Transformation of Digital Twin through a Reliable Engineering Partnership

Challenge

Brainstorming to get cracking and restore order

A Sweden’s top-rated 3D visualization and Virtual Reality studio reached out for team extension/augmentation services. Although they had their core engineering center in Romania but they lacked the rare skillset ‘Unreal Engine developers’.

Unreal Engine developers are thin on the ground and Europe is not the right place to look for cost-effective developers with such skills. Obviously, there is a talent gap prevailing globally with this kind of development but they tried their luck on the east side of the globe, and so did we meet.

Outsourcing is often hard to get right – and sometimes, the outsourcing process can delay the work it was meant to speed up. This is why our partner turned from the traditional outsourcing models for their IT and software development work to a better working model – such as team augmentation.

CodeNinja rendered 3D still imagery, interactive 3D models and allowed their viewer to move through the virtual environment freely. Our augmented team allowed their business to maintain control and visibility, while adding key skills and knowledge required for rapid progress.

After the team was onboarded, a requirement analysis was conducted and the team began to collect relevant documentation. Although some records were provided by the partner but these were not sufficient for development in a production environment. Also, the code we got was all messed up and they were in need of ‘hot development fixes’.

Technology such as Neo4 was originally developed by SL but it had glitches. Our engineers fixed the code and made it available for their high-end, real-time clientele using the software. The main software suite Neo4, a real-time 3D visualization tool was needed by their clients to target property developers, realtors, urban planning authorities, architects, municipalities and governmental organizations.

• A Sweden’s top-rated 3D visualization and Virtual Reality studio reached out to augment their team
• It was hard to find Unreal Engine Developers with cost-effectiveness in Europe
• Codes were all messed up and they were in need of ‘hot development fixes’
• CodeNinja’s augmented team added key skills and knowledge required for rapid progress

Proposed Solution

All hands on deck to build powerful solution

The range of services provided by CodeNinja covered full-cycle development including business analysis, software architecture enhancements, data science, software development, quality assurance and implementation.

Our team’s capacity to adjust the delivery volume (production server hot fixes) within 20 days was applauded by the partner. They expressed their desire to expand their partnership with CNC and induct more resources into this project.

To cope with loosely defined requirements and the innovative project nature, CNC followed a predictable scrum-based workflow to ensure on-time delivery.

CNC developers revamped the system, boosted overall performance, and made architecture easier to manage. They optimized document handling, improved data accessibility, streamlined broken functions. Jira Confluence was used to share software requirement documentation.

VP of engineering from Romania when reached CNC, the engineering leadership drew a comprehensive roadmap of the requirements to facilitate our partners better. When they inquired for Unreal Engine developers along with front and back-end developers, we looked into our benches.

Engineering talent is readily available on our benches while pre-vetted and interviewed engineers are also lined up on CodeNinja BaseCamp. It might not be easy for local businesses to break the barriers but we found the right team on our cloud with little effort.

Cursory interviews were arranged with their team, and after CNC team assessment, we bagged the Sight Line project. Since their quarterly targets were tightly linked with their revenue streams, we built all features, integrations and did infrastructure modernization within squeezed timelines.

With a diverse engineering talent augmentation and short development time, we earned our partner’s trust. They further wanted system overhauling and their major work to be handled by CodeNinja.

• CodeNinja being reliable and strategic engineering partner for outsourcing, adjusted delivery volume
• Unreal Engine development initiated in shortest possible time; rare and diverse engineering talent is made available
• Application infrastructure modernization as the legacy system wasn’t updated and halting their optimal performance
• Adopted DevOps practices CICD (continuous development, continuous integration) to fasten the development thus, quick results
• · Built systems like set-up staging server for testing and error-free code delivery.

Features

Enhancing capabilities and expanding possibilities

Team Structure – Four teams were raised

Multiple teams were formed for this project. One team was responsible for new features’ development and execution, comprised of Unreal Engine developers (3D visualizations/ mapping). The second team catered to the legacy system modernization while third and fourth teams looked after the application infrastructure and team for Cloud Azure infrastructure.

Managed Solution

Legacy system upgraded with latest tech stack

Old web structure or the legacy system wasn’t in-shape, slow loading times, browser incompatibility issues etc., were there. So, we shifted their technology stack. Although moving from legacy system is a delicate process so we have started from staging site and ensuring continuity of business operations.

Set-up staging server for testing and error-free code delivery

A nearly exact replica of a production environment for software testing was made to test codes and updates to ensure the quality of a production-like environment before actual deployment. It is meant to keep the legitimacy and integrity of the live site displayed to customers. This practice improved website performance 2x times and reduced errors by almost 70%

Continuous development, continuous integration – DevOps practices (CDCI) pipeline

CDCI method is introduced in this project for automation into the stages of development. Agile devOps practices with site reliability engineering (SRE) approach were incorporated resulting in continuous delivery and deployment.

Outcomes

Providing highly skilled and experienced engineers

CodeNinja delivered team augmentation services to Sweden’s top-rated 3D visualization and Virtual Reality studio. Our engineers rendered 3D still imagery, interactive 3D models and allowed their users to interact through the virtual environment. The developers revamped the system, boosted overall performance, and made architecture easier to manage.