Software development is, at its core, a game of resource management. Your company may have an in-house team with talented engineers and project managers. That team has capabilities, which are the resources you must manage to bring a new piece of software to life. But what happens when those capabilities don't extend to the type of software you wish to create or if they're stretched so far that the team isn't capable of working on more as you try to scale?
The software doesn't get made.
Or, if it does, it's delivered past the deadline and over budget. These are the problems that a software development outsourcing company exists to solve. Discover how software outsourcing services are the key to unlocking your development potential.
What Is Software Development Outsourcing?
On the most basic level, software development outsourcing involves contracting a third-party vendor to handle some element of your software engineering. The scale is variable. You may use outsourcing companies to provide support to an existing team, such as using external developers to conduct quality assurance as your in-house team works. Others use software outsourcing companies to handle every aspect of the development process for a new project, from planning to execution and future maintenance.
Businesses typically contract outsourcing software development companies for one or a combination of several reasons. Cost efficiency, capability enhancement, and enhanced flexibility are all key benefits delivered by an outsourced development team. The method is particularly favored by startups. They gain access to global talent and teams they can scale as needed while keeping development costs low.
That's not to say that established teams can't make use of outsourcing. It's common practice for in-house teams to rely on outsourced teams for vital support functions or to bolster capacity when working on enterprise-level projects. Lightci provides all of these services via three outsourcing models to bring your software development project to life.
Lightci Outsourcing Software Development Services
Custom Software Development
You have a project in mind. Your challenge is that you either don't have an in-house team or if you do, that the team is focused on another project or otherwise doesn't have the capacity needed to work on your custom software. Enter Lightci. As part of our software development outsourcing services, we deliver bespoke products engineered to your requirements.
You gain access to a talented development team filled with people capable of leveraging the tech stack needed to bring your new project to life. All members of the team are experienced developers sourced based on the specific project. We also assign project managers to your external team who work alongside your in-house managers to ensure project requirements are communicated clearly and there's a defined feedback loop that minimizes delays and confusion.
Whatever your big idea may be, we create the magic that makes it a reality.
Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning
The terms "artificial intelligence (AI)" and "machine learning (ML)" are far from mere industry buzzwords. These technologies are the future and, when used correctly, they have the potential to unlock capabilities and drive efficiencies that simply couldn't exist in your business before their introduction. Unlocking that potential is a challenge. Your new software needs to be capable of learning from the data you input, which goes far beyond the scope of software you've developed before.
We give you access to software engineers who understand these challenges. We understand the complex data collection and processing methodologies needed to bring AI and ML-powered software to life. With Lightci, you can create software that drives efficiency within your business and delivers a user experience unlike any other to your customers.
Enterprise Software Solutions and Management
Developing enterprise-level software is a far cry from creating small applications. The stakes are much higher as your client, or your own business is creating a multi-faceted product that needs to work on a massive scale. Mistakes are costly. Errors in code can lose customers. The project needs a large team to match its scale, with each member of that team both understanding and being capable of delivering on their roles.
Enterprise software is a tough nut to crack for even the most talented in-house team. That's when outsourcing software development comes into its own. You gain access to capabilities that may not be available locally. Plus, your outsourced team is scalable to the project's needs, meaning you can build out your team based on the work that needs to be done right now. Trust Lightci to handle project management, provide skilled developers, and ensure that your large-scale software project delivers on every level.
Legacy System Modernization
Legacy systems are often the bane of the software developer's life. If they're not trying to integrate those systems into new solutions, they're replacing them entirely. In the latter case, data migration, reengineering, and rehosting of an existing solution can prove as time and cost-intensive as simply building a new solution from scratch.
Software development outsourcing companies like Lightci can handle legacy system modernization. Rewriting and rearchitecting existing systems fall under our remit, as does handling the rehosting and data transfer requirements you have for your legacy system. You don't lose your existing system or the data it holds. You modernize what you have, taking advantage of modern software capabilities to transform your legacy systems so they become more efficient, cost-effective, and scalable.
