Nymbl × Crafted
“What set the Crafted Team apart was their willingness to flex with our business requirements rather than rigidly adhering to predetermined processes. Their flexibility and diverse set of expertise proved invaluable as we navigated through this period of change. ”
Founded in 2014, Nymbl is a team of clinicians, programmers, and experts dedicated to breaking down the physical and emotional barriers of aging. This enables people everywhere to experience a freer, better life through digital health.
Nymbl started with a fun, effective balance training program and is now moving toward bladder training. Both of these programs exist in their iOS and Android applications. As the company grew and their technology aged, the team eventually needed to re-evaluate their cross-platform mobile strategy. Improving platform stability would allow them to respond quickly to feedback and continue growing their user base with a cutting edge experience.
Goals
Manage risk to the business - the current cross-platform mobile technology, Xamarin, stopped supporting iOS versions later than 17.
Pave the way for a Next Generation mobile app offering new features and a more engaging user experience.
Approach
After evaluating the current Xamarin app and the option to upgrade to .NET MAUI, Crafted and Nymbl decided to rewrite the app in Flutter. Choosing Flutter for the cross-platform technology allowed us to rebuild the mobile app quickly in one codebase and improve stability while paving the way to add new features iteratively.
“Working with Crafted made our transition to Flutter easy and straightforward! Their commitment to quality had a real impact on our app journey. They helped us transition our app with minimal disruption, delivering what we needed in a timely manner. Throughout our engagement, the Crafted team was professional, responsive, and guided us at every step!”
Project story
Nymbl attempted a migration to MAUI before engaging Crafted. We began with an evaluation of that progress against a rewrite in a more widely adopted technology such as Flutter. To make a decision, we did extensive research and built a Proof of Concept (POC). After making significant progress in one week with the Flutter POC, we decided with our stakeholders at Nymbl to pursue a rewrite modernization.
We collaborated with Nymbl to design a phased approach. Phase one started with a complete rebuild of their most used training program to establish a scalable code architecture. Weekly demos and iterative deploys with Codemagic kept all teams aligned on progress for early feedback.
Cappy, one of Crafted’s senior engineers on the project, said: “We didn’t want to end the engagement with a lump of code handover. We made sure to have good documentation, an automated pipeline, and great tests. We tackled the project holistically to set Nymbl up for long term success.”
The care the team took to establish a robust infrastructure around the codebase means Nymbl has a great foundation to continue the modernization journey.
“I feel incredible about what we delivered. We created something stable, testable and easy to extend.”
Outcome
“We delivered the entirety of their Balance application rewritten in Flutter. Additionally, we delivered a full suite of unit and integration tests to ensure stability well into the future” said James Hammond, software engineer who worked on the project.
Meghan added from the Nymbl team, “The Crafted Team stepped in at a moment's notice to ensure uninterrupted service to our customers. We faced uncertainty about our near-term needs, so we sought versatile, 'Swiss army knife-like' support that could adapt to any challenge that popped up. Thanks to their flexibility and adaptable approach, we had time to gain clarity on our long-term organizational needs.“
Crafted’s work with Nymbl was ultimately a success. We built a modern cross-platform application with a robust test suite in roughly one quarter. The time to market beat original projections, allowing us to easily ramp their developers for a smooth handover.
“Crafted has always striven to maintain the highest levels of customer satisfaction, and with this referral, that commitment was a top priority… it’s gratifying to see that, at the conclusion of the project, we hit the mark!”
