One call. Get your questions answered. Leave with clarity.
No pitch. No pressure. Just clear advice.
Before you book, the three things everyone wants to know:
How long?
Most builds finish in under two months.
Who owns it?
You do. Every line of code, from day one.
What if I've been burned before?
Then you know the questions to ask. Ask us all of them.
Working software every two weeks. Leave anytime, and take everything with you.
How can we support you?
Which of these sounds like you?
Pick the one that fits best.
Tell us about yourself
We'll follow up to schedule your call.
“We didn't have to commit to a 12-month contract, all those big things that really scared us off from working with other teams.”
What Happens After You Book a Call
Before we meet
We will email you a mutual Non-Disclosure Agreement (NDA). This means we can't tell anyone about your idea and you can't tell anyone about our proprietary tools and rates.
Consultation
We meet virtually to get to know you and learn about what you're building. We will explain our process and how we work together. If your company is Canadian, we'll also tell you whether government funding could cover part of your build.
Project success depends on scoping
Understanding the exact functions your app needs from the beginning is one of the most important decisions you'll make. Early scoping determines two things that affect everything that follows:
- The architecture, which defines how stable and expandable your system will be
- The cost, which determines how efficiently your budget is turned into real progress
When scoping is rushed or skipped, projects drift, costs climb, and costly rework needs to be done later.
We start by giving you a way to figure out exactly what your build needs to do, and which features and decisions push the price up, before you commit to anything.
That's why we provide access to our App Cost Calculator for $197, credited back in full if you hire us. You'll answer simple, non-technical questions, and it takes about 20 minutes. It's designed to help you:
- Turn your idea into instructions a developer can build from
- Identify what truly needs to be built first
- Understand the cost implications before development begins
- Avoid decisions that quietly inflate budgets later
Estimate
Once you answer the questions in the App Cost Calculator, we'll book a second complimentary meeting to make sure we've captured your requirements perfectly, because they shape the estimate.
We'll then provide your estimate as a range, with a low and high end. Building from scratch can lead to unforeseen challenges, and a range gives you a clear understanding of what it may cost to build your solution.
You only pay for time and materials. By providing this range, we make sure you have a realistic picture of the total investment before we start.
Hiring Us
When you are ready to proceed, we'll send you two documents: the contract, and a written list of exactly what we're building for you in this project, so we both know what's included and what isn't. It's called the Scope of Work, and it's what protects your budget from quietly growing.
"Before committing, I was a little bit worried about what the maintenance would look like. The team was really able to show me what went into the system, and it did make sense for me to keep going forward and build my own learning management system."
Frequently Asked Questions
Capability & Experience
What industries do you work with?
We are industry agnostic and work with:
• Professional services (law firms, accounting firms, consulting agencies, case management, time tracking, client portals, document automation)
• Healthcare & Medical
• E-commerce & Retail
• Manufacturing
• Real Estate
• Education & EdTech
• Logistics & Transportation
• Agriculture & Food
• Energy & Utilities
• Construction
• Hospitality
Do you work with startups and small businesses?
Yes! We built New Idea Machine for non-technical business owners because we believe every entrepreneur deserves to have someone in their corner who'll tell them the truth about their options.
Let's talk about what you're building. Even if we're not the right fit, you'll walk away knowing your next steps.
No sales pitch, just direct advice from someone who's spent years helping business owners make these exact decisions.
How big is your team?
We're a team of nine working with a network of fifty developers across different specialties.
When you have a project, we match you with developers who actually fit what you're building:
• The right tech stack.
• Someone who understands your industry.
• The pace that works for your timeline.
It means you're not stuck with whoever happens to be available. You get people who can jump in, understand what you need, and start delivering without weeks of ramp-up time.
The practical benefit: your project moves faster because the team is built around your specific requirements, not the other way around.
What technologies do you specialize in?
• General Purpose: Python, JavaScript, Java, C++, C#, C, Go, Rust, Ruby, PHP, Swift, Kotlin.
• Web Development: HTML, CSS, TypeScript, JavaScript (React, Vue, Angular frameworks).
• Data & Analytics: Python, R, SQL, Julia, MATLAB.
Process & Project Management
Is quality assurance included?
Yes, with every build. Your software is tested as it's built, and you see it working every week or two, so problems get caught while they're small.
How do you structure development process?
We work in an agile method. Regular meetings where we show you what we've built. You see progress every week or two, not months later.
