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Five practices, one method. Whatever the work is, it starts with what the business needs rather than what we would enjoy building.

We are not a development agency that also advises. We advise, and then we build what the advice concluded.

What we do

Each practice is staffed by senior engineers who have shipped that kind of system before.

Web Development

SaaS platforms, enterprise web applications and the front and back ends behind them.

  • A product your team can extend
  • Infrastructure you own
  • A rollback path that has been tested
Explore Web Development

Mobile App Development

Native iOS and Android applications, and the backends that keep them in sync.

  • Apps that work with no signal
  • Store releases your team can ship
  • One backend, not two
Explore Mobile App Development

Cross Platform Development

React Native and Flutter, where one codebase genuinely serves both platforms.

  • One codebase, two stores
  • Native modules where they are needed
  • A migration path if you outgrow it
Explore Cross Platform Development

AI Development

Generative AI, predictive analytics and document intelligence, evaluated before they are built.

  • An evaluation before a build
  • Measured accuracy, not a demo
  • A decision on whether to proceed
Explore AI Development

Staffing Augmentation

Senior engineers embedded in your team, under your process, for a fixed period.

  • Engineers who have shipped this before
  • Knowledge transfer as a deliverable
  • A defined end date agreed upfront
Explore Staffing Augmentation

Technology Consulting

A fixed-scope diagnostic that ends in a written recommendation, whether or not it recommends us.

  • Options with costed trade-offs
  • A written decision record
  • No obligation to proceed
Explore Technology Consulting

What that looks like in practice

The capabilities behind the practices, and the ones clients most often did not know to ask for.

Deciding what to build

The part most firms skip. We run a diagnostic before proposing anything, and sometimes it concludes you should not build at all.

An admin dashboard showing account and usage views

Product engineering

Web and mobile products, built in slices that go live as they are finished.

Integration

Making systems talk without copying data between them.

Data and reporting

Figures that reconcile, and that trace back to their source record.

Modernization

Retiring systems one slice at a time, with the old one still running.

Field service app screens showing a job list and job detail

Offline-first mobile

Applications that work a full shift with no coverage, then reconcile.

Platform and delivery

Pipelines, environments and the monitoring that makes them safe to change.

Security and compliance

Built in from the first commit, not audited in at the end.

What we build with

Chosen for what a system has to do and who has to run it afterwards, not for novelty.

Interface

  • TypeScript
  • React
  • Next.js
  • Angular
  • React Native
  • Flutter

Services

  • Java
  • Spring Boot
  • Node.js
  • Python
  • Go
  • GraphQL

Data

  • PostgreSQL
  • MySQL
  • MongoDB
  • Redis
  • Kafka
  • Snowflake

Cloud and platform

  • AWS
  • Azure
  • Google Cloud
  • Docker
  • Kubernetes
  • Terraform

AI

  • OpenAI
  • Anthropic
  • Gemini
  • LangChain
  • PyTorch
  • pgvector

Industries we work with

Engineering shaped by the realities of your industry.

Different industries carry different operational constraints, customer expectations, integration challenges, and levels of risk. We bring the engineering depth to understand that context first, then design technology around what the business actually needs.

A banking hall desk where a laptop shows an account dashboard with a running balance, recent transactions and a monthly activity chart, a phone beside it

Fintech & BFSI

Secure, reliable systems for businesses built on trust.

We build and modernize financial platforms, workflows, integrations, and customer-facing applications where reliability, data integrity, auditability, security, and performance are fundamental to the business.

A clinician talking with a patient at the bedside while a monitor shows that patient's record - vitals, scans and recent reports - with the same case open on a phone

Healthcare

Technology that connects complex care and operational workflows.

We help build digital healthcare platforms, operational workflows, integrations, and data-driven applications designed around reliability, secure information handling, usability, and the realities of interconnected healthcare systems.

A lecture room seen from the back, a laptop in the foreground playing a course video beside its numbered module list, the same course open on a phone

EdTech & eLearning

Learning platforms designed around engagement and scale.

From learner journeys and course delivery to assessments, administration, analytics, and integrations, we develop education platforms that make learning experiences easier to operate, evolve, and scale.

A cafe table by an airport window with a laptop open on a travel booking screen showing destinations and dining, a passport, a boarding pass and a phone beside it

Food & Travel

Digital experiences that keep customers and operations moving.

We build customer journeys and operational platforms around ordering, booking, marketplaces, partner integrations, administration, and real-time workflows where experience and operational efficiency need to work together.

A gym floor with a phone showing the day's activity - steps against a goal, calories, distance and heart rate - beside a watch tracking a run in progress

Fitness

Digital products designed to turn engagement into progress.

We create fitness platforms supporting member experiences, scheduling, subscriptions, progress tracking, coaching workflows, administration, and integrations, with usability and continued engagement at the centre.

An open-plan office with a laptop showing a workforce dashboard - headcount, attendance, leave requests and approvals - and the same modules on a phone

HRMS

Workforce systems built around how organisations actually operate.

We build and improve workforce platforms spanning recruitment, onboarding, employee management, attendance, operational workflows, reporting, and integrations, reducing friction across the employee lifecycle.

Why CipherCru

Different where it actually changes the outcome.

