when custom software provides a strategic advantage to your growing firm, iteon can develop software that is a perfect fit for your needs.
Our software development practice is managed by industry-leading professionals with 15 or more years of managing software development teams of every scale. We identify the business drivers behind your technology first, and then build scalable, stable systems to meet those needs. Our continual exposure to best practices and new technologies ensures that you will receive an optimized solution.
All software projects are managed from our San Francisco headquarters, utilizing Rapid Application Development project management philosophies adjusted for small business projects.
Smart Brick TM Development Iteon is known for innovation and using technologies in disruptive ways. There is often nothing special about the technologies we use--be it .NET, SQL at one end of the spectrum, or LAMP (Linux-Apache, MySQL, PHP) at the other end. But over the past few years, we have developed a technique that allows us to reduce the risk involved in using software development to gain strategic business advantage. This process involves creating "smart bricks TM." We've figured out that most of both the risk and the cost involved in developing applications comes in the design phase. If the application isn't designed correctly, one side or the other will end up unhappy, as retooling will cost time and money. Instead of doing all of the design up-front, we start with a small piece of functionality (often the single most important piece of functionality), understanding how it fits generally into the bigger picture. We create the first smart brick TM with the intention that it be integrated into the bigger structure, and as successive smart bricks TM are built, the structure around them begins to come together as well. Because we have built a lot of great software, we are experts at writing software that can be easily integrated together. As we move to successive smart bricks TM, the design process truly goes into high gear. Because each brick is somewhat independent, modifcations can be made in a more dynamic way without having a huge impact on the overall structure. In addition, because each piece is being delivered as it is completed (vs. delivering prototype screen-shots, than a partially-functional demo, then a final end-product), small changes can be made along the way, especially as end-users see and use the completed pieces. This isn't 8 different projects--the goal is still the same--to create a great fully functional application that has all the features desired, but this process allows for a more dynamic design process. It even allows a "let's try this" approach that has little cost or time penalty--if one brick isn't as useful as first imagined or needs to be redesigned after it is completed, it is a small part of the overall cost. There is another huge added benefit to using smart bricks TM--not only does the flexibility and faster deployment time not cost more, it often costs less or allows additional features to be easily added for only a small added incremental cost. Because the risk is so much lower for both Iteon and our clients (the risk is at the smart brick TM level not to the whole project), there is no need to factor in the likelihood of changes into a set up-front fixed bid price. If another smart brick TM is needed or a particular smart brick TM is needed sooner, it can just be done. This also makes it easy to give a good cost estimate up front, without the need for change orders. Also the progress and quality of our work can be easily measured--deliverables are not fuzzy, but actual functional pieces of software. Don't hesitate to give us a call if you're thinking about a project. Even if you are just thinking about a possible piece of software--the first smart brick TM can be used as an inexpensive functional pilot--if it isn't as useful as you'd hope, you can either rethink or just stop at the one smart brick TM. If it is great, you can move forward with confidence.