Mobile-First Design and Engineering for a Kuwaiti Non-Profit
1,400
Visitors a day
Arriving after release, well beyond what anyone expected.
50
Members of parliament
Whose records the platform makes accessible.
3
Weeks before the election
The margin the new version shipped with, against an unexpectedly early vote.
The client
Raqib50 is a non-profit site that makes the records of members of parliament public, and holds them to account that way.
The challengeWhat the teams actually needed
An existing application had to be re-engineered for a market where nearly everyone is on a phone, in Arabic, against a deadline that moved.
Challenge 01Built for mobile, not adapted
The app had to be re-engineered to support a market dominated by mobile use.
Challenge 02A language barrier
Working in Arabic added a dimension the team had to design and test around.
Challenge 03An election brought forward
Parliamentary elections arrived earlier than anyone planned, compressing the deadline unexpectedly.
What we did
A mobile-first rebuild against a moving deadline
The founders wanted a Ruby on Rails team that could inherit the existing codebase and build the mobile app from nothing.
Detailed, then in constant contact
A thorough scoping session opened the work, and communication stayed close throughout.
Mobile first
A mobile-first design was implemented, since that is where the audience actually is.
Against a fluctuating date
Functionality was prioritised against a deadline that kept shifting, which is the only way to ship at all in that situation.
Out in November
The new version was released in November, three weeks before the unexpectedly early elections — and its popularity ran well past expectations.
Client testimonial
With our previous software developer it was a one task project. We designed the application, sent them the design, they programmed it, and gave back the final product with little chance to improve the app. We hardly cooperated at all. With Netguru, the situation is completely different. We started with a scoping session, where we could get to know the team and made sure we are all on the same page. Since then, we are constantly in touch, and stay on top of project progress and possible issues. This made working together very efficient.
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What’s next