You buy results.
Not hours.
Custom software for regulated industries, produced by an AI delivery system we build around your product, with our engineers responsible for every result, and a system that keeps developing it after launch.
Hamburg, since 20195.0 on ClutchEngineering constitution on GitHub
You have probably been here before. A vendor billed by the hour, and the delay arrived with the invoice. Perhaps the team went quiet in month three. Perhaps there is a prototype, one you built yourself with an AI tool over a weekend, and nothing about it runs in production. Perhaps you inherited a codebase nobody dares to extend.
In each of those cases you paid for time. Somebody's time. Nobody was paid for the result, and the vendor was rewarded for taking longer. CQUELLE, a boutique custom software development company in Hamburg, exists to make the result the thing that is bought.
You approve stories with acceptance criteria. We deliver them, produced by an AI delivery system we set up around your product, reviewed and answered for by our engineers. The price comes with the scope, in the proposal. Not by the hour, and not on this page.
What you paid for before, and what you pay for now
What you buy
- Buying hours
- Time. A developer-month, a sprint, an estimate.
- Buying results, with CQUELLE
- A story: one capability with acceptance criteria, approved by you, delivered and accepted.
Who carries an overrun
- Buying hours
- You, at the same rate, for as long as it takes.
- Buying results, with CQUELLE
- We do. The story is priced as a result.
What you can inspect
- Buying hours
- A timesheet and a status report.
- Buying results, with CQUELLE
- The story board, every repository, every pull request, and a published engineering constitution.
What the vendor is rewarded for
- Buying hours
- Taking longer.
- Buying results, with CQUELLE
- Finishing the story and starting the next one.
After launch
- Buying hours
- A new project, a new estimate.
- Buying results, with CQUELLE
- The same delivery system keeps taking feedback and requirements, and engineers release.
Three things you can check
Each of these is a rule we publish, a system you can inspect, or a project we delivered. Client names are withheld where an NDA applies.
- 01
You buy results, not hours.
The unit of every engagement is a story: one user-facing capability with acceptance criteria, an out-of-scope line and a tested scenario. You approve the list. We deliver the stories. You accept each one against its written criteria.
- Stories are capped at 20 hours in our public engineering handbook, so a result is always small enough to see on the board and to accept.
- The commercial wrapper fits the client: a packaged build with a fixed price for the approved scope, a governed frame agreement for enterprises, an operate plan after launch. The price arrives with the proposal, after you have approved the list.
- A recent client entered with one bounded work package on an existing product, priced as a result and delivered in slices. That is the entry pattern working.
- 02
An AI delivery system around your product, with people responsible.
Around your product we set up the system that produces the work: per-client instruction and rule files, skills, a pre-configured environment, CI/CD from day one, finish dates forecast from what is logged. Most of the production runs through it. Every result is reviewed, tested and answered for by an engineer.
- One client describes a feature in a sentence, the system produces it, and it ships after review, with nobody sizing it by the hour. Hourly billing stopped making sense there, which is where this offer comes from.
- On another engagement, a first work package that a conventional estimate had put at several weeks of developer time was produced in an evening with the delivery system and handed over in slices.
- A third client moved an ongoing product line from a previous vendor to us after seeing how the system works.
- Every generated line goes through the same review, tests and acceptance as hand-written code. Code and infrastructure are yours; the delivery system is ours to reuse and improve.
- 03
The system keeps developing your solution.
After launch the delivery system stays around the product. Your feedback and new requirements flow into a per-client AI handbook; the system analyzes, fixes and implements; our engineers review and release. Offered as an option with the operate plans.
- On one engagement the agent's behavior is governed by a living specification the client revises directly. Changes take effect without a re-engineering cycle.
- Three operate tiers, including a regulated tier with release attestations for auditors.
- You own code, accounts and documentation, so the option is a choice, not a lock-in.
Read how we work before you sign
Two documents frame every engagement. Neither is marketing, and both are older than this page.
- The engineering constitution, public on GitHub
- How stories are written and sized, how a task breakdown happens before every story, what done means, how a slip is announced before the estimate runs out, and the sentence we hold ourselves to: we work as if we could be replaced tomorrow. Read the handbook.
- The AI policy, written down
- Approved tools only, under business agreements, with no training on your inputs. Personal data, credentials and production data never pass through an AI tool. Your contract takes precedence over the policy, and on request we work without AI tools and state what that does to effort and schedule. We share the document before signing.
Three ways to buy results
The unit is the same in all three, the accepted story. The wrapper changes with the client. Prices are in the proposal, after the scope is known.
Packaged build
Mid-market. An idea, an AI-generated prototype, or a bounded module on an existing system.
A scoping week produces the story list and the price for exactly that scope. Then a Starter, Standard or Growth build: up to 8, 20 or 32 stories in 4, 8 or 12 weeks, with a 30-day warranty on delivered scope.
Governed frame agreement
Enterprises and regulated operators with procurement, security and governance requirements.
