Offshore software development is no longer an alien concept for the IT industry; it’s an attractive option that enables companies to hire skilled and talented professionals from outside their domicile country, at relatively lower costs.

This is why many SMBs, large enterprises and even startups are exploring the idea of establishing their offshore development centers (ODCs) in leading offshoring destinations like India, Philippines, China, Ukraine, Russia, and so on.

In this article, we will focus on how to set up an offshore development center and the top benefits businesses will gain from it.

Test automation has raised the standards of software QA and opened a whole new world of possibilities to testing professionals — wider test coverage, improved accuracy, lesser time-to-market, increased efficiency, and so on.

With testing tools and frameworks utilizing Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) techniques, automation testing has become a pivotal component of product development and deployment; just like Agile and DevOps.

In this article, we have collated six best trends that are poised to occur in the automation testing landscape in 2021.

The ‘Work from Anywhere’ phenomenon has become a norm these days — professionals are ditching the age-old office culture and embracing remote working because of the flexibility, peace of mind and work-life balance it offers.

The idea of a distributed workforce finds its roots in the concept of remote working. There are even fully remote companies like Zapier, Buffer, Automattic, Toptal, etc. that completely rely on the services of distributed teams for both tech and sales jobs.

In this blog post, we’ll be focusing on six actionable steps that will help established or fledgling businesses to build and manage distributed teams for their projects. But, before we move into that, let’s take a quick look at the basics.

Embracing the DevOps model is not a choice but a necessity for organizations if they have to stay afloat in the sea of competition. Although DevOps provides immense scope for innovation and productivity, implementing it on an organizational level is easier said than done.

According to The Upskilling 2020: Enterprise DevOps Skills Report released by DevOps Institute, more than 50% of organizations find DevOps transformation very difficult.

Here, we present before you the six main challenges that companies face while adopting DevOps practices. The best solutions for overcoming these challenges are also discussed.

The effect of globalization can be gauged from the myriad number of international brands entering domestic markets of various countries. But, out of these, only some are capable of satisfying the expectations of local consumers.

Why is that so?

It’s mainly because such brands don’t take the factor of ‘localization’ into consideration during product design.

Today, we’ll be discussing with you the significance of localization in the product designing process and the key strategies that will help your product to scale on an international level.

The concept of offshoring projects entered the IT bandwagon in the late 80s and is still going strong. However, unpleasant experiences such as bad coding, communication failures, security violations, etc. faced by companies in the initial years after the advent of offshoring, have given rise to certain misconceptions.

These myths have led businesses to think that offshoring is not worth their time and money. Through this article, we aim to dispel such myths surrounding offshore software development and present you the real facts.

So, let’s begin.

Ever since its debut in 2009, NodeJS has been impressing businesses and developers alike. This JavaScript runtime environment produces dynamic web applications for businesses, while making app development a hassle-free process for developers.

No wonder, a report published by Statista early in 2020 revealed that NodeJS was the most used framework among developers, with 51.4% respondents voting in its favor.

In this blog post, we’ve collated some of the best and commonly used NodeJS developer tools that you can contemplate for creating scalable, user-friendly applications.

There was a time when customers had to make phone calls (which were often frustrating) to order food from restaurants; but not anymore, because today, in the age of mobile apps, the dining experience is just a piece of cake!

Restaurant apps such as online food delivery apps and table booking apps are creating a new revolution among customers and generating huge revenues for restaurateurs. In fact, market research firm Statista predicts the worldwide revenue in the Online Food Delivery segment to grow at a CAGR of 7.5% and touch US$182,327m by 2024.

Software has somewhat become a commodity these days; we depend on it to fulfill many of our routine activities like booking tickets, ordering essentials, watching movies, conducting money transactions, and so on. Similarly, businesses also rely on a variety of software to manage important operations like inventory tracking, sales forecasting, maintaining customer profiles, analyzing data and even for remote working.

This is where the approach of SaaS or Software as a Service holds great significance. With more and more companies moving their operations to the cloud, the concept of SaaS is rapidly gaining momentum; it’s expected that the global SaaS market will reach $623 billion by 2023.

APIs are transforming digital ecosystems by connecting modern applications with each other for delivering smarter and personalized user experiences like never before.

They enable businesses to increase revenue and add value to products; which is why most successful businesses have a well-planned API-driven strategy in place.

RESTful APIs are currently the trend in API development because of the level of flexibility it provides compared to other alternatives. But, how to design and build a high-quality REST API that delights end developers and is easy to maintain? What are the best practices to be considered while designing RESTful APIs?