Most software firms can build what is asked for. The difference is in how the problem is understood, what gets challenged before development begins, and whether the technology decision still makes sense for the business six months later.

  1. 01 / 05

    Context

    Business before technology

    We begin with the business outcome, the operating reality and the reason for change, before discussing architecture, frameworks or implementation.

  2. 02 / 05

    Diagnosis

    Diagnosis before prescription

    We investigate the underlying constraint before accepting the proposed solution, because building the wrong thing well is still the wrong outcome.

  3. 03 / 05

    Reuse

    Reuse what works

    We preserve useful systems, integrations and operational knowledge instead of rebuilding because starting again is easier for the delivery team.

  4. 04 / 05

    Measure

    Choose the right level of complexity

    We match architecture and engineering effort to the scale, risk and requirements the business actually has, not to theoretical complexity.

  5. 05 / 05

    Continuity

    Protect the business you have while planning the one you want

    We plan modernization around operational continuity, staged migration and reversibility, so progress does not destabilize the business already running.

How every engagement runs

The same five stages whichever practice does the work.

Diagnose

What the business needs, what constrains it, and what already exists.

Decide

Options with trade-offs, and a written recommendation. Sometimes it is to stop.

Prove

The riskiest assumption tested in production, on real data.

Deliver

Built in slices, each one live and usable, documented as we go.

Hand over

Your team runs it with us watching, then without us.

Work we have written up

Engagements where the decision mattered as much as the delivery.

All case studies
A wide view of a water treatment site
Utilities

Retiring a mainframe without a big-bang cutover

Brindley Water

Read the case study
Thackray Health: Making patient data available without moving it
Thackray HealthHealthcare

Making patient data available without moving it

9x

faster record retrieval

Read the case study
Corran Logistics: Replacing a build-versus-buy decision with a third option
Corran LogisticsLogistics

Replacing a build-versus-buy decision with a third option

£1.4m

saved against the buy quote

Read the case study
Ellery Wealth: An AI pilot that we recommended stopping
Ellery WealthFinancial services

An AI pilot that we recommended stopping

6

weeks to a clear answer

Read the case study
What stood out about CipherCru was their ability to understand both the business objective and the technology behind it. They did not simply execute requirements; they challenged assumptions, identified better approaches, and helped translate our vision into a practical technology solution. Their communication, technical depth, and focus on long-term maintainability made them a valuable partner for our business.
Sandra GraiseCEO, LendUx

Questions about our services

The ones we are asked most often before a first conversation.

How do I know which service I need?
Most people arrive with a problem rather than a category, which is the right way round. The five practices above are how we staff work, not how you have to describe it. Tell us the constraint you are actually under — a release that keeps slipping, a system nobody can safely change, a decision you are being asked to make without enough information — and the first conversation is about which practice that belongs to, or whether it belongs to none of them. Where the answer is genuinely open, that is what the diagnostic is for: it settles the direction before a budget is committed to one.
Do you take on small projects?
There is no minimum. Size matters far less than whether the work has a real decision in it and whether it can be finished rather than left half-integrated. A short, well-defined piece of work is often a better first engagement than a large one, for both sides. If what you need is more hands on a plan you have already made rather than a decision, that is staffing augmentation rather than a project, and it is usually the cheaper answer.
Will you work on a codebase someone else wrote?
More often than not, that is the work. We start by reading it rather than rewriting it: what the system actually does, which parts are load-bearing, and which of the things that look wrong turn out to be deliberate. That takes weeks rather than months, and it ends in writing, including an honest account of what we would leave alone. A rewrite is occasionally the right recommendation and it is the one we are slowest to make, because a system that has been running for years is carrying business rules that exist nowhere else, and most of the cost of replacing it is the cost of rediscovering them.
Can you work to a fixed scope and price?
Where the scope can genuinely be written down and held, yes, and it is agreed against that scope before work starts. The honest caveat is that fixing a scope fixes it against today’s understanding of the problem, so it works well for a diagnostic, a migration or a defined integration, and badly for a product that is still deciding what it is. Where the requirements are still moving, we would rather you paid for people over time and could change your mind cheaply than hold you to a specification we both know is already wrong. Which shape a piece of work takes is agreed before it starts, not discovered in an invoice.
Where is your team based?
We are one team rather than a network of subcontractors, and the engineers who scope your work are the ones who do it. What most people are asking underneath the question is about overlap and accountability, so: you get working hours that overlap yours, one engineer accountable for delivery, and no handoff to a second company you did not choose. If where the work is performed matters to you for a data-residency or contractual reason, say so early. It is a constraint we can design an engagement around, and a difficult one to retrofit.
What does the first month look like?
The first three weeks are the diagnostic: what the business needs, what constrains it, what already exists, and what it would cost to be wrong about each of those. It ends in a written recommendation with options and their trade-offs, and it is written so that it can honestly conclude you should not build. If it concludes you should, the work starts on the riskiest assumption rather than the easiest screen, so something real is running before the budget for the rest of it is committed. Either way you finish the month with a document you could hand to someone else.

Not sure which of these you need?

That is a reasonable place to start. Tell us the problem and we will tell you which practice it belongs to, or whether it belongs to none of them.

Start a project

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