Digital Transformation
The integration of digital technologies into every area of your business. That's what a digital transformation entails, and it can be a daunting prospect for companies that rely on manual systems or otherwise have little experience in developing the software needed to facilitate their transformation. Add the need for custom software development if the packages you need for that transformation aren't available "off the shelf" and you have a challenging process.
Lightci enables full digital transformations via our outsourced software development services. That transformation may involve legacy system migration - a service in its own right - or simply designing and developing the software you need to bring your team into the 21st century. Your goal is to create a fundamental change in how you do business. Trust us to facilitate that change both with software and when you're developing your new digital culture.
Locational Transformation
Think of locational transformation as the unlocking of your company's full potential when it comes to accessing talent on a global scale. No longer restricted to your local talent pool, you're able to build teams across the world, each one containing talented engineers who have capabilities that simply aren't available to you in your location.
Locational transformation isn't about moving your company headquarters. You're not disrupting your current operation. Through outsourced software development, you instead enhance what you already have. Through Lightci, you leverage the outsourcing model that works best for your business to build a team capable of delivering across time zones anywhere in the world. The result? Your software development teams are enhanced, delivering projects faster and at a lower cost thanks to your access to a global talent pool.
Why Work With Our Software Outsourcing Company?
Now that you understand the key services available when outsourcing IT development, you need the answer to the simplest of questions:
Why?
Software outsourcing delivers an array of benefits, with each of the following being available when you trust Lightci as your outsourcing partner.
Partners for Your Software Development Projects
The use of the word "partner" above isn't an accident. One of the most important things to understand about your outsourcing team is that it isn't a ragtag assembly of freelance software engineers. It's a full team, integrated into your in-house team, and fully aware and capable of supporting your core business functions.
With Lightci, you're not working with a service provider. You receive a software outsourcing partner - one that is dedicated to understanding every aspect of your business operations, your culture, and what you aim to deliver both internally and to your clients.
Your in-house developers can trust your outsourced team to deliver because that external team becomes part of your department. We become part of your company too. Our goal is to understand the full project scope so we can provide our domain expertise wherever you feel is necessary. That may involve ensuring you have access to an external project manager who can organize your external team on your behalf. It may even mean outsourcing development on an entire project while trusting us to understand why that project is important and the requirements it aims to fulfill.
To put it simply - we work with you, not merely for you. With Lightci, you get a partner that integrates into your business as much as any local hire.
Enhanced Cost Efficiency
Software engineers cost money. In the U.S., a junior engineer can command between $50 and $60 per hour. Climb up to the senior level and that hourly wage can double easily, which creates a huge cost burden for businesses ranging from small companies to global corporations. Add the cost of maintaining the appropriate tech stack needed to develop your software, plus operational costs and project management, and a single piece of software can be a severe drain on your finances.
That drain is mitigated when you outsource software development. Operational costs are reduced as your outsourced team has access to the technology needed to build your software and the organizational structure you no longer need to create, without you needing to invest a dollar. Your labor costs are also reduced due to greater access to a global talent pool.
As your development partner, Lightci reduces costs across the board. When augmenting your team, we reduce the hiring process to 10 days or less, which is far lower than the expensive multi-month hiring processes many of our clients implement locally. We have access to tech stacks. We know how to build and manage teams. With us, you can focus on your core business operations safe in the knowledge that you have a capable team of engineers operating at a far lower cost.
An Experienced In-House Team
We build your product development team to spec, meaning we create the team around your project's requirements. That may give you the impression that we're merely a hiring company and don’t have an in-house team of our own.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
While we build your development team from the ground up by sourcing the talent you need to make your product idea a reality, we also maintain an in-house team dedicated to enhancing our partnership with your business. Think of this team as your liaison between your company and its outsourced developers. We serve as the go-betweens by maintaining open lines of communication and aiding in the management of your project to ensure your business objectives are realized.
Most importantly, we have experience. A lot of it. We know what it takes to build talented and multi-faceted development teams and we've worked with some of the biggest names in tech while ensuring those teams operate as promised.
Access to Talented Software Engineers on a Global Scale
Finding qualified professionals and identifying potential in candidates. These are the top two challenges hiring managers in software development and other tech-adjacent companies face when hiring. Those challenges often arise as a result of local restrictions. Your business has to hire from a limited talent pool, typically restricted to a city or state, which makes it harder to find the right people for your project.
