The Client

We are finance platform that serves international students at top universities in the U.S. It has been in business since 2014 and they use big data and machine learning to pull international credit history and enhance credit decisions for students.

We started working with TowerHouse in March of 2014, my co-founder has worked with them in the past, and they do great work. They've done everything from building financial platforms to developing video games for mobile phones. They're very talented and exactly the group we needed to develop our platform.

At that point we needed someone to build and refine our platforms, and with TowerHouse we achieved that, and so much more.

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The Approach

They built our web-based and mobile-friendly platform with a Salesforce backend. They work with PHP and Java for our web-based technologies and do a bit of Python scripting. We’ve also modified the Salesforce platform in many different directions..

They're helping us optimize some aspects of the platform currently, and they've also helped with other tools and technologies we implemented in finance and other areas of the company. They function almost like an offshore tech or engineering department for us, rather than as a more transactional, outsourced technology firm.

We've worked with at least 5 of their developers. This includes a traditional developer, a lead engineer, a designer, and someone with Salesforce-specific experience. “Developer” is a bit too generic of a term—they have a few additional specialties that we're able to tap into.

They have a lead engineer that's assigned to the team. They clearly defined roles from the start and set up a very good routine. For instance, our CTO has a daily check-in call with them where they go over priorities and address anything that needs troubleshooting on the fly.

In terms of tools, they use JIRA and Slack. There's always an ongoing chat with the team. They’re available at all hours, and they go above and beyond to get the right results. We truly appreciate that.

Even though they are on slightly different time zones, they adapt to U.S. hours. Their English level is pretty good. Some of them are U.S.-educated, and others have spent an extended period of time here. They work exclusively with U.S.-based clients, so it's a fairly seamless experience.

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The Outcome

We have thousands of visitors every day, with a thousand potential customers hitting our platform and submitting applications every month. Customer feedback has been great from all corners of the world. One-third of users access our platform via mobile devices and are excited by that option.

They're like a tech team for our company. They very much integrate with our systems, routines, and check-in process, rather than asking for a task and doing it in a black box. I can't give specific examples, but if we had we opened a Uruguay office with our own software developers, there would've been no difference. That's how seamless the whole process has been.

I have nothing but amazing things to say about the work they've provided for us.

‍Feedback

TowerHouse developed and optimized a Salesforce machine learning and data analysis platform using Java, PHP and Python scripting. As an engineering partner, they implement finance tools and other tech.

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