Quoted 85k to port a web service we offer to a mobile app

JohnnyTodd · 24-10-2011 12:28PM #1

85k to rework a website/service we offer to make it moble accessible?

Is this reasonable for what they claim is a months software development? Seems pretty high.

Hobbes · 24-10-2011 12:52PM

Get a few quotes from different places. Also you should get the quoted documented.

If that is an out of the air quote, it is more likely done to deter you.

JohnnyTodd · 24-10-2011 01:01PM

How much do you think it should cost?

Bubonic · 24-10-2011 01:03PM

Thats impossible to say without knowing more details of the site in question and the spec of the application you want to build.

If you want to PM me some details I will give it a quick look over it.

The Corinthian · 24-10-2011 01:28PM

If we're simply talking about a mobile optimized Web site, then on the face of it 85k is high.

However, as Bubonic pointed out, it's really impossible to say without really knowing what would be required. If you're talking apps, for multiple OS's, rather than a mobile Web site, then that would increase cost. Video streaming would also bloat the price, due to format (and thus rendering) and client requirements between the various mobile platforms. Or something in the back-end may require greater work than normal (e.g. integration costs, due to legacy issues).

Ultimately, without more information, you're asking the age old "how long is a piece of string" question.

Confused_73 · 24-10-2011 02:23PM

85 K does seem very high ... but as the guys say, what exactly are you looking for? If you are mobilising all aspects of a large website, then there would be a lot of work involved

You need to get a breakdown of the quote, to see how many days they estimate for the work and at what daily rate you are being charged

Bubonic · 24-10-2011 05:55PM

Also check how much QA and how Project Management is included.

Cheap software houses will leave it out and look cheaper, whereas good ones
will charge you for it.

You will pay for it either way really, if its not done correctly you will burn way
more development time anyway.

onemorechance · 24-10-2011 07:04PM

JohnnyTodd wrote: »

85k to rework a website/service we offer to make it moble accessible?

Is this reasonable for what they claim is a months software development? Seems pretty high.

e85k to re-work a website to make it mobile accessible does seem high; e85k to rework a web-service to make it mobile accessible might not be so high.

As the others have said, it depends on the work involved and how many people the quoter will be putting on it.

Get a breakdown of the e85k and see if you think it's worth it.

Elfman · 25-10-2011 03:08AM

JohnnyTodd wrote: »

85k to rework a website/service we offer to make it moble accessible?

Is this reasonable for what they claim is a months software development? Seems pretty high.

My guess is that either the 85K or the 1 month time frame is off.
Have you set the month deadline if so they may be working long hours.

I think Hobbes may have it spot on. The project may be badly spec'd or the company may not have personal available and the quote is designed to put you off.

hard to say for sure without proper spec .

For any project worth that kind of money it should be a default course of action to get a few quotes

DublinWriter · 26-10-2011 03:54PM

JohnnyTodd - 85K seems excessive.

Can you put a link to your existing site up here?

Placebo · 28-10-2011 01:36PM

i hate all these vague questions, the op never returns and i lose sleep over it - everytime !

ocallagh · 28-10-2011 01:41PM

85k could be a bargain for all we know.

I'm guessing 6 or 7 developers with project management thrown on top. They'll be working together for a relatively short period of time so the requirements must be quite detailed and I'd imagine the quote is too. If not, there's something up.

mewso · 01-11-2011 04:08PM

Placebo wrote: »

i hate all these vague questions, the op never returns and i lose sleep over it - everytime !

Obviously he has gone back to the customer to quote them a lower price

JohnnyTodd · 01-11-2011 04:19PM

mewso wrote: »

Obviously he has gone back to the customer to quote them a lower price

What makes you think that?

Ronan_ · 01-11-2011 05:37PM

Because you came here with a question and although others here tried to help you out and asked you for more information, you didn't post again...

mewso · 01-11-2011 07:18PM

Ronan_ wrote: »

Because you came here with a question and although others here tried to help you out and asked you for more information, you didn't post again...

Well I was joking but that is a better reason. I'll go with that.

