Case: Our Ukrainian development team plays a major part in Saxo's digital success

Saxo is Denmark’s leading online bookstore and, in line with the digital transformation, has ensured constant development of its platform to create new services and revenue opportunities. Today, in addition to selling physical books, Saxo’s platform also offers memberships where users can stream e-books and audiobooks, listen to podcasts and buy books at member prices. Saxo is so successful with their digital services that they are also one of the leading book streaming services in Denmark.

Developing new digital services

Saxo has always focused on evolving with readers and their reading habits. Especially in the last 10 years, the book market has changed significantly, partly because digital book formats in the form of e-books and audiobooks have seen a significant increase in popularity – not least due to book streaming services. Rasmus explains: “Saxo wants to be part of the user journey and help our users with all types of book reading, whether it’s physical books, e-books or audiobooks. Therefore, Saxo’s business model includes different types of memberships that take into account the individual’s reading preferences, both in terms of format and streaming consumption.”
Creating new business areas at Saxo has been a great investment. Rasmus continues; “Since 2018, Saxo has evolved from being the Danes’ favourite online bookstore to becoming one of the country’s largest book and audio streaming services.” This impressive digital transformation emphasises Saxo’s ability to adapt to changing market needs and technological advances, most recently with the addition of podcasts. With this expansion of platforms, Saxo has not only retained their existing customer base, but also attracted new users who seek flexible and digital solutions for their reading habits.

Rapid scaling and lower costs

How did Saxo manage to scale their development capacities, enabling their digital platform to offer new services? In 2014, Saxo established a development team in Ukraine with sourcing partner Conscensia, allowing them to scale rapidly within a very short period of time. Over the years, Saxo has scaled further in their development department in both Copenhagen and Lviv. However, it is easier to recruit in Ukraine, and Saxo has also succeeded in retaining Ukrainian developers. Rasmus Burkal says: “When Saxo recruits developers in Ukraine, candidates are assessed on several parameters, such as IT skills, communication skills, collaboration and English. Naturally, the cost price is lower in Ukraine compared to similar IT profiles in Denmark.”

One combined development department in 2 locations

At Saxo, all roles and processes in the development department are defined and documented, which is necessary when colleagues are not in the same room. Rasmus Burkal says: “We drive the requirements and direction of Saxo from Copenhagen in terms of product ownership, architecture, UI/UX design and data team. The execution is carried out by our skilled software developers in Ukraine, from the development of the e-commerce website both backend and frontend, streaming backend, app development in Android and iOS and QA.”

Rasmus Burkal explains that the team in Ukraine has a good understanding of Saxo’s business needs and common goals. Saxo has a flat hierarchy, and Rasmus prioritises spending time ensuring a good work culture, where everyone works towards the same goal. Rasmus explains: “At Saxo we cultivate transparency, for example, everyone knows how the business is doing, how many new clients we are bringing in, and we share our KPIs with the team every month. We inform the team in Ukraine on equal terms with our in-house developers, from strategic decisions to reporting KPIs every month. All our developers have the same insight into the business.”

Saxo has been able to create a work culture where there is no difference between internal and external developers – they are all Saxo employees, working together to solve both small and big challenges.

Exceptional output from Ukrainian developers

Saxo has more than 10 years of experience running their development team in Ukraine, and the team has become crucial to Saxo. Rasmus explains: “The developers are very proactive and provide input for development in both small and large contexts. I’m impressed by their competences and ability to get involved despite the distance. We get exceptionally good output from our Ukrainian developers. Since the war started in Ukraine in 2022, we have been focusing on the impact it could potentially have on our colleagues in Lviv, but amazingly it hasn’t had any impact on our digital development or roadmap. We try to offer the necessary flexibility and adapt to the reality they face, which is obviously very different from ours in Copenhagen.”

Sourcing partner is important to Saxo

Saxo chose to build their development team with a Danish sourcing partner instead of using freelancers or a foreign sourcing partner. Rasmus explains the benefits of a Danish supplier; “Our Danish sourcing partner is our bridge to our remote office in Ukraine. Conscensia wants to make it easy for us by providing a lot of practical things, and their insight into labour market conditions, legal matters, recruitment, office facilities and not least focus on well-being is of great value to us. We have a well-functioning and highly skilled team that is built on Saxo values and approach. Conscensia and Saxo have a good joint approach to recruitment, onboarding and focus on continuous development of the team. It’s an advantage to have a Danish sourcing partner that I can spar with in different areas. In addition, our Ukrainian delivery manager is also a great help with both small and larger things that need to be handled. Conscensia’s representation in both countries makes managing the team and life easier for me.”