Mobile Applications Reducing Costs for bexio

The Client

bexio is a Swiss market leader for cloud-based business software for small companies. Since 2016, their software has been used by over 40,000 companies. To run small businesses more efficiently, they offer solutions for all the administrative tasks like contact management, accounting including payroll, banking, product management, time-tracking, and inventory management. 

The Products

bexio outsourced to us their mobile development and support. In 2016, we built bexio Scanner – a native iOS mobile application to scan and upload documents. Later, we developed a cross-platform application – bexio Contacts, that evolved into another cross-platform app – bexioGo. The latter features the scanning functionality we first built when we started working with the client.  In 2020, we released a new version of bexioGo with a time-tracking option, i.e. now people can time-track and report work time per task, client, account, etc. directly from their mobile. All of the functionalities are also available in the client’s online ERP system. 

During the course of our partnership, the size of our software development team varied from 2 up to 5 people. In 2022, the plan is to add onto the mobile app’s features and functionalities, and expand it further. 

Our Partnership

Melon’s PMO says that the partnership with bexio is marked by one of the smoothest and easiest communications. They are one of the most easy-going clients she has worked with. The project has been entirely agile. Our team has regular meetings with the client, together we agree on priorities and then the decision-making, time-management, the freedom and the responsibility to efficiently complete the tasks lie with our development team. 

Melon’s team proactively has made suggestions for improvements and worked out concepts on how a specific issue can be solved. The client has been very happy that we have been able to process their inputs and feedback quickly.

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We have enjoyed that bexio’s team are highly technical and knowledgeable and we speak the same language. They’re perfectly aware of the specifics of the React native platform that we use for bexioGo. As with any other technology, it has its strength and weaknesses, and they know them well. Which again speeds up and eases the communication. 

bexio have another great asset – a QA team which is thorough and detail-orientated. They also have an in-house designer who puts a lot of attention to UX/UI and at the same time pushes our team to act like-wise. For us, this has been a great opportunity to learn and to add this expertise and experience to our background. It’s the most beautiful app we’ve developed so far, the most user-friendly according to Melon’s PMO.

The Challenges

The challenges were mostly with implementing the design. In the very beginning, the design itself required fine-tuning and our client presented additional requirements for both usability and look-and-feel. We took it to heart and managed to produce an updated design, so that the client is truly happy with the results.

From our partnership, we learned that attention to detail is important and highly appreciated by clients. Transparent communication is key, especially with technically accomplished clients like bexio. The moment we’ve had an issue, we shared it with them, and reached resolutions quickly and easily. 

Technically the most interesting part for our software development team was the document scanning feature, as well as image editing with the cross-platform technology. The team enjoyed it very much and learned a lot.    

There was no unnecessary pressure. The work was smooth, well-planned without any rushed decisions. The result is a product that we both cherish, and we are both truly proud of.