Views: 27
Choosing a provider to develop an application or software is a strategic priority. Beyond the appealing marketing pitch, it’s essential to verify the agency’s technical maturity, structure, and integrity. The five questions below help reveal those who deliver sustainable solutions, who have genuine experience and presence in Switzerland, and who are true partners ready for a long-term collaboration. By mastering these aspects, every company can ensure its investment results in solid expertise, full transparency, and real added value, rather than a mere publicity stunt, unfruitful attempts, or wasted resources.
Your requirement for local expertise in the face of disguised offshoring
Genuine involvement by a locally based team ensures technical coherence and accountability. A lack of Swiss ownership can mask total offshoring behind a façade of proximity.
Importance of a local presence
Having engineers based in Switzerland facilitates coordination with internal teams, enabling rapid decision-making and smooth communication. This physical proximity fosters a deep understanding of the regulatory and cultural constraints specific to the Swiss market. It also aligns business strategy with technical choices.
On-site experts reduce response times for incidents or last-minute adjustments. When needed, in-person meetings, co-design workshops, and integration phases benefit from a stronger collaborative dynamic. While videoconferencing tools are practical and widely used—by local and non-local agencies alike—they cannot always replace the richness of direct exchanges critical during certain project phases.
Local presence is also a guarantee of compliance with Swiss regulations, an understanding of local user needs and habits, and a strategic perspective on local business challenges—all of which are vital to the success of your mobile application or business software project.
Finally, being on the ground fosters a sense of ownership: the Swiss team adopts the project and becomes its guarantor. This shared responsibility curbs schedule slippages and ensures better tracking of critical milestones, conditioning efficient project management and high-quality deliverables.
Risks of fully disguised offshoring
A focus on a Swiss office can conceal that all development is delegated to distant teams. In this model, architectural decisions and code reviews escape local oversight, causing misalignments and time-consuming coordination efforts. Quality expectations often suffer as a result.
Time-zone differences, skill-level disparities, and language barriers can lead to misunderstandings about specifications, delays, and cost overruns. Technical trade-offs made remotely without local expertise are frequently contested during integration, necessitating costly fixes and endless back-and-forth.
In the worst case, local management becomes a mere interface role, without real control over the codebase or technology choices. The client company ends up dependent on an offshore provider, unable to negotiate intermediate deliverables or deadlines. This posture increases vendor lock-in risk and can lead to degraded quality—or a product that is wholly non-compliant and late.
Verifying Swiss ownership
Ask for the composition of the project teams, distinguishing management, architecture, and development roles. Transparency about where competencies are located is essential. A mature provider will readily supply this information and describe each collaborator’s level of commitment.
Also request regular progress reports delivered by the local Swiss office. These follow-ups demonstrate the Swiss branch’s daily involvement. Project performance indicators (milestone compliance, code quality, test coverage) should be shared systematically.
For example, a Swiss industrial company discovered during acceptance testing that the code had been entirely developed abroad, without local intervention or oversight. Correction delays then stretched by several weeks, jeopardizing the business solution’s launch. This example underscores the importance of demanding an actual technical presence in Switzerland from the contract stage onward.
Beware of reverse abuses: 100% local does not guarantee value for money—it may even be a trap!
Certain agencies tout their exclusively Swiss presence to justify rates well above the market average. They sometimes hide behind a claimed agile approach or unpredictable hourly billing to mask poor internal organization, lower technical proficiency, and deliverables that fall short of expectations.
Localization alone does not guarantee execution quality, on-time delivery, or maintainability of the delivered code. A local team—even one promoting ecological, human, or proximity values—is not inherently competent or well structured.
It’s therefore crucial to distinguish truly value-creating local presence—with clear governance, an experienced team, and cost transparency—from a mere marketing lever used to inflate budgets artificially.
💡 Tip: When speaking with an agency claiming “100% local,” ask these simple but revealing questions:
- Can you describe your project organization, quality processes, and tracking tools?
- Which technologies will you use to develop my application, and why?
- How do you ensure the maintainability of the delivered code?
- What deliverables are included in your estimates (specifications, tests, documentation, etc.)?
- Can you provide a precise range—or even a fixed price (depending on the level of specification)—for completing our entire project?
The most serious firms are sometimes hybrid: strategic and technical leadership in Switzerland, local engineers, strategists, and project managers, but a smartly organized production capacity beyond borders. This model combines proximity, efficiency, and optimal value for money. Such companies are accustomed to working with demanding clients and often build their business on expertise, cost transparency, and delivering results—rather than agency branding and communication.
Post-launch support: differentiating a one-off engagement from a lasting partnership
A successful launch merely begins the most critical phase: operation and evolution. “One-shot” providers deliver without guaranteeing support or maintenance.
One-off projects vs. sustainable partnerships
In a one-off model, the provider’s responsibility ends upon code delivery, with no commitment to ongoing support or future enhancements. The client company then handles maintenance internally or hires another vendor, resulting in loss of institutional knowledge. This approach undermines operational continuity.
Conversely, a sustainable partnership integrates “operations and upgrades” from the outset. The provider remains responsible for deployment, bug fixes, and new feature integration. Terms and processes are defined in a support agreement with clear service-level agreements (SLAs).
This model strengthens the value chain: the team that designed the application understands its context, knows its constraints, and retains knowledge of the technology choices. They become an extension of the in-house service, creating a virtuous cycle of continuous improvement and responsiveness to business needs.
Support and maintenance arrangements
It’s crucial to specify support modalities (hours, contact channels, response times) and geographic coverage. Dedicated resources should be identified—whether level-1 engineers for first-line support or expert specialists for complex fixes. This organization ensures clear responsibility distribution.