Android apps capture more than 70% of the market share, and this number will only increase in the coming years. After a series of beta updates, Google officially released its much awaited OS version – Android 11, on September 8, 2020. Though there are not many far-reaching changes in the newer version, there are some great features that will benefit both developers and users alike.

In this article, we have collated the main updates/features and APIs of Android 11 that app developers need to know, for creating new apps and for updating the existing ones.

Artificial Intelligence or AI was once considered an illusory concept which was mostly popularized by science fiction movies.

But today, it’s a big technological reality that’s revolutionizing the world in general, and the industry landscape in particular. According to Statista, the global AI market size is expected to touch $126 billion by 2025. On the other hand, with the proliferation of mobile devices like smartphones, wearables and tablets, organizations are widely implementing Enterprise Mobility Management (EMM) to improve the productivity and efficiency of their employees; by allowing them to work from anywhere, anytime.

Now, how can Artificial Intelligence play a major role in enhancing Enterprise Mobility and take it to a whole new level?

Scalan Labs has bagged the third place in the report on the “Top App Development Companies in October 2020” published by Appdeveloperlisting.com. This is in recognition for our efforts to constantly build robust, user-friendly products that delights and engages with customers. A subsidiary of DesignRush, AppDeveloperListing.com is a renowned B2B marketplace that ranks and categorizes US startups and companies based on industry expertise, location, operating systems and technological competence.

Many years ago, people had to rely on travel agencies and tour operators to plan a trip. Now, all the planning and arrangements can be done single-handedly using travel mobile apps.

Through this article, we aim to enlighten travel and tourism based companies about developing travel apps – why it is beneficial, the important features to be incorporated, and finally, the cost.

Microsoft’s Visual Studio Code or VS Code is an inevitable part of a JavaScript developer’s coding journey. The lightweight code editor, known for its performance and stability, has a marketplace full of quality extensions that boosts developer productivity and speeds up product development.

Let’s check out 8 such powerful VS Code extensions that JavaScript programmers can try out for a better coding experience.

Most companies struggle to compile data, and even if they have enough resources, they fail to properly interpret and understand important insights. This adversely affects the prospects of better business management and decelerates a company’s growth in the market. That’s where Business Intelligence can play a major role; it can be applied to many business-related activities for getting a better overview of processes and for achieving the desired results.

In this blog post, we shall be discussing the importance of Business Intelligence and how it can empower organizations to get a clear edge over their competitors.

Today’s modern websites and web apps are designed and developed keeping in mind the needs of the end users. And for this, a combination of front-end and back-end technologies work in tandem with each other.
This article sheds light into the various facets of MEAN stack and discusses why businesses can choose it for web app development.

Test automation is synonymous with speed, quality and productivity. It vastly increases test coverage and assures remarkable accuracy even for highly complex features. Bugs and other bottlenecks can be easily detected and troubleshooted, thus ensuring neat, clean and error-free code.

Hence, it’s imperative to develop a foolproof test automation strategy to be on the safer side. Below are the key steps that can be implemented.

Mobile app gamification is a powerful strategy for acquiring new users who will remain loyal to your brand and bring more revenue. So, if you haven’t gamified your app yet, just rope in the best mobile app development company to do it for you.

Let’s take a look at the steps that will help you craft a successful mobile app gamification strategy.

Mobile apps are no more a luxury, but a necessity in our daily lives. Nowadays, it’s Intelligent apps or I-apps that are creating new waves among businesses and consumers. In fact, a study by Markets and Markets forecasts the Intelligent apps market size to touch $46.98 billion by 2023.

Today, we shall learn the features of Intelligent apps and also take a quick look at some of the best ones available in the market.

The eCommerce market has been expanding for the past few years and the COVID-19 crisis has provided more impetus to its growth. In fact, it is projected to touch $6.54 trillion by 2022, according to a Statista report. Today, we will be discussing how to create an eCommerce app using Node.js. Let’s begin by taking a look at the two main development approaches employing Node.js.

In June 2020, at the Worldwide Developers Conference held in California, Apple announced the 14th version of iOS. User privacy and personal data use is the top priority in iOS 14, and this means developers must meticulously plan their app development strategies for retaining users’ trust.

In this blog article, let’s take a look at some of the important changes expected in iOS 14, from a developer’s perspective.

Modern applications rely almost completely on APIs for delivering amazing user experiences. But APIs are not just mere software solutions; they are powerful agents of digital transformation. Hence, an API-driven strategy has become indispensable for businesses to attain success.