This matters because projects change. Your vision evolves. Market conditions shift. Customer feedback arrives. Agile lets us pivot without starting over.
It's also more cost-effective:
• No change order fees when priorities shift.
• No 30%+ contingency markups to cover scope creep risk.
• You're not locked into a fixed plan that becomes obsolete halfway through.
We'd rather build in short cycles, show you real working software, and adjust based on what you're learning. That's how good products actually get built.
How often will we meet to review progress?
Several times a month. Usually bi-weekly, depending on what works for your schedule and the project pace.
Frequent check-ins keep us aligned:
• You catch things early when adjustments are quick.
• No surprises at the end.
• The product evolves based on your input throughout the process.
The result: you're involved in a way that actually improves the outcome, and the final product reflects exactly what you need.
Scope, Requirements & Risk Management
What are unforeseen challenges?
Every project has its own complexities. While we work hard to identify risks and constraints upfront, some challenges only become visible once development is underway.
When that happens, we address them quickly and adapt the solution without losing momentum.
Can you help define requirements?
Yes. We start by understanding the business problem. What are you trying to accomplish? Who needs this? What does success look like?
Then we map out how people will actually use it. What's their workflow? What's frustrating them now? Where are the bottlenecks? This surfaces requirements you didn't realize mattered.
We turn that into a clear feature roadmap with priorities. What's essential versus what can wait. What delivers value immediately versus what's nice to have later.
For MVPs, we're especially focused on cutting scope. What's the smallest version that proves your core idea? What can you validate manually before building it into software? We've talked clients out of half their initial feature list because they didn't need it to test their hypothesis.
Most clients arrive with a partial picture. "We need a dashboard" or "Automate this process." That's fine. Our job is asking the right questions until we land on something that actually solves your problem.
How do you handle changes during development?
Changes happen. We expect them. Your priorities shift. You get customer feedback. A competitor launches something. The market moves.
We build flexibility into how we work. Because we're meeting regularly and showing you progress, you can redirect us before we've gone too far down the wrong path. You tell us what's more important now, we adjust the roadmap, and we keep moving.
Sometimes, this may change the estimate we initially provided you but we will let you know ahead of time.
Our approach costs less overall because we're not building features that become irrelevant. We're building what matters right now based on what you're actually learning.
Cost & Budget
How much will it cost to build my app?
There are many factors that determine the cost of your app development. For example, building an app you download from the app store is far more expensive than building a progressive web app that looks and behaves like a mobile app.
Formal requirements gathering helps us give you an accurate estimate instead of just guessing.
We recommend building in stages and prioritizing "must-haves" vs "nice-to-haves" so you can launch faster and protect your budget.
And if you're applying for grants to develop your app, we'll help you through that process by providing an estimate that works with grant requirements.
How does your pricing work?
Every project gets split into must-haves and nice-to-haves. We build the essentials first, then you decide what's next based on your budget and results. This approach typically saves clients 30-40% compared to fixed bids, which build in large contingency fees and charge extra for changes.
We work on a retainer basis and bill for actual time and materials:
• You put funds in a retainer upfront.
• We draw hours against it as work gets done.
• You get detailed time logs with each invoice (weekly or bi-weekly).
• Any unused funds at the end are fully refundable.
Is maintenance included?
Maintenance is optional. Most clients keep us on a small monthly retainer (5-10 hours) for updates, security patches, and minor tweaks. Others prefer to handle it in-house or work with their own team.
Either way, you're never locked in. If you want to move on after launch, we'll hand everything over with full documentation and a smooth transition. We'd rather have you stay because you love working with us, not because you have to.
Ownership, IP & Security
Who owns the code when the project is done?
You do. From day one. No lock-in, no restrictive contracts, no proprietary code that traps you.
When we're done (or if you decide to move on mid-project), everything transfers to you with full documentation.
How do you manage security, privacy, and data protection?
We build with industry best practices from the start: encrypted data transmission, secure authentication, regular updates, and proper access controls.
For projects with sensitive data (health records, financial info, personal information), we bring in an independent security expert. It's crucial to have an independent expert check each project for security holes.
You own all your data. We never access, store, or use it beyond what's necessary to build and test your software.
Do you sign NDAs or confidentiality agreements?
Yes. Before our first meeting, we'll send you a mutual NDA that protects your idea and prevents us from discussing any of your information with anyone outside our team.