You're wading in the shallow end when the pool can be much deeper than you ever imagined.
With Lightci, you expand your hiring scope to the global scale. Restrictions on access to talent enforced by localized hiring practices disappear as your outsourced team is built from engineers from around the world. Crucially, we specialize in hiring. Through our augmentation service, we've developed a process that allows us to identify talent quickly and a network through which we can identify candidates who have expertise in the tech stacks you require to build your software.
It's all about scale. Our role, beyond ensuring the delivery of quality pieces of software, is to open your business up to an entire world of talent that is currently outside of your reach. Capability and capacity expand in harmony when you work with the right software outsourcing providers.
Outsourcing Services Complete Work Faster
Do you know how long it takes your company to develop a piece of software on average? The timeline varies between companies, with project scale and team capacity typically influencing these timelines, but many find they spend between four and nine months on a mid-size project. More if the project involves creating an enterprise-scale piece of software.
Many factors go into this time requirement. Your in-house team is contracted to work a set number of hours per day, for instance, meaning no progress is made on the project when the team is off the clock. You also have a budget to manage. That budget may prevent you from hiring more in-house members when you face a capability crunch, with delays occurring because there's only one member of the team who understands a particular tech stack. That member can't be everywhere at once so work has to wait.
At least, that's the case for companies that don't take advantage of outsourced software development. Lightci speeds up your development process in several ways. Our time-to-hire is significantly lower than the industry standard, meaning you get access to new engineers in a matter of days rather than months. With your team in place, you also create more working hours in your day. As your in-house software developers clock off, your external team clocks on, with many of our clients finding they can turn an eight-hour day into a 16-hour one with our help. Double the working hours means you can work to tighter deadlines.
There's also the capability aspect. This ties into what we discussed earlier about offering access to a global talent pool. Only have one or two people in your team who understand a particular tech stack? Bolster those numbers with software outsourcing and it becomes far easier to manage the resources you have available for your development projects.
Flexibility and Scalability
Cost and speed - the two great barriers to scaling your business.
Your costs grow as your company grows, with each new hire adding a salary and operational expenses to your balance sheet. On the speed front, you always hope that your team can keep pace with the rapid growth in demand for your services. When it can't, you need to hire fast. That's not always possible when operating in a location with a limited talent pool.
You'd have flexibility in a perfect world. Grow your team quickly when demand increases, and shrink it back down whenever demand drops. That level of flexibility simply isn't possible in the traditional software development environment. But it becomes not only a possibility but a distinct reality when you outsource software development.
You can adapt to rapidly changing business environments thanks to your outsourced team. With Lightci, you can also build an operational team in mere days to tackle unexpected projects or meet the challenge of changing requirements within an existing project. Simply put, you can grow or shrink at pace with our software development outsourcing services.
Data and Knowledge Management
It's not merely the coding aspect that concerns you when working with an outsourcing partner. Your company has a culture. It has a knowledge base and data that will need to be ported over to your external team to enable it to work on your software projects. The security and management of this combination of knowledge and data is a key and legitimate concern.
How can you trust that your outsourced software engineering partner will properly protect your company's most sensitive information?
With Lightci, that trust comes from a combination of our commitment to form a partnership with your company and our adherence to regional, national, and global regulations. We are an Employer of Record (EOR), which is the term used to define any legal employer that oversees the hiring of contractors and employees.
Our work as an EOR means that we handle the legal aspects of payroll, benefits packages, and taxation for your outsourced team on your behalf. It also means we handle the legal burdens when it comes to data compliance. Every piece of data or information you send to your external team is protected by contracted security measures, as defined before we begin work on your project.
We Work Across the Entire Development Lifecycle
Some outsourcing software development companies work on the "one-and-done" system. That means you contract them as a vendor to provide a team, with that team then completing the assigned work and immediately disbanding once you receive your deliverable. If that is what you require, Lightci can provide that sort of service.
But we also offer much more than that.
