Project Rescue & Vendor Transition
Restore Delivery Certainty.
When a project stalls, the "Sunk Cost Fallacy" is your worst enemy. Whether you are dealing with technical debt, offshore communication drift, or simple vendor complacency, staying the course is costing you more than switching.
Patient Zero specialises in Delivery Restoration. Whether you need to fully transition away from an underperforming partner or introduce a "Challenger" Team to raise the bar on performance, we provide the sovereign engineering rigour to get your roadmap moving again.
Why Projects Lose Momentum
Software projects rarely fail overnight. They die a slow death caused by misalignment between your business goals and your vendor's incentives.
When the urgency fades and an incumbent vendor gets comfortable, the focus often shifts from "shipping value" to "billing hours." If your delivery feels heavy, slow, or opaque, you are likely facing one of these three structural blockers:
The "90% Done" Illusion
The vendor reports progress, but the feature never actually lands in production or delivers real value to your users.
The Velocity Plateau
Your incumbent vendor has become comfortable. Without competition, they have no incentive to innovate or speed up.
The Knowledge Gap
Documentation is scarce, and you suspect the vendor holds the "keys to the kingdom" to prevent you from leaving.
Our Engagement Models
The Project Rescue
Stabilise and Fix.
For projects in "Code Red." We deploy a Forensic Strike Team to audit the codebase, stabilise the environment, and pay down the technical debt that is blocking delivery. We stop the bleeding and ship the MVP.
The "Challenger" Model
Benchmark and Accelerate.
Don't fire them yet; challenge them. We deploy a high-performance team alongside your incumbent vendor. We build a specific feature set to demonstrate what "Good" looks like, creating competitive tension that forces the incumbent to improve, or proves they need to go.
Seamless Transition
Secure and Transfer.
Changing vendors doesn't have to mean stopping work. We run a parallel onboarding process (Sprint 0) where we digest the architecture and build the backlog before the handover happens, ensuring zero loss of momentum.
Won't Switching Slow us Down?
Actually, the data shows it speeds you up.
THE FEAR
"If we switch vendors, we'll lose months on knowledge transfer and onboarding"
THE REALITY
A new vendor brings the "Clean Slate Effect."
- No Baggage: We aren't afraid to cut "Zombie Features" that the old vendor is clinging to.
- The Strike Team Injection: Our teams are designed to be productive from Day 1. We don't need 3 months of ramping up; we need access to the repo and a backlog.
- Parallel Running: We often start building the next priority while the old vendor finishes the current one. By the time we take over fully, we are already shipping.
Turnarounds & Acceleration
From stalled codebases to market leaders: see how we restore velocity.
Zero to MVP in 2 Weeks
A stalled Finance App migration was stuck in development hell.
Solution: Our Strike Team removed the bureaucratic gates and rebuilt the MVP in 14 days.
Outcome: 4 apps for two customers delivered in a highly regulated environment.
Zero to Launch in 6 Months
NTI needed to launch a new line of business on an aggressive timeline.
Solution: Two fully embedded teams co-designed and delivered a three-app ecosystem.
Outcome: Full MVP ready in 3 months, launched on time and on budget.
CitrusAd
Scale-Up
Explosive international growth required elastic capacity beyond the internal team.
Solution: We provided the "surge capacity" to handle the load, scaling from one team to three to help deliver.
Outcome: Supported growth to a $205M acquisition.
The Roadmap to Recovery
How we move from "Code Red" to "Code Complete" without stopping delivery.
1
The Forensic Audit (Days 1-5)
We gain access and run a code analysis to separate critical debt from "Zombie" features.
2
The "Sprint 0" Overlap (Weeks 2-3)
We don't wait for the old vendor to leave. We start building the backlog and CI/CD pipelines in parallel, ensuring the Strike Team hits the ground running.
3
The Stabilisation Sprint (Month 1)
We ship the first "Stability Release" at Sprint 1. This fixes the critical bugs and demonstrates to the business that the project is moving again.
4
The Velocity Shift (Month 2+)
With the foundation fixed, we switch from "Rescue Mode" to "Feature Mode," introducing the
Challenger cadence to outperform previous benchmarks.
FAQs
Can you work alongside our current vendor?
Yes. In fact, we recommend it for large enterprises. Bringing Patient Zero in as a "Challenger" creates a healthy competitive environment. We often take on a specific stream of work (e.g., a mobile app or a new integration) to demonstrate a higher standard of velocity and code quality. This gives you a benchmark to hold your other vendors accountable.
My current vendor holds the IP/Code. Is this a risk?
It is a solvable risk. We manage professional transitions. We guide you through the technical steps to regain Sovereign Control over your repositories and cloud environments. We ensure the handover is rigorous, validating that the code they hand over actually compiles and matches production.
How do you ensure we don't lose momentum during the switch?
The "Sprint 0" Overlap. We don't believe in "Stop and Start." We typically run a Sprint 0 overlap where our architects review the code and build the backlog while the old vendor is winding down. This means our developers hit the ground running with "Ready for Dev" tickets on their first official day.
Do we have to rewrite everything?
Only if it's unsalvageable. Our goal is delivery, not vanity rewrites. We perform a forensic audit to separate "Technical Debt" from "Total Write-Off." If we can stabilise the core and build around it using modern patterns (like the Strangler Fig pattern), we will.