Today, we delve into the benefits of APIs and figure out how a business can execute a solid API-driven strategy that sells.

The DevOps culture has helped organizations to build, test and deliver software products and services in a faster and efficient manner, compared to the traditional software development life cycle (SDLC). And, the role of automation in adding value to DevOps practices and the product as a whole, cannot be ignored.

This article explores the idea of DevOps automation and the various benefits associated with it.

A Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software enables companies to coordinate, manage and analyze the various interactions with prospective and existing customers. Nowadays, open source CRM tools (i.e, the source code is available in the public domain) are mostly preferred, because such software can be modified by developers to fulfill specific business needs.

Recent years have seen a massive interest among consumers to shop online via smartphones. This has led to a spike in in-app purchases and digital payments; and a payment gateway plays a major role in facilitating these online transactions.

It is predicted by eMarketer that mobile payments in the US will increase to $130 billion in 2020. This is enough to understand the need for payment gateway integration in mobile apps dealing with m-commerce or other customer-oriented businesses.

In this era of digital transformation, interoperability has become inevitable for businesses to succeed and gain ground in the highly competitive market. And, a major strategy that propels interoperability is that CTOs must design software keeping in mind the needs of developers.

Now, how’s that possible? Let’s find out.

Usage of mobile devices has acquired new dimensions; earlier, if it was used for texting, sharing documents, doing bank transactions or ordering a cab/food, now it’s used for online learning, working remotely and even for attending a conference! (Thanks to COVID-19.) And, all these activities are mostly done via apps.

But the more we engage with these apps, the more the chances of violation of our personal and professional data

Docker and Kubernetes, the two popular containerization technologies, have already enhanced the concept of OS-level virtualization by creating better isolated systems. In this blog post, let’s find out how the combination of both these open-source tools help in the right maintenance of your infrastructure.

A database forms an integral part of a mobile or web application as it stores and disseminates data, thereby allowing users to access information at their will; without any glitches. Now, there are many database models that companies can choose from, and each one of them have their share of pros and cons.

This blog post aims to compare two widely used database models – NoSQL and SQL, on the basis of a number of parameters.

A robust mobile application that offers impeccable customer experience and escalates revenue, is the dream of every business striving to capture a competitive market. But the cost of developing such an app is never fixed; it varies according to a number of factors.

In this article, we discuss 5 key factors that need to be considered for a better overview of the cost of app development.

A Minimum Viable Product or MVP is the most simplest version of a full-fledged product. With just 2-3 core features, an MVP is the first stepping stone to a startup’s success. Today’s most loved websites and apps like Facebook, Airbnb, Spotify, Uber and many more, started out as MVPs.

This blog post sheds light on the key points that need to be taken into consideration before embarking on MVP development.

Technology has touched almost every field of human endeavour, and the food and beverages sector is also not left behind. In order to keep pace with the ever-changing consumer expectations, the F&B industry is adopting various tech innovations to digitize manufacturing and related processes.

This article discusses 5 digital technologies that are transforming the food and beverages industry in various ways.

Social distancing, lockdowns, travel restrictions and people’s quarantined lifestyle have adversely affected business operations for some time. But technology has proven to be the shot in the arm for companies struggling to stay relevant amidst the pandemic situation.

This blog post focuses on 5 best on-demand app ideas that businesses can implement in order to sustain themselves in the COVID-19 world

The coronavirus pandemic has brought in paradigm shifts in business operations and workplace policies; and the Internet of Things (IoT) has a significant role to play in helping companies navigate through this crisis.

In this blog post, we discuss 5 important IoT use cases that would be a reality in a post-COVID-19 world.

The COVID-19 pandemic has ushered in a ‘new normal’ – a shift to remote working, increased demand for basic goods and services, a new found concern for individual health, and so on.

In this scenario, companies around the globe are trying hard to adapt and reinvent themselves to maintain business-continuity. But, what does the future hold for them in a post-pandemic world? Will the picture be all bleak or will it turn rosy?

A robust software product is the result of a technology stack, i.e., a set of tools, programming languages and frameworks that work together to achieve the ultimate goal of a web or mobile app.

The aim of this article is to enlighten business owners about the five key factors that determine the selection of tech stacks for web development.

Ionic, the open-source UI framework that leverages core web technologies for building awesome cross-platform mobile apps, has recently (in Feb. 2020) released its latest version – Framework 5, also called Magnesium.