We're capable of supporting you through the entire product development cycle from the initial planning phases to the ongoing maintenance and support of the software we help you create. Our goal is not to develop a fly-by-night team. For most of our clients, the teams we create become part of their companies – overseen by us – that not only support the product for which they're contracted but go on to work on other projects in the future.
Think of the team we create on your behalf as an extension of your in-house development team. That extension offers direct input into the innovative solutions you're trying to create. It's also aligned with your business goals and exists with the purpose of ensuring you reach the objectives you set for your company. We're here for the long haul to demonstrate that outsourced services can become key to sustainable business growth.
Any Tech Stack
Access to the right tech stack is vital for any software project. On the in-house front, you already have a tech stack in place. Any external team that enters your company's collective fold needs to be well-versed in how to utilize that stack to ensure they work well alongside your in-house team. For companies outsourcing a custom software development project, access to the right tech stack often involves finding a team capable of leveraging technologies that either aren't available to the in-house team or are too expensive for the company to purchase itself.
Either way, Lightci has you covered.
The tech talent we source for your software project is capable of frontend, backend, artificial intelligence, and natural language processing development using almost any combination of currently available technologies. We can build in almost any tech stack. Just as importantly, we can build in the stack that makes the most sense for your project and the deliverable you intend to create.
Focus On Core Business Processes and Objectives
For many of our clients, software development is either not their main business process or something they do to support their overarching objectives. Either can create challenges when the client needs to build software. The software development process shifts focus away from the core business, with resources that would otherwise be dedicated to growing the company and finding customers instead of being tied up in building a product.
Time is your most valuable resource.
Free up more of it to focus on core business objectives with Lightci's third-party services. With your outsourced development team in place, your people regain the time they need to focus on more important work. For instance, your external teams can handle the software while internal teams home in on how to market the end product. The technical expertise built into your team also means you can spend less time searching for the right people to complete your project.
We exist to serve your core business. That's why we aim to become a partner, rather than a simple vendor, to you. The more we understand about your core business objectives, the better able we are to serve as a software developer capable of helping you reach those objectives.
Exceptional Product Quality
All of the reasons to work with us mentioned so far, including improved speed to market and access to a global talent pool, mean little if your outsourced product development results in a piece of software that isn't fit for market. Quality is key. Without it, your software fails to function properly. That functional failure creates chaos if the software is internally focused. For customer-facing applications, poor-quality software results in crushing damage to your company's reputation.
It's the ability to tackle the quality conundrum that leads to Lightci serving as a full-service outsourced developer. With your external team working alongside you at every stage of the development lifecycle, you end up with an experienced team not only in terms of technical expertise but also in terms of the quality expectations you and your customers hold.
Our motto is simple: Nothing less than the best.
We deliver exceptional quality because you rightfully demand it and our reputation counts on it.
We Work with The Best
The perfect demonstration of the exceptional quality Lightci promises comes from the companies with which we've worked. We're trusted by some of the world's leading tech pioneers to provide the technical expertise they need to bring their product ideas to life.
Examples of our previous clients include Google, Coinbase, and Brex, with each presenting different challenges for which we needed to develop teams to handle complex product builds. Coinbase says that we show engineering prowess that simply isn't available in the Big 4. Google says that we integrated into its product team as well as any internal hire they’ve ever made, with our engineers displaying a rare combination of talent and grit. But perhaps the most glowing recommendation of Lightci's software outsourcing services comes from Brex:
"Brex hires only the best of the best, and we’ve generally never been comfortable using external firms. Lightci put our concerns to rest and we couldn’t have been happier."
We're experts in helping companies with outsourcing software development at all levels. We also guarantee the same levels of service and quality regardless of whether you operate a regional business or a global corporation. And, as Brex discovered, we prove to even the most outsourcing-skeptical companies that working with external developers is hugely beneficial to your business.
The Three Software Outsourcing Models
You understand that the basic concept underpinning software development outsourcing is that you’ll be working with a third party to build your product. However, there are multiple outsourcing models. You must be aware of all of them to choose the model that best suits your business objectives.
