Innovation is an open-ended culture progressing with technologically adept minds looping in tandem and connecting the dots. In the digitally transformed era, these loops are online networks of allies, and dots are the socio-digital touchpoints ever-active with updating know-how–in short, a team.
Success is a journey towards achieving a dream by continuously advancing teamwork. In the world of hyper-connected digitally physical and virtually feasible, dynamic realities, the only way for entrepreneurs trying to amplify their startup success momentum exponentially is by partnering with ScaleupAlly – A trusted ally guaranteeing expanding startups’ Dream Team of Technovators (expert, professional, in-house, and freelance).
Conceived by Manu Jain, the CEO, and his team of friends, ScaleupAlly helps startups Innovate with the Best Tech Talent. Manu says that in an era where technology is essential for every business, great tech talent is scarce. ScaleupAlly partners with Startups and Business leaders to quickly build industry-changing solutions using
The ‘Dream Team’
A dream team behind a project increases the chances of success by 70%. The ‘Dream Team’ is a guild of certified tech experts. From Engineering Leads to QAs, from Software Developers to Data scientists, combined with the in-house team of industry experts and project managers to ensure speed, quality, and guaranteed fulfillment.
ScaleupAlly sits in the sweet spot between IT Shops and Freelancers. The ScaleupAlly Way makes it easier for Startups to have a world-class product at quite an economical rate.
The ScaleupAlly Advantage:
‘ScaleupAlly Promises’ and ‘ScaleupAlly Values’ make the firm the best Technology Solution Provider. The promise to have Solid Working Frameworks with a Proactive Approach and Obsession for giving great experiences every time. “And our five Values-
- We Do What We Say,
- Be Humbly Confident,
- Passion to Excel,
- Ubuntu,
- Have Fun,
helps us to excel in what we do,” reflects Manu.
The Promise and Values make a unique hyper-collaborative ecosystem ensuring each team members reach their peak performance.
A Laser-Sharp Focus
He adds, “Our Intentions are always aligned with the client. And this has been praised across our clientele. We stick by our principles of *Doing whatever is best for the client project, *Flexible engagements to suit the client’s startup stage, *Solid Project Management with a Proactive Approach. The proof of we being the best lies in the numbers.
- ScaleupAlly works with 100+ Startups every year.
- 25 Startups feature ScaleupAlly as their Main Development Team.
- One in every two clients is a referral of an existing client.
- 4 out of 10 is the NPS Score by Clients.
- 8 out of 10 is the NPS Score by Talent Network.
- ScaleupAlly grew from 12 to 53 in a span of 15 months.
- ScaleupAlly stands at a 4.9 Score at Glassdoor,
- ScaleupAlly stands at 5 out of 5 stars at Clutch, an Industry-leading platform for B2B Service Providers.
Manu states that ScaleupAlly works in three domains-
- Cloud Solutions: Building robust and scalable web and mobile applications
- Business Intelligence: Improving decision-making using Interactive Reporting and Visualization
- Data science: Unlock powerful analytics by tapping into data you didn’t even know you had.
The laser focus approach towards Startups and the intentions to co-grow with them helps ScaleupAlly beat the competition with high margins.
A Sweet Spot
Manu informs that the IT Shops’ incentives aren’t aligned with clients. “Fixed talent pools, FTE salary requirements, and concurrent clients can quickly get your project off the rails.
Working with freelancers can have tremendous advantages. At the same time, choosing the wrong freelancer can spell doom for your project.”
The ScaleupAlly Way “Brings us to a sweet spot between IT Shops and Freelancer Models,” reveals Manu. ScaleupAlly enjoys the advantages of both models and overcomes the limitations at the same time.
Analyzing over 100+ Client reviews, Scaleupally has created a Word Cloud that describes its feedback and the why startups loved ScaleupAlly.
ScaleupAlly has worked in the industries like BFSI, eCommerce and Marketplace, Education, Fashion and Grooming, Fundraising and Charity, Gaming, Travel and Hospitality, Real Estate, Restaurant, and Food Delivery, and Retail & FMCG.
The Tale of the Phoenix
Manu has been a seasoned entrepreneur. He started his journey at the age of 21 with his first Ed-Tech Startup PassKarado. He, along with his friends, started it. PassKarado was a platform to upload and download the Academic Material of any given university. The mission was to reduce the information asymmetry in Student Life during Examination week. Within a span on one year, PassKarado was getting all National and International Media hype and had 200+ Universities on board with 15,000 registered users using the app. “Given we were in the early stage of our life, we did not know how to sell, and this led to the shutdown of the Idea,” reveals Manu.
In 2015, while pursuing MBA from IMT Ghaziabad, Manu and his same college friends started Admito. Admito was another Ed-Tech startup in the MBA College Selection space. The idea was to match MBA Aspirants’ academics, examination scores and preferences with colleges’ life and offerings. Within two years, Admito had more than 40,000 registered users and more than 700+ B-Schools data on the platform. In 2017 end, Admito was shut down as the team was not able to raise enough funds for its survival
Both failures did not dishearten the team. Like a phoenix, the same team rose again, but this time into Services Space. Their experience in Product Development allowed them to see a gap in the Global Market- ‘Non-tech founders and early-stage startups struggling with Quality Digital Platform Development.’
