Industry: Software Development, Mobile Development
JetBrains products used: Space
Organization Size: 25
Country: International
Makery delivers end-to-end digital services. The company was founded just over five years ago with the mission of creating innovative solutions in areas related to e-mobility, health, and well-being. Makery works closely with industry leaders at all stages of product development, from ideas, research, and planning, through to design, architecture, implementation, publishing, release, and maintenance.
“Rather than using a multitude of individual tools, we’ve always preferred integrated environments. We started looking for a new digital home, and when we heard about Space at KotlinConf, we really liked the concept. So we decided to sign up.”
— Andras Kindler, Co-Founder, Makery
Balazs Zsedely, Gyula Voros, and Andras Kindler are the three founders of Makery.
We deliver end-to-end digital services. We work with our partners on all phases of product development, from ideas, research, and planning, through design, architecture, and implementation, to publishing, release, and maintenance. We operate globally, helping to develop innovative solutions, for example, in the fields of mobility and health & wellbeing.
Kotlin is widely used for Android and backend development at Makery. We also organize meetups and the Kotliners conference as an official community partner of JetBrains. We use multiple JetBrains products: IntelliJ IDEA, Android Studio, and DataGrip. We also have experience with YouTrack and Upsource, which is what led us to Space.
Rather than using a multitude of individual tools, we’ve always preferred integrated environments. We started looking for a new digital home, and when we heard about Space at KotlinConf, we really liked the concept. So we decided to sign up.
Before signing up for Space, we had used Trello, Asana, and YouTrack, but none of them was “integrated” enough for us – we always needed a complementary tool (eg. to provide chats, wikis, message boards, etc.).
We settled down in Basecamp, and enjoyed using it for quite some time. But as we progressed as a company, we found that it was evolving more slowly than we had expected and we started to feel like we had outgrown it.
In general, the areas of issue management, project hierarchy, and calendars are the most difficult to get right. In the tools we used, we almost always found these to be a bottleneck for productivity.
We were looking for an integrated environment to be a new digital home for us that could seamlessly manage everything in one place. We learned about Space at KotlinConf 2019, and its concept resonated with us. Since we’re quite content with JetBrains tools, we decided to try Space as well. And we’ve been using it as our main tool ever since. Even though it was an EAP (now beta) with known issues and missing features, we adopted it, and we love using it in our daily lives.
The main benefits for us:
First, right after KotlinConf, the three of us did a closed test-run to evaluate Space. This went well, so we onboarded the team during an all-hands meeting where we went through all of Space’s features. We then did a test-run as a company, using Space and another product in parallel for about 1.5 months. Once we felt that we were reflexively using Space instead of the other product, we shut the latter down and started using Space exclusively.
When it comes to Space’s educational material, the blog posts work great for us. We’re also members of the space-insiders channel, which is also a good resource, and we regularly submit issues to the tracker.
Yes, please feel free to get in touch with us at andras@makery.co
Anna Vinogradova, Chief Marketing Officer, AmberCore Software Ltd
Communication has become faster since we started using Space. I think the deciding factors in choosing to go with Space were its ease of use and versatility.
Garth Gilmour, Head of Learning, Instil
When the social distancing restrictions were introduced in March 2020, we needed a tool that would let us collaborate online with students as part of virtual deliveries, and Space was the obvious choice.
Joshua Bigoss, Director of Data Services, Ensign Services
My team could not have responded to the needs of our organization during the pandemic without the agility and precision that Space made possible. In 2020 my team and I had a lot of 12 hour days and 7 day work weeks. There were months of being woken up at 3 am by anxiety, stress, or fear for our residents and caregivers and the ever-changing needs of our organization. But I never once had to think about effective communication, collaboration, or availability and was grateful to have this tool.