Preventive and evolutionary maintenance should be defined in a separate contract, detailing update frequency, security patch management, and new version roll-outs. Ticketing and incident-tracking tools guarantee request traceability and enable monitoring of provider performance.
The “training and knowledge transfer” component is often underestimated. Yet it ensures progressive autonomy for the internal team. Educational workshops and comprehensive documentation are essential for easing adoption of updates and routine application management, as discussed in our change management guide.
Performance indicators and SLAs
Implementing performance indicators (mean time to resolution, availability rate, number of regressions) provides objective measures of support quality. These KPIs should be monitored monthly and reviewed regularly to enable continuous process adjustment.
Service levels (SLAs) must be contractually defined, with penalties for non-compliance. This encourages the provider to maintain high responsiveness and quality. SLAs should cover both critical incidents and minor enhancement requests.
For example, a Swiss fintech specialist in mobile payments experienced a major incident on its deployment night. The initial provider offered no 24/7 support, causing hours of downtime and loss of user trust. An urgent reinforcement of support with permanent availability commitments was then negotiated to secure ongoing service.
Edana: strategic digital partner in Switzerland
We support companies and organizations in their digital transformation
When subcontracting is involved, ensure full transparency
Subcontracting without local governance can conceal quality gaps and security risks. Transparency across every link in the project chain is indispensable.
Identifying subcontracted parties
If subcontracting is used—which we do not recommend—obtain a detailed list of tasks assigned to third parties (development, testing, design, infrastructure). Each sensitive activity (authentication, payment, ERP integration) must be explicitly listed. This traceability prevents surprises during final integration.
The location of subcontracted teams should be known to address legal and contractual issues related to data processing. Jurisdictional differences can impact intellectual property and regulatory compliance. It’s advisable to require annexes specifying these aspects.
This role mapping also verifies that the primary provider retains overall project control. Contractual responsibilities are clarified, avoiding phases executed without proper oversight.
Contractual frameworks and governance
Contracts must include scoped subcontracting clauses (approval, NDAs, audits). A serious provider will share its subcontractor selection and control processes. These commitments guarantee quality and security compliance.
Project governance should include validation points at each milestone, involving both the lead provider and its subcontractors. Collective technical and functional reviews ensure deliverable coherence and early detection of deviations. This rigor limits cost and schedule drift.
Establishing a steering committee that brings together the client, the provider, and key subcontractors—when applicable—allows risks to be anticipated. This formal framework strengthens communication and holds each stakeholder accountable.
Quality control measures
Defining quality indicators (test coverage, build-success rates, bug feedback) is essential. These metrics must cover all deliverables, regardless of origin, and serve to validate each component before integration.
Cross-code reviews led locally ensure adherence to best practices defined at project kickoff. Periodic security audits and performance tests limit vulnerabilities introduced by external providers.
For example, a Swiss industrial group discovered late that some automation scripts were developed by an uncertified subcontractor. The resulting correction and compliance efforts added 15% to the initial budget, underlining the importance of continuous oversight and rigorous local management.
Industry expertise and cost justification
Experience with comparable projects ensures a quick grasp of business challenges and better risk anticipation. Pricing should reflect added value, not just brand image.
Relevance of experience in the same sector
Knowledge of sector-specific business processes (banking, healthcare, industry, e-commerce) shortens the scoping phase and simplifies requirement definition. A provider familiar with heavily regulated sectors (e.g., Swissmedic, FINMA) will integrate these constraints into the architecture from the start.
Anonymous references allow you to assess the breadth and depth of expertise. The goal isn’t to collect logos, but to showcase use cases aligned with your project’s challenges. This experience enhances reliability and accelerates time to market.
Analyzing similar success stories highlights best practices and pitfalls to avoid. It forms the basis for a realistic, tailored project plan that minimizes exploratory phases and maximizes productivity gains.
Assessing understanding of business challenges
The diagnostic phase should include a functional audit by experienced consultants capable of interviewing stakeholders and mapping processes. Presenting this audit demonstrates the provider’s ability to translate needs into an appropriate technical solution.
Showing a proof of concept or prototype allows you to validate the chosen approach. This technical demonstration should cover critical use cases and highlight the envisioned ergonomics, performance, and scalability.
A legitimate provider will also suggest optimization paths and open-source alternatives, avoiding vendor lock-in. This stance reflects a commitment to your company’s interests rather than selling a preconfigured solution.
Cost justification and value delivered
Pricing should be broken down by work phase (scoping, design, development, testing, deployment, support) with clear deliverables for each stage. This granularity helps you understand where value is created and avoid hidden costs.
Presenting a detailed provisional budget, complete with day-rate estimates, gives you transparent insight into resource allocation. Budget variations should be explained according to identified risks and selected options.
For example, a major Swiss insurer requested a precise cost breakdown for each development lot, including evolutionary maintenance. The provider justified its rates with productivity gains and reduced time-to-market indicators, providing concrete proof of value delivered.
Choose a reliable, sustainable digital partner to ensure your project’s success
By asking these five questions, your company gains a comprehensive evaluation framework: local expertise, post-delivery support, transparency in subcontracting, industry experience, and cost justification. These criteria guarantee a partner capable of combining technical expertise, business-challenge understanding, and long-term commitment.
Every digital project deserves a provider who rejects methodological copy-and-paste, prioritizes support and business understanding, embraces open source and scalable architecture, and values performance, security, and modularity. If you aim to build a strategically adapted, extensible, and secure ecosystem, our experts are ready to support you at every step, from strategy to execution.