Malice · 01-11-2011 09:03PM

If you haven't already I'd go back to them and get them to detail where the 85k is coming from. Chances are, like Hobbes wrote, it was an "out of thin air" figure quoted as a deterrence.

Malice · 01-11-2011 09:03PM

If you haven't already I'd go back to them and get them to detail where the 85k is coming from. Chances are, like Hobbes wrote, it was an "out of thin air" figure quoted as a deterrence.

JohnnyTodd · 03-11-2011 12:40PM

Its not an app to optmize viewing of a website. We have many machines used for process control installed throughout Europe (approx 250). These machines are PLC controlled with a SCADA user interface( customed C#.NET application developed my myself). What we want is a mobile application to allow our service technicians diagnose and make process control adjustments remotely.

Thats the jist of it.

JohnnyTodd · 03-11-2011 12:41PM

Malice wrote: »

If you haven't already I'd go back to them and get them to detail where the 85k is coming from. Chances are, like Hobbes wrote, it was an "out of thin air" figure quoted as a deterrence.

Yes I have done that and they refuse to give a proper breakdown. SOunds dodgy.

stevenmu · 03-11-2011 12:43PM

At a guess they were either scared off by the words PLC and SCADA, or they have some expertise with thos and fee they can charge a ridiculous premium for it.

Have you looked at Windows Phone 7? If you've written the C# app yourself you should find development for it pretty straightforward, you might be able to port it yourself.

mstester · 03-11-2011 12:45PM

Walk away!

Seriously walk away, if they are charging 85k and are not will to give you a proper break down of costs etc then they are either dodgy or very incompetent.

My advice is to shop else where.

Also has your company considered hiring a contractor in for the task? Maybe alot cheaper if you can find the right man

JohnnyTodd · 03-11-2011 12:49PM

stevenmu wrote: »

At a guess they were either scared off by the words PLC and SCADA, or they have some expertise with thos and fee they can charge a ridiculous premium for it.

Have you looked at Windows Phone 7? If you've written the C# app yourself you should find development for it pretty straightforward, you might be able to port it yourself.

Hmm, what is the learning curve for mobile development? I'm more an embedded systems programmer (Assembler /C )

I have written quite a few C++/C# Windows Applications also.

JohnnyTodd · 03-11-2011 01:00PM

Ronan_ wrote: »

Because you came here with a question and although others here tried to help you out and asked you for more information, you didn't post again...

Jeez Ronan, give me a chance. Not on boards all the time you know. Some of us have work to do!

The Corinthian · 03-11-2011 01:13PM

JohnnyTodd wrote: »

Its not an app to optmize viewing of a website. We have many machines used for process control installed throughout Europe (approx 250). These machines are PLC controlled with a SCADA user interface( customed C#.NET application developed my myself). What we want is a mobile application to allow our service technicians diagnose and make process control adjustments remotely.

This puts another spin on it as what you are seeking is an extrannet based interface into an in-house system. The 'mobilizing' aspect of such a project would be the simplest part of it, where it would become more complex is with regards to (legacy) integration, creating functionality that potentially does not even yet exist (do all the required diagnosis and process control API's already exist?) and, naturally, security.

Then there is the question of whether the work involves specialized technical knowledge that carries a premium. All this can potentially bloat out your costs.

Have you considered writing an API for doing everything you want and just get someone who can do mobile interfaces to hook into these? The cost, from what I can see is in the integration, not the mobile side of things, and if you give that on a silver platter to a mobile developer, it should reduce your costs significantly.

JohnnyTodd wrote: »

Yes I have done that and they refuse to give a proper breakdown. SOunds dodgy.

Potentially, but not always. It is more than likely they've given you a 'ballpark' estimate. Giving a detailed one depends upon having accurate requirements (does a requirements document exist or are you still working off a 'wish list'?) and being willing to sit down and do the necessary analysis and authoring the detailed quote document (one or more working days).

Some companies don't have the time to do this for everybody who comes knocking at their door. In many other cases, they don't judge the client to be serious enough to invest the time - anyone in IT consulting will have encountered 'tire-kickers'; these are 'potential' clients who are looking for quotes but not really interested in going beyond that. Worse still are those who are looking for quotes simply so they can use them to renegotiate with an existing supplier.