Manu states, “When CB Insights surveyed Failed Startups, they found
- 23% of startups said ‘not the right team’
- 17% of startup said it was Poor Product/User un-friendly Product.”
The challenges Founders and Startup face are
- Not enough budget to hire a full-fledged in-house team.
- Difficult to hire and remotely manage quality developers, engineers, and leads on a freelancer basis.
- IT Shops hire cheap talent and provide cheap quality.
- Specialized agencies are quite expensive.
Manu and his team leveraged on this gap and started becoming the Product Team for Startups globally. What began in 2018 has grown by 16x in terms of Members Count by 2022.
Innovation Triangle
Being an experienced leader in the same industry, Manu says that he understands the revolution modern technologies are bringing to the industry. Technologies like Blockchain, Web3, DevOps, TDD Approach, AI, ML, and Cybersecurity are impacting the entire ecosystem.
He mentions, “To adapt with this changing scenario, we have developed an Innovation Framework to stay ahead of the curve. We call it the Innovation Triangle.”
It has three main elements- Invention (the new idea), the value for the client (client proposition), and the value for the organization (business proposition).
The real challenge lies in finding the New Idea that is valuable to Clients and generates business for the company. For the Innovation to happen, ScaleupAlly uses a 360-degree approach.
- The R&D Team of ScaleupAlly helps find New Ideas that are worthy of exploration
- The Clients help identify the value of those ideas.
- The Talent pool helps check the feasibility of the ideas and what is needed to make them happen.
- The Marketing and Business team helps create the Business Value and Marketing Strategy around it.
Triumphing in Turbulence
Elaborating more on their initial challenges during the pandemic, Manu conveys, “There is a saying that if you stay positive in a negative situation, you win.”
March 2020: COVID-19 was new to the world and had an impact on everyone. Companies, Governments, startups, Businesses, everyone suffered. ScaleupAlly’s first instinct was to ensure the safety and sanity of the members, and “We started WFH immediately on 20th Mar 2020,” says Manu. The second decision was to ensure the company has at least three months of runway to provide salaries.
Without an iota of doubt, the Leadership team reduced their own salaries by 33%. ScaleupAlly always makes sure the salaries are paid on time. One of the core promises of ScaleupAlly was to ensure any of the members that joined ScaleupAlly with the belief that this is a good company should not face any salary cuts, or appraisal delays.
Apart from this, it was very important to ensure everyone in the team stayed positive and adapted to the new normal, “We conducted refreshing sessions for fun and enjoyment to balance the chaos happening in the outside world,” shares Manu.
Professional Family Comes First
One quarter down the COVID, as the entire world was adopting the new scenario, amazing things happened. Tech Sector emerged as a rare sector that boomed in the COVID Era. He quips, “We made ourselves ready to accept the increase in Tech demands.” Second quarter onwards, not only did the count of projects increase but it started doubling. With the strong base and collaborative efforts of the team, ScaleupAlly keeps achieving new milestones and taking on new challenges every day.
Manu furthers they made sure that each of them was in a good mental space and are not facing any challenges with the work. Their sales team came up with new processes to keep up the sales; the management made sure the salaries were never disturbed, and the Project managers made sure the clients were updated about the progress and maintained a smooth conversation with them. “COVID was hard but a collaborative way helped us overcome it,” says Manu.
People Are the Miracle
In his advice to other tech business leaders who wish to make their organizational environments the best for their employees, Manu first quotes Simon Sinek – “Leaders are responsible for the people who are responsible for the results. Results not responsible for leaders,” and then elaborates on it by saying that to ensure that the organization produces results, achieves yearly targets and has a lower attrition rate, ‘leaders should focus on equipping their team members/employees with the mindset, skillset, emotion-set to perform at their best.
He cites, “We at ScaleupAlly heavily focus on ensuring that people are inspired to go to work, feel safe when they’re there, and go home fulfilled at the end of the day.”
It does take time to happen, but when it happens, a miracle happens. “In Q2 2022, we, the leaders, at our individual capacity, achieved only 10% of the Quarter Targets. The rest 90% were all achieved by Team Members. This quarter, i.e., Q3 2022, the Leaders % is going to reduce, and still, I am confident we are going to oversee the target.”
Perpetually Humane
On envisioning scaling ScaleupAlly’s growth and prospects in the future, Manu shares that they aim to be the Most Human Organization among Services businesses. They at ScaleupAlly measure their company’s performance on 3Ps.
“*Profits: Given we are bootstrapped; we need to take care of the bottom line.
*People: We measure the satisfaction of the Team Members at regular intervals. The increased Profits should increase People’s Satisfaction, and,
*Processes: To ensure consistent results, what automation/processes we were able to set up around that.”
He further states that in terms of revenue, ScaleupAlly has grown at a CAGR of 68% in the last four years. And from a team of six to 52, ScaleupAlly has moved from a Survival Stage to Growth Stage.
ScaleupAlly aims to be a team of 100+ in the next 1.5 years and increase a CAGR to 75%. ScaleupAlly also aims to have a Talent Pool of up to 500+ in the next one-and-a-half years.