Staff Augmentation Model
Often dubbed the simplest form of software development outsourcing, staff augmentation sees us serving as your ERO to find the right talent for an upcoming project. You still build a team. The difference between this and other models is that your new team becomes a fully integrated expansion of your in-house team. Typically, companies choose this model when they need to supplement an in-house team with talent quickly. Speed is of the essence, which is why Lightci has refined our hiring process to the point where we can locate the appropriate talent in less than 10 days.
Your augmented team will often work directly alongside your in-house team. This means regular face-to-face contact through meetings, with the team following the development structures you already have in place. In some cases, the augmentation model is direct enough for your new staff members to join your existing team in your offices. However, it's typically an outsourced model allowing businesses to take advantage of talent in other countries with appropriate communication structures in place to ensure the augmented team understands and can complete its objectives.
Dedicated Team Model
With the dedicated team model comes a greater responsibility for overseeing a project to completion on our behalf. It's the full-service model typically used by startups that have limited internal resources or companies for which software development isn't a core business process of offering. In many cases, the clients that require this model don't have their own software development teams. They need somebody to build that team for them and ensure the team is capable of delivering.
If you outsource software development via the dedicated team model, we do far more than provide tech talent. Lightci creates an entire management structure for that team, overseen by you, that enables efficient task allocation and operates via a workflow agreed upon by you. The team is still part of your company in terms of how it operates. However, you're essentially creating a new division to focus on software where none existed before within your company.
The key benefit is that you quickly build a group of talented developers who collectively place all of their focus on delivering a specific product or service for your company. Upon delivery, you have the option of disbanding the team or keeping it on for future development projects.
Project-Based Model
Think of the project-based model as a middle-ground between the augmentation and dedicated team models. Here, Lightci functions as an extension of your in-house team while also overseeing the entire software development process from the early planning stages to completion and ongoing maintenance. You're heavily involved in this process in terms of defining objectives and working with us to build the team required for the project. We also develop feedback loops to ensure your team is kept "in the know" about what's happening with the project.
The difference with this model is that we take responsibility for managing the project. As such, a project-based outsourcing model often requires an external project manager and a business analyst who serves as the go-between for your company and ours. We'll allocate workflows, set timescales (with your input), and handle quality testing throughout the development process. That leaves you free to focus on big-picture tasks like marketing the end product. It's a collaboration - we handle development based on your instructions so you can focus on other business objectives.
Three Steps to Powerful Product Builds
Even the smallest of software development projects can grow in complexity in an array of unexpected ways. We understand that. It's why Lightci has developed a simple three-step process for powerful product builds that we use whenever we serve as your outsourced software development partner.
01 - Define Requirements
This step is the deep dive, not only into the project at hand but also your business, its culture, and the objectives it hopes to achieve. It's in this first step that we solidify the budding partnership between us and your business.
On the project side, we focus on building the context needed to develop a high-quality software deliverable. Needs, preferences, and goals are all taken into account, with a combination of the three serving as the foundation of the entire project.
It's also during this step that we solidify the crucial aspects of the product build. Features are agreed upon. Timelines for deliverables are implemented. Costs are determined, as is the check-in cadence your business requires to keep track of the ongoing project.
02 - Built to Spec
Execution is the priority in the second step of our process.
Following the plan developed during Step 1, we move into the development of the entire build. The extent of our work depends largely on the outsourcing model you choose. For instance, the staff augmentation model sees us add members to your team who work to your instruction with our supervision. In other models, we handle the management and execution of the entire build process to create an end result that is both aligned with your requirements and fully tested.
03 - Delivery and Maintenance
A finished product isn't necessarily a product that requires no further work. Ongoing support is a must. The product may also evolve over time as your business scales and consumer feedback informs you of features your customers want to see in your software.
We provide continuing maintenance to your software, which includes ongoing support to your company to ensure the software continues to perform at its best. Updates can also be handled, typically by the team we assembled to handle the development stage, upon your request.
Choose Lightci - Your Outsourced Software Development Company
Are you ready to see your product magically come to life thanks to your outsourced software development team? Lightci is ready to work with you. Get in touch today to schedule a no-obligation demo through which we can show you the outsourcing models we have available so you can determine which works best for your business. All we need from you are some basic company details and an explanation of the software you wish to create and we can focus on developing our new partnership.
