Full Stack Support to Mobile Virtual Network Operator

The age of digital services, on-demand business’ and eCommerce are growing rapidly and moving all physical assets toward the Net. Now, the only thing which can make a lot of trouble for you is a lack of access to the Internet because of an account without any cash on in. Mobile Vikings, a mobile virtual network operator, noticed this market niche and as a result entered the Polish telecom market. Now, the company, together with Ulam Labs, has been developing a competitive automatic prepaid platform for mobile services.

Industry
Custom Software Development
Technology
Python, Django, AngularJS, AWS, Docker, Convox
Link
mobilevikings.pl
Company size
40+
Country of origin
Poland
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Telecommunication market in Poland

  • One of the largest telecom markets in Europe

  • By 2018, the number of subscribers exceeded 51 million

  • The market will grow by 4.3% and will reach $9.1 billion by 2022

  • In 2019, 5G trail networks should be implemented

  • A mobile penetration is above the EU average, standing at almost 141% by 2018

Customer

About

  • Belgian mobile virtual network operator (MVNO) founded in 2007

  • Build out the business on the Polish telecom market in 2013

  • Belgian know-how and source code implemented in Poland

  • Fifty thousand Polish subscribers in 2018

  • Headquarters in Wroclaw

Plans

  • Unlimited phone calls and texts to Vikings customers as well as to other mobile operators

  • 4G Internet in 15Gb and 20Gb packages

  • Auto top-up service

  • Intelligent wallet service

  • Additional dedicated discounts for Vikings

Challenges

Upgradability of Mobile Vikings system to Polish telecom network standard

Outsourcing of development and operations (DevOps)

Development of a mobile native app

As technologies and business markets change practically at the speed of light, Mobile Vikings wanted to get the best professionals from the Polish market who wanted to work on new, even very difficult tasks with tight deadlines. After a few weeks of searching the market and considering many possible options, Mobile Vikings decided to start the cooperation with Ulam Labs in 2016.

Results

Thanks to the efficient development approaches, Mobile Vikings was able to deliver real value to its customers.

The main achievements

01

reliable Mobile Number Portability

02

microservices that effectively support the auto top-up process

03

best in class of a mobile native app

04

high security transaction system

05

a work acceleration platform which enhances log aggregation, continuous delivery and implementation

The steps of system upgrading

01

Creating a structure that would make the system scalable

02

Implementing a new algorithm that would enable transfer phone numbers automatically

03

Rewriting the legacy code according to best practice

04

Testing the application to make sure the improvements within the Mobile Vikings products make the system stable

Key functionalities

Mobile number portability process (MNP)

Technically, MNP process is the facility that helps to switch from one mobile phone network service provider to another in any licensed service area (e.g. a country) while remaining an existing telephone number and avoiding the costs of switching between operators. Mobile Vikings wanted to receive a software module which allows the company to transfer phone numbers both automatically and effectively from other mobile operators.

Payment management system

The basic challenge was to create a seamless payment service with a high transaction security rate.

Ulam Labs has been assisting internal MVs team adding new features to provide better system performance and business edge.

Currently, the team consists of:

  • 5 Ulam’s employees including 3 frontend and backend specialists and 2 mobile app developers,
  • 4 MV’s development engineers, 2 quality assurance specialists, UX, product design and management team.

Deployment environment

MV used to work on Amazon Web Service, however the system had a lot of issues with deploying new platform features. The company wanted to have a stable, easy-use system for testing new features.

Auto top-up

The technology enables your mobile account to be topped up automatically once it gets to a preset limit, involving your credit card only. The challenge was to top-up a user’s account correctly, without potential multiple top-ups.

Mobile App

Mobile Vikings wanted to receive a complete native app, which would have more features and get more powerful interface, and back-end

Used technology

The tech stack:

Besides the mentioned solutions, Ulam Labs also added a new tool - Elasticsearch. The centrally-stored data search and analytics engine helped solve the problem of a growing number of use cases and managing the cases in a proper way. Apart from this, an SQL Database was created based on MySQL and PostgreSQL relations. To create, change, and improve infrastructure, Ulam Labs used HashiCorp Terraform. The open source tool that codifies APIs into declarative configuration files which can be shared amongst team members, treated as code to view current versions, review, and edit.

“Experienced and professional team”

Ulam is a great team, and I regret that they’re not part of my own team. They are seniors so they have a lot of experience, and they work in a professional way.
Magdalena Piksa
Managing Director, Mobile Vikings Polska

And that’s all...

Now, it’s your turn! Are you excited to start the process and learn more about your journey with Ulam Labs? Don’t hesitate to contact us with your questions.

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