From a business perspective, 'tire-kickers' you're better off refusing detailed quotes to 'tire-kickers', because their conversion rate is so low that you're better off sourcing new sales leads in the time that it will time to do those quotes.

Of course, I'm not saying that this is the case here, and would certainly walk away if I was a serious client from anyone who refused some form of breakdown, but it is fair to say that not all such refusals are 'dodgy'.

stevenmu · 03-11-2011 01:13PM

JohnnyTodd wrote: »

Hmm, what is the learning curve for mobile development? I'm more an embedded systems programmer (Assembler /C )

I have written quite a few C++/C# Windows Applications also.

It depends very much on the mobile platform you're developing for.

Windows Phone 7 (WP7) apps are written using a version of Silverlight, so they're C# based with XAML to define the UI. XAML takes a little bit of effort to pick up and understand, but not a lot, and since you're using Visual Studio to develop (and possibly Expression Blend for better UI design) it does most of the work, you can drag and drop controls etc and only need to look at the XAML for more advanced control (like using the design and source views with asp.net). If you're already pretty confident with C# it's an easy learning curve, and you may even be able to reuse lots of your existing code.

You can download the SDK for free, including a free version of Visual Studio 2010 if needed, and it comes with a built in emulator for testing, so it could be worth spending a few hours or a day or two with it to see what you think. See the App Hub for more details.

I don't know much about iOS or Android platforms, beyond that they use Objective-C and Java respectively, I don't know much about their toolchains, SDKs etc. But really mobile development isn't all that different from desktop development, you need to keep in mind the smaller screen, limited resources and connectivity issues, but other than that it's all pretty straightforward.

DublinWriter · 03-11-2011 08:04PM

JohnnyTodd wrote: »

Its not an app to optmize viewing of a website. We have many machines used for process control installed throughout Europe (approx 250). These machines are PLC controlled with a SCADA user interface( customed C#.NET application developed my myself). What we want is a mobile application to allow our service technicians diagnose and make process control adjustments remotely.

Thats the jist of it.

So, you could just use the web browser on your mobile device and save yourself 85K?

I would ask them to produce some high-level project plan showing major milestones if that kind of money is involved.

Trojan · 03-11-2011 09:02PM

The Corinthian wrote: »

It is more than likely they've given you a 'ballpark' estimate. Giving a detailed one depends upon having accurate requirements (does a requirements document exist or are you still working off a 'wish list'?) and being willing to sit down and do the necessary analysis and authoring the detailed quote document (one or more working days).

Some companies don't have the time to do this for everybody who comes knocking at their door. In many other cases, they don't judge the client to be serious enough to invest the time - anyone in IT consulting will have encountered 'tire-kickers'; these are 'potential' clients who are looking for quotes but not really interested in going beyond that. Worse still are those who are looking for quotes simply so they can use them to renegotiate with an existing supplier.

From a business perspective, 'tire-kickers' you're better off refusing detailed quotes to 'tire-kickers', because their conversion rate is so low that you're better off sourcing new sales leads in the time that it will time to do those quotes.

Of course, I'm not saying that this is the case here, and would certainly walk away if I was a serious client from anyone who refused some form of breakdown, but it is fair to say that not all such refusals are 'dodgy'.

+1 to all that.

It's also quite common in some (particularly larger NGO) organisations for them to have a small budget set aside at the start of the project which is purely to fund the technical exploration and requirements analysis phase (similar but not identical to a feasibility study which you'll often see grant-aided).

Shocking as it may seem to some, the service provider is actually paid for them to come up with their quote for the main project.

I've also seen it occur in small business where a provider has added a line item on the invoice for the cost of quoting, and it refused by the customer on the basis that it's just the cost of doing business. Of course I'd expect that customer eventually paid that expense, whether they realised or not.

But yeah, tyre kickers, bad. A lot of them out there.

--

As for the original post. Let's ask the question this way:

I was quoted 85k for a car. Is this reasonable? Seems pretty high to me.

That's the problem without very detailed specs.

Quoted 85k to port a web service we offer to a mobile app

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