The same accepted-story unit inside a frame: a price list per story size, stories bundled into call-offs, security reviews, release attestations and audit support. No open time-and-material budget for anyone to approve.
Operate plan, with the self-developing option
Anything we built, and systems we took over, after go-live.
Monitoring, updates and included engineering capacity, in three tiers up to a regulated one with release attestations. As an option, the delivery system keeps taking feedback and new requirements, and engineers release.
Regulated industries
Four fields where the audit trail, the data residency and the acceptance criteria are the product. If yours is not here, ask anyway; sometimes the answer is a referral.
HealthTech
Patient and practice software, from a veterinary platform rebuilt live to a blood-donation operator with tenant isolation by construction. GDPR by default; HIPAA where your market requires it.
FinTech and banking
Advisory and banking platforms where every decision has to be attributable and the audit trail shapes the architecture before the first screen is designed.
EdTech
Assessment and learning platforms, including an audit-trailed eAssessment system used in international research studies in 60+ countries, with tens of thousands of test-takers per cycle.
Insurtech and public sector
Policy, claims and underwriting workflows where the complexity lives in the rules, and public-sector requirements, where sovereignty, EU team locations and an on-premise option come first.
What clients say
Rated 5.0 across every project on Clutch.
It's been a pleasure working with CQUELLE team. In an era where AI tools can do everything, it's hard to find people that can understand the business need and ask the right questions. A great profile for a startup where things are not perfectly square and a lot must be achieved.
They were very responsive and reactive both in the planning and execution of the project.
They demonstrated a remarkable ability to deliver items on time consistently.
The people responsible
A named lead owns every milestone. The people below are the ones on your calls, with their real roles and locations.
Eugen
Software Development & Management
Hamburg, Germany
Roman
.NET & Angular Developer
Lviv, Ukraine
Oleh
.NET, Angular & React Developer
Warsaw, Poland
Mark
.NET & React Developer
Bucharest, Romania
Vladyslav
Full Stack Developer
Kharkiv, Ukraine
Your standing team
Assembled per engagement. You interview each member.
Poland, Estonia, Romania & Ukraine
How a standing team works
From the first call to accepted results
Four steps, and the price appears at the second one.
- Discovery
A 30-minute conversation
You bring the prototype, the codebase or the idea, under NDA if you prefer. Thirty minutes, no team pitch, and a clear no if we are not the right vendor.
- Scoping
Stories you approve
In two working sessions with your decision-maker we write the stories, each with acceptance criteria, an out-of-scope line and a test scenario. You approve the list. The proposal names the price for exactly that list.
- Build
Results, accepted weekly
The delivery system produces, an engineer reviews, a demo every week, and you accept each story within 5 business days against its written criteria. New stories get a price before work starts; the date holds.
- After launch
The system keeps going
Hosting in Frankfurt or your own cloud, an operate plan, and if you choose it, the self-developing option: your feedback and new requirements go into the client handbook, the system proposes and implements the fixes, and an engineer releases each one after review.
The stack we work in
.NET and Python on the backend, React and Next.js on the frontend, PostgreSQL, cloud-native on European infrastructure, on-premise where required. Large language models where a product calls for them.
AI & LLM
.NET
React
Angular
Python
Next.js
PostgreSQL
Boutique on purpose
CQUELLE GmbH was founded in Hamburg in 2019 and has stayed deliberately small since. The company is technically led: the founder has written software since 2005 and still reads pull requests. The team stays senior, in pods of two to five engineers with a named lead per engagement.
Headquarters in Hamburg. Engineers in Lviv, Kharkiv, Warsaw, Bucharest and Tallinn, all within one hour of German time. Contracts with a German GmbH under EU law.
When we are not the right fit
You want engineers by the hour, managed by you, with an open-ended bill.
That is the model we left. We can put a standing team around your product, priced per role and month, but the unit of work is still the accepted story, and we will say so in the first call.
You need a fifty-person program.
We are small by choice, and the delivery system scales what a small team can deliver. It does not turn us into a system integrator.
Your workflow is standard.
Bookings, invoicing, a plain CRM: buy the product, and we will say so in the first call.
You need the team in your office every day.
The contract and your contact are in Hamburg. The engineers work from Poland, Estonia, Romania and Ukraine, in your working hours, in your tools.
Questions from buyers who have been here before
What does CQUELLE do?
So the AI writes the code?
What does it cost?
We are an enterprise and need governance and security. Does a package fit?
We already have a prototype. Can you start from it?
What if we want to leave?
The first step is a conversation
Thirty minutes. Bring the prototype, the codebase, or nothing at all. Under NDA if you prefer. There is no team pitch and no rate in that call, and we do not turn your prototype into a product for someone else.
An engagement shape
Packaged build, governed frame agreement, or operate plan. Matched to your situation, with reasons.
The first risk to remove
The one thing in your current setup most likely to sink the project, named out loud.
A straight answer
If we are not the right vendor for this, you hear it on the call, along with what to look for instead.
Turning Visions
into Milestones
Have a question? Send us a message. We reply within 48 hours.
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