Roughly what most engagements cost.

Real engagements come back with a fixed price after a paid scoping week. These bands are honest reference points for what the shape of work typically lands in.

Internal tool · Rescue audit

Single-engineer engagement

Three weeks, one senior engineer. Internal tools, integrations, audit phase of a rescue.

from £24k
3 weeks · 1 senior · fixed-price
  • One senior engineer, full-time
  • Designer on call — where the work touches UI
  • Production deployment + observability
  • Runbooks + 30-day care window
  • Fixed price after scoping week
Web app · MVP · scaleup feature

Extended engagement

Ten to fourteen weeks. Two to three seniors, designer, founder rotation. New web app, sizeable AI feature, or full rescue rebuild.

from £140k
10–14 weeks · 2–3 senior + designer · fixed-price
  • Two to three senior engineers, full-time
  • Designer embedded ~70% of the engagement
  • Founder on rotation throughout
  • Real users in the engagement, not after
  • Weekly cadence as standard
  • Handover + 30-day care window
  • Outcome-priced variants on the table

Sometimes the work earns more than the invoice.

For a growing share of engagements, the cleanest answer is part fixed-fee, part outcome. It only works when the project shape supports it — and it's an option, not a default.

We won't do outcome-only on most projects (the cash discipline isn't there), and we won't do it on engagements where the “outcome” lives months past the handover with someone else owning the moving parts. Where it works, it's the most aligned engagement either side will ever sign.

Shape A · most common

Fixed-fee + revenue share

Reduced fee up-front; small % of revenue from the thing we built for 12–24 months. Cleanest where there's a clear “the thing we built generates this revenue” line.

Shape B · founders pre-funding

Deferred fee + equity

Half-rate cash, equity on the back of the engagement. We'll do this for founders who can articulate what the build unlocks, on a small number of engagements a year.

Shape C · for scaleups

Milestone bonus

Fixed-price base, performance bonus tied to a real metric (signups, activations, revenue) at 90 / 180 days. Bonus capped at 50% of the engagement fee.

What's in the price

  • The senior engineers — no juniors padded in at any point
  • Designer embedded for the engagement
  • Production deployment to your domain
  • Observability + monitoring wired in
  • Repo, CI, deploy pipeline standing up in your org
  • Weekly demos, Looms, decision notes
  • Runbook + handover docs that future-you can actually use
  • 30-day care window post-handover

What's not

  • Domain registration, SSL, hosting fees (charged at cost)
  • Third-party SaaS we recommend (Vercel, Supabase, OpenAI, etc.)
  • Stock photography or licensed assets (charged at cost)
  • Ongoing maintenance after the 30-day care window
  • Multi-month retainers (we'll talk if it's the right shape)
  • Native mobile / desktop / backend-only builds (we don't take these)
  • Anything we said no to at scoping

The honest answers.

What if the scope changes mid-engagement?

Then we re-scope. Small changes get absorbed in the sprint. Anything that changes the shape of the engagement gets a written change note, a revised price, and your sign-off before we start. We'd rather have the awkward conversation in week three than the awkward invoice in week ten.

Why fixed-price instead of time & materials?

Because T&M lets us be wrong about the estimate and lets you be wrong about the scope, and rewards both. Fixed-price means we're the ones taking the risk on “how long does this actually take”. We can do that honestly because of the unit economics (see Why Sprint?) — most studios can't, which is why they sell hours.

What does the scoping week cost?

£4–8k depending on shape, paid before we start. You get a written scope, a sprint plan, and a fixed price. If we're not the right pod for the build, we say so at the end of the week and you keep the doc — no hard sell.

Can we hire your engineer afterwards?

Talk to us. We don't structure engagements as recruiting funnels, but we're part of an independent group, and we're reasonable about it. Better that than a poison-pill non-solicit nobody enforces.

How are payments scheduled?

30% on kickoff, milestones across the engagement, 10% on handover. We don't do all-up-front (you shouldn't pay before we've shipped anything) and we don't do all-on-handover (we're not the bank).

Do you take retainers / ongoing work?

Yes — but only as a defined product. After handover most clients enrol on a Site care plan covering maintenance, security and updates on a monthly retainer. We won't sell you an open-ended “just keep some engineers on tap” retainer; we will sell you a real care plan with hours, SLAs, and a monthly written summary.

Ready to scope something?

See how we work