It focuses mainly on improving user engagement and refining native mobile experience. This blog post throws light into the top 5 features of Ionic v5.

Building cross-platform mobile apps is increasingly becoming popular among small and big businesses, and two frameworks have made their mark in this affordable app development approach – Flutter and React Native.

Both technologies are open-source and offer a native experience to their users. So, to choose between the two can be a difficult task Well, a tough question indeed! So, let’s analyze the key features of the two technologies based on five main factors.

Containerization technologies are increasingly becoming popular and are fastly replacing VMs for app code deployment. And, the preference for container orchestration tools like Kubernetes and Docker Swarm is also growing rapidly.A Google-driven open-source system that has a strong user and developer community, Kubernetes efficiently automates deployment, management and scaling of containerized apps.

This article sheds light into the various features of Kubernetes and Docker Swarm by comparing both the technologies on five main parameters.

The novel coronavirus or SARS-CoV-2 has so far claimed more than 318,000 lives (as on May 18, 2020) and has infected millions of people worldwide. The virus has literally brought down mankind on its knees.

But, even as the numbers continue to spike, good news of Artificial Intelligence or AI being employed for developing innovative solutions for combating the pandemic, provides rays of hope!

As the world reels under the impact of COVID-19, lockdowns are in place and hence, workspaces have shifted from offices to homes. This has led to a renewed significance for the concept of remote working. But, what drives this model? It is a centralized virtual workplace where both in-house employees and offshore teams work in real-time to achieve business goals, irrespective of their location. 

In this blog post, we delve into the main benefits of using collaboration software for remote working.

The world is fighting hard to contain the novel coronavirus outbreak and in this crisis, the contribution of technology is no less; it minimizes person-to-person contact and enhances combat and relief efforts.

Let’s take a look at some of the technologies that are aiding in COVID-19 crisis management and reducing the impact of the pandemic situation on people’s lives.

In a highly competitive business world, companies need to possess the right mix of talent and technology in their arsenal, in order to stay on top of the game.

Companies may find it locally; but it may be too expensive to bear especially when pandemic situation persists. This predicament can only be addressed through offshore software development. Simply put, it is the process of assigning product development tasks to an external company/organization located in another continent.

Recently, Google released the latest version of its official IDE used for Android app development – Android Studio 3.6. It comes with some new, as well as, enhanced features targeted to improve code quality and to boost developer productivity.

Here, we’ve collated 5 such best features of Android Studio 3.6 that will ultimately help build strikingly awesome mobile apps.

Every year, technology is rapidly evolving and digitally transforming businesses, thereby driving disruptions and creating new tech-ecosystems. Enterprises have already geared up to adopt state-of-the-art technologies into their workplaces and cash in on fresh tech-opportunities to build their brands.

We’ve collated here 5 best emerging technologies and their top trends that are expected to impact the world in general and businesses in particular in 2020

There are many back-end programming languages suitable for custom web development and among them, PHP and Python hold great promise when it comes to building robust web solutions.

PHP, or Hypertext Preprocessor, is a scalable, general-purpose HTML-embedded scripting language that has a syntax similar to C language (with curly brackets, operators, etc.). It’s estimated that about 78.4% of all websites, whose server-side programming language is known, use PHP.

The web is a powerful medium to convey ideas. According to Internet Live Stats, the world has 1.5 billion websites, of which 200 million are active. An ever-changing digital world and the varying paradigms in customer preferences has prompted businesses to adopt newer technologies to build innovative websites and web applications.

The aim of this article is to enlighten developers and business owners about the top technology trends in web development that are expected to dominate this year.

Developing a cross-platform app is, indeed, a boon to businesses as they can reach out to a large clientele without having to spend a fortune on building different apps for multiple platforms.

Generally, all the frameworks used for developing cross-platform applications have the following basic characteristics:

The advanced technological capabilities of the IoT have strongly impacted a host of industry verticals and among them, the healthcare industry has benefited the most.

IoMT or Internet of Medical Things has redrawn the boundaries of healthcare by delivering robust solutions that help patients and healthcare providers to undertake better-informed decisions. In fact, Deloitte claims that the IoMT market will touch $158.1 billion in 2022.

Over the years, software developers have handled myriad programming languages – from C, C++, C#, Java, PHP to React, Angular, Python and many more. With a dynamic business landscape that calls for cutting-edge products to beat competition, the demand for high-level programming languages is increasing.

Here, we have collated 5 such best programming languages that can create a strong impact in 2020.

