanted to branch out to global markets. This resulted in an increased demand for new hires – in 2019, the in-house development team growth exceeded 400%. To keep up the pace and still deliver top product quality, Smart Pension decided to hire developers externally and leave the recruitment process to Code & Pepper.

We built dedicated agile teams of Ruby on Rails developers that worked from two locations (Warsaw and Krakow, Poland). They were fully synced with the core team in London. Together they were creating an advanced pension forecaster that complies with strict regulations present in various markets.

The developers and quality assurance experts Code & Pepper sourced followed Smart Pension’s requirements, such as clean code, Continuous Deployment, and high test coverage.

Learn more about this case study here.

The Monkee app serves as a digital finance coach that helps users manage personal and family budgets in a motivating, fun way. The app incorporates behavioural design, gamification, and machine learning.

The startup struggled to hire a React Native developer in their local market. The market failed to meet the demand for developers in general, and the requirement for a particular technology made the search even more difficult.

Code & Pepper’s team augmentation services, however, helped Monkee bridge the skill gap and accelerate their mobile app development using React. We designed a custom recruitment process according to the CTO’s requests and sourced relevant candidates.

Prompted by Monkee’s growth, we provided a continuous supply of talent for different stages of their business, e.g. by finding a new back-end talent with advanced Node.js skills. Since the development team worked from various locations, we also helped with remote team coordination and staff maintenance.

Learn more about Code & Pepper’s team augmentation at Monkee.

AZA is a cross-border transaction platform for individuals and entrepreneurs from African countries. Code & Pepper has participated in building one of their latest products: BFX, an international instant payment platform.

Initially, our team’s job involved front-end development outsourcing, using React connected with Material-UI. But soon we started to work on the project with AZA’s in-house team more closely, and our cooperation switched to the IT team augmentation model.

Our approach to communication, including one-team policy and full transparency, facilitated building trust and rapport with AZA’s team, which was crucial after their unsatisfactory experiences with a previous software development agency. This led the people involved in the project to exchange insights about platform design and implement some of the improvements proposed by team members hired by Code & Pepper.

We also conducted a code review, participated in the quality assurance processes, and replaced JavaScript with TypeScript to make the whole application less prone to errors.

For more details, see the full case study.

Led by independent researchers, the Global Trade Alert is an alternative source of data about state measures and their impact on international trade. The GTA platform collects and presents information on global legislative changes in real time, using interactive charts and allowing data export.

Code & Pepper’s team consisting of 3 full-stack developers, a UI designer, UX designer, DevOps expert, and project manager developed the new GTA website in the end-to-end model, using AWS, JavaScript, and PHP solutions. Our team gave both the admin panel and the web platform a full makeover, including a new user interface, front-end and back-end implementation, and cloud migration.

Introducing cloud hosting and optimising the admin panel led to increased data input efficiency and accuracy. Interactive filters boosted the searchability of real-time and historical data. Previously missing event tracking mechanisms now help the GTA team understand user behaviour and make more informed decisions about further product development.

The redesign also resulted in improved performance, search engine friendliness, and SSL encryption for data security.

Read the full case study to learn more.

DirectID is a banking data aggregator offered by the FinTech solutions company, The ID Co. It enables customers to use their online banking profiles to log in to other applications and platforms.

Because of the PSD2 directive, The ID Co. urgently needed to ensure a continuous flow of customer data from European banks. They decided to leave it to Code & Pepper to integrate their product with a third-party open banking solution (Salt Edge) and build an API compatible with an existing solution (Yodlee).

Our team took care of banking data integration, API development, and software architecture with the use of .NET Core, ASP.NET Core, C#, Docker, and Microsoft Azure.

We recreated the whole complex, multi-level authentication structure inside Yodlee and adjusted it to the specifics of Salt Edge. Merging the two solutions resulted in software architecture with 3 layers of code and the Azure SQL Database and Microsoft Azure cloud stack. In terms of quality assurance, we used xUnit, FakeItEasy and Polly library for flawless operation of the product’s features.

Check out the full case study.