By now it should be clear that the cost of making an app like Uber depends on numerous factors. But here’s an attempt at the estimate. Building an MVP for an On Demand Platform involves creating web/mobile interfaces for both supply and demand. Add to this the fact that native experiences are the expected norm leading to parallel development efforts if we chose to build both for iOS and Android. The other important component is the nerve center/admin panel that doubles up as a CRM and a Dashboard to control some of the critical operations. Everything is glued together by the APIs that operate on top of central databases and control logic – part of the backend framework that runs on cloud.
Assuming the platform architecture is scalable and is able to handle 500-1000 transactions a day right away we are looking at an upwards of $100k-$300k effort for an initial MVP. Variations in the ball park primarily are on 3 accounts –
1. Number of stakeholders
2. Number of platforms that are part of the initial launch
3. Complexities in the business model
4. Geography/ Region out of which your development team operates or engineers the product. Per hour rates vary from $20 -$60 (parts of India/Eastern Europe/South East Asia) to $80 -$150 (parts of Western Europe/US)
With a modular approach that takes advantage of pre-built IP, we at Juggernaut are able to reduce the time and cost involved by around 30%. In addition, since Juggernaut’s engineering teams are based out of India we bring a huge cost arbitrage to the table while still ensuring smoothness in communication generally associated with in-house teams.
The engagement processes have evolved over more than 5 years of distributed product development. All in all the costs for an MVP while taking the Juggernaut approach can be as low as USD 40k to USD 80k. But more than the cost advantage the bigger value proposition that we bring to the table is experience drawn from doing more than 50+ On-Demand Platform in different geographies and domains. This makes the approach consultative wherein at every step, we draw from the playbook of many successful implementations that we have been associated with directly and indirectly.
