Leobit
Indoor and Outdoor Cycling Solution
Web-based data analysis tool
Leobit developed a comprehensive solution for individual and group cycling in interactive settings. The released product has helped the customer to start the cooperation with a leading cycling hardware manufacturer and increase their market share.
Within 4 years of cooperation, Leobit helped the customer grow from a startup to a global company and increase the number of users by 10 times, from 20,000 to 200,000, via new gamification approach and embedded software development.
Client background
In 2008, an indoor cycling startup was founded by several experienced developers and specialists interested in sports. They wanted to create a game-changing concept of indoor cycling that would allow people to enjoy cycling, achieve better results, and exercise more efficiently. The founders relied on visualization technologies to create a more interactive cycling experience, build exciting real routes, organize competitions and challenges. Such an approach proved to be highly effective and kickstarted their business path.
In 2016, they decided to outsource a major part of their development tasks to Leobit having started a long-term technological partnership. Since then, Leobit has been assisting the company with all its development needs and initiatives. In 2017, the cycling software gained the interest of a leading indoor cycling hardware manufacturer based in the US that wanted to provide end-to-end cycling solution for individual and group trainings.
Today, the customer’s company is recognized as a global market leader in interactive cycling and continuously increases the number of users around the world.
Business challenge
To withstand market competition, tech companies need to keep abreast of all innovations and offer unusual solutions. The customer’s company realized that to attract more end clients, it was necessary to supplement their existing software with additional functions and develop new products. This would allow selling the software to sports club chains and cooperate with top market players. For these tasks, Leobit was contracted to help.
At later stages of the cooperation, the customer also faced the need to prepare the software for the use on a larger scale with a particular type of bikes. This would allow their company to provide an end-to-end cycling solution and expand their customer base. Consequently, the requirements for software quality and scalability considerably increased. Moreover, the customer decided to launch a product for solo cyclists that supported individual trainings. This was another significant business step which required Leobit’s professional development assistance.
Cameron C. View all
Leobit has been integral in helping us expand our offering when it comes to software. Having a team of experienced software developers has been just absolutely essential to the success of our projects. I’ve been working with Leobit for the past three years and I can’t imagine doing it any other way. I can always rely on them to get the job done and I always know that I’m going to get quality work.
Project description
As a company with substantial outsourcing experience, Leobit knows that fruitful cooperation requires constant communication and maximum transparency. During the years of the partnership with the customer, Leobit has always met deadlines and the requirements.
Stage 1
DISCOVERY AND QUALITY IMPROVEMENTS
In May 2016, the customer contacted Leobit to fix some bugs, analyze the existing code, and maintain the previously developed software. As a result, the Leobit’s team managed to quickly and successfully complete the tasks that had remained problematic for a long period of time prior to our cooperation.
After the Discovery period, the customer entrusted all components of the existing product to Leobit, including:
- Website with training statistics
- Desktop application installed on a club PC
- IOS mobile app for collecting statistics
- 2 booking apps which duplicated the website functionality (Android + iOS)
From then on, Leobit has been providing maintenance services, architecture improvements to support the necessary new functionality, as well developing as the features required by end customers.
Stage 2
NEW FEATURES AND ACQUISITION
The group cycling software provided by the customer was mainly paired up with the equipment produced by a particular hardware manufacturer based in the US. After Leobit had fixed the bugs and expanded the existing functionality, the hardware manufacturer expressed the intention to buy the Norwegian startup and use this software exclusively for their bikes. The customer agreed to this acquisition as it presented a great opportunity for global growth.
For the successful completion of the takeover procedure, the customer had to assess the product and provide the related documentation. Leobit helped them to go through the acquisition process and continued the cooperation with a newly created cycling giant.
Stage 3
EMBEDDED DEVELOPMENT AND GAMIFICATION
The new hardware has opened additional opportunities for the customer and allowed the company to enter the global market. They were able to offer an end-to-end solution which was highly demanded by the top sports clubs. With the growing quality requirements for the product, Leobit suggested to expand the QA team working on the project.
In 2017, Leobit started helping the customer’s embedded team with the software for dash cycling computers. That same year, the customer’s company also decided to supplement the embedded cycling product with a solo indoor cycling project that was developed by Leobit from scratch:
- At first, the customer planned to develop an Android mobile app for native tablets with embedded software. After Leobit created an MVP and proofs of concept, customer partially reviewed the selected functionality having decided to make the product more interactive.
- Unfortunately, the Android platform didn’t support the required gamification, so Leobit offered an alternative. To satisfy the new demands, it was necessary to switch to Unity that allowed creating a cross-platform solution with high interactiveness and scalability.
- Leobit started rewriting the entire solo cycling solution for Unity to implement the necessary gamification.
Whereas the solo cycling solution provides various functions for individual users, Leobit has also developed a black box product and public API for sports clubs chains. The black box duplicates the functionality of indoor cycling but without extensive interactivity. It generates statistics and reports that can be used to evaluate the training dynamics and user achievements. The public API was also created by Leobit to help sports clubs process the data collected from bikes and users. This was a step from SaaS to PaaS taken to provide the clubs that have an API but don’t have servers with an opportunity to aggregate all fitness data and use the full capabilities of the customer’s product.
Stage 4
MIGRATION TO CLOUD
In 2018, the customer decided to enter the Chinese market renowned for its strict limitations. Leobit assisted the company with the preparation and provided continuous consultations.
In the course of the cooperation, Leobit realized that the use of legacy and outdated technologies restricted the opportunities for the future development of the product. Leobit suggested to fully migrate the indoor cycling to the cloud. At the end of 2018, the migration started with the aim of creating a 2.0 Version of the existing products. The project is still ongoing.
Value delivered
Leobit helped the customer company to enter the global market. The solution is currently used in more than 2,500 sport clubs in the USA, UK, Canada, Germany, Norway, Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden, Australia, China, Japan, Singapore and many others
Developed the embedded cycling product for solo indoor program with added gamification
Assisted with scaling and growing end product users by 10 times, from 20,000 to 200,000
Migrated to cloud
60,000+ installs of the app in Apple Store and Google Play