Embracing the cloud has become the norm of every business aiming to stay ahead of the competition; but to achieve that winning edge, it’s important to develop cloud-native applications.

As the name suggests, cloud-native apps are created, built and deployed in the cloud; in fact, they reside in the cloud, as compared to on-premise apps that are molded to suit cloud environments.

Developed by Facebook and having a smooth learning curve, ReactJS is an SEO-friendly JavaScript library that builds dynamic user interfaces. A product of Google and having a steep learning curve, AngularJS is a front-end framework that has a powerful tool-set for building dynamic websites and web apps.

There’s a lot of buzz in the tech market about foldable devices – basically, smartphones having large and wide screens that can be folded to showcase portrait and landscape dimensions according to one’s convenience.

Tech giants like Samsung, Huawei and LG have already made their mark with innovative foldable smartphones that offer unique immersive user experiences.

Angular version 9 has arrived! It has introduced a new backward compatible compiler named Ivy, that has a host of benefits compared to its predecessor, View Engine. Angular has enhanced internationalization, modified ng update and extended new choices for ‘providedIn’.

Here are some of the best improvements of Angular v9.

The field of web application development is constantly evolving with new programming languages and tools gaining acceptance among developers; the latest one being Microsoft’s Blazor.

A free and open-source HTML framework, Blazor brings w ith it an innovation – it builds interactive web UIs for client-side using C# and .NET, instead of the traditional JavaScript.

Offshore software development industry is growing by leaps and bounds, and the real challenge for business owners is to find the right vendor who meets their goals and expectations.

This article explores the 5 pivotal questions that a business must ask a prospective offshore development company before sealing the deal.

Mobile internet is ubiquitous with 51.98% of web page views worldwide coming from mobile devices, as reported by Statista. And, the usage of Progressive Web Apps (PWAs) among mobile users is also increasing.

Launched in 2015 by Google, a PWA is a progressive and responsive website that looks and functions like a mobile app. It gives a native-app like feel and runs on the browser without having to download from app stores.

Full-stack developers are experts who have sound knowledge of developing both the front-end (client-side) and back-end (server-side) of software applications.

Today, there is a rising trend among techpreneurs to hire them instead of specialized developers in order to build Minimum Viable Products (MVPs).

Microservices is a decentralized approach of app development wherein a single application is a suite of loosely coupled services or functionalities, each running on its own and communicating independently.

This is in sharp contrast to the monolithic architecture where the entire application is centralized into a single package of dependent services.

Today’s businesses are looking for cost-effective options to develop high-grade software solutions. The benefits of dedicated development teams have encouraged companies to contemplate offshoring their projects. But, before taking the big leap, there are certain points to consider; which, if ignored, can have far-reaching consequences.

Here, we discuss five big mistakes that should not be committed when hiring a dedicated development team.

Offshore development is a sure-shot way to build quality products at affordable rates, but it does have its share of challenges.

One such problem is the inefficient collaboration between local and remote teams due to the distance factor. Now, this can be eliminated by utilizing the best Project Management and team collaboration tools.

Here, we’ve collated five such tools that will help teams to work in tandem with each other.

According to a study by Deloitte, about 80% of the world’s 500 biggest companies have offshore teams for product development. An offshore development team is instrumental for a company in order to reduce costs and for better utilization of resources and time.

But managing such a team, thousands of miles away on the other side of the globe, ain’t a cakewalk; but with some clear-cut strategies, it can be done easily.

Western companies consider offshore software development a feasible option due to lower costs, access to quality talent and ability to focus on core business competencies. India is a leading offshore IT destination preferred by such companies because of its world-class infrastructure and a strong workforce of brilliant mobile and web developers.

Let’s find out why companies want to hire Indian developers for their offshore projects:

Kochi or Cochin, also known as “Queen of Arabian Sea”, a port city located in the south-western coast of India, is the commercial capital of the state of Kerala. It is a booming technopolis where hundreds of IT/ITES companies operate in its IT hub, the Infopark. Kochi has a thriving and skilled IT community and is one of the fastest growing offshore software development centres in India.

We’ve curated the top 5 reasons as to why it is regarded as an ideal IT destination.

Node.js is an open-source, cross-platform, light-weight run-time environment that executes JavaScript code on the server-side of an application. It builds event-based, real-time applications, mainly web servers that constantly handle dynamic data.

Let’s take a look at some of the advantages of using Node.js.

Both React.js and React Native – open sourced by Facebook, are used by software developers for building robust products; but what are their basic structural and functional differences?

Well, let’s find out.