Sahseh Case Study: Contract CTO, Platform Rebuild, 5M Users [ Skip to content ](#main) Menu [About](https://a2zweb.co/en/about) [Case Studies](https://a2zweb.co/en/case-studies) [Blog](https://a2zweb.co/en/blog) [Contact us](https://a2zweb.co/en/contact)Services [AI Automation](https://a2zweb.co/en/services/ai-automation) [AI Digital Employees](https://a2zweb.co/en/services/ai-digital-employees) [Chief Technology Officer as a Service (CTOaaS)](https://a2zweb.co/en/services/chief-technology-officer-as-a-service-ctoaas) [Custom Software Development](https://a2zweb.co/en/services/custom-software-development) [Tech Auditing & Strategy Consulting](https://a2zweb.co/en/services/tech-auditing-strategy-consulting) [Tech Hiring Support](https://a2zweb.co/en/services/tech-hiring) [Vibe Code Rescue](https://a2zweb.co/en/services/vibe-code-rescue) [All Services ](https://a2zweb.co/en/services) Products [BrandGEO](https://a2zweb.co/en/products/brandgeo-ai-brand-visibility-monitoring) [SharpAPI](https://a2zweb.co/en/products/sharpapi-ai-workflow-automation-api) [CVMatchScore](https://a2zweb.co/en/products/cvmatchscore-resume-scoring-matching) [Book a call](https://calendly.com/a2zweb?utm_source=a2zweb&utm_medium=website&utm_campaign=book_call&utm_content=nav_mobile) - [ ![Sahseh](https://a2zweb.co/logos/sahseh.png) ](https://www.sahseh.co "Sahseh") Sahseh: a new platform, a new team, a clean migration ===================================================== Contract CTO for the Gulf region’s first Saudi coupons and cashback app. Audited the legacy product, hired the team that replaced it, and moved 5M+ users onto a new platform and a new continent without losing a record. Client [Sahseh](https://www.sahseh.co) Industry Consumer fintech, coupons and cashback Region Saudi Arabia Engagement Active, multi-year The challenge ------------- Sahseh had grown past what its first platform could carry. Five million users across seven markets were being served by a legacy application nobody had audited, and the company had no in-house engineering leadership to say what should be repaired and what should be replaced. A B2B employee-benefits line and a card-linked offers programme were both waiting on an answer. What we did ----------- We came in as contract CTO rather than as an outside reviewer. The first month was an audit of the legacy application; the rest was building the thing that replaced it, including the people. We defined the target architecture, set the quality bar the new codebase had to clear, sat in on candidate interviews for every product and engineering hire, and then ran the delivery of the next-generation app with the team we had just helped assemble. Outcome ------- The full production estate moved from the old platform to the new one, including a forced cross-region cloud migration from the Middle East to Europe with no loss of user data. The engagement did not end at launch: infrastructure operations, a framework upgrade programme, and compliance advisory for a card-linked offers programme with a global card network, including the PCI DSS certification path, are all still running. Role Contract CTO (CTOaaS) Scope Audit, architecture, team building, platform build, migration, compliance Scale 5M+ users, GCC and Egypt Status Active, multi-year The client ---------- Sahseh ([sahseh.co](https://www.sahseh.co)) is the first Saudi application built specifically for verified discount codes and cashback. It has been live since 2019 and more than five million people have used it to avoid paying full price. The app carries offers for over a thousand merchants, among them Noon, Amazon, Trendyol, Shein, iHerb, Namshi and Styli, with cashback reaching 42% on some stores. It operates across Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Qatar, Kuwait, Bahrain, Oman and Egypt, runs bank-linked offer programmes with Saudi banks including Al Rajhi, SNB and Riyad Bank, and added a B2B employee-benefits offering on top of the consumer product. That is a lot of surface area for a company whose engineering had grown organically. By the time we were engaged, the platform underneath was the constraint on everything the founders wanted to do next. What we did ----------- ### The audit The engagement opened with an audit of the legacy application: what the code does, where the data lives, which parts are load-bearing, and what it would cost to keep each of them alive for another two years. The output was a split between what to carry forward and what to retire. ### Architecture and standards We defined the architecture for the next-generation platform and, just as importantly, wrote down the standards it had to meet. Sahseh had never had an internal definition of "good enough to ship". Precision matters in a product where a wrong coupon or a mis-attributed cashback claim costs real money and real trust, so the quality bar was set explicitly and enforced in review. ### Building the team A platform is only as durable as the people who maintain it. We ran the technical side of hiring for the entire product and engineering team: writing the briefs, screening, sitting in on interviews, and calibrating the founders on what a strong answer sounds like when you are not an engineer yourself. The team that shipped the new app is the team that was hired during this engagement. ### The migration Everything moved from the old platform to the new one. Partway through, a change of circumstances forced a cross-region cloud migration of the full production estate from the Middle East to Europe. It completed with no loss of user data. Where it stands --------------- The engagement continued after launch. Current work covers: - **Infrastructure operations** for the production estate. - **A framework upgrade programme**, so the new platform does not quietly become the next legacy platform. - **Compliance advisory** for a card-linked offers programme with a global card network, including the PCI DSS certification path. > We are incredibly grateful to have been working with Dawid (A2Z Web), and his impact on our company has been nothing short of remarkable. Dawid audited our legacy app, guided us through interviewing tech team candidates, helped us set new standards for quality and precision, and facilitated the successful development of our next-generation app. His professionalism, expertise, and collaborative spirit have been invaluable assets to our team. We highly recommend Dawid and A2Z Web for any company seeking top-notch tech leadership. ![Omar Alqoroni](https://a2zweb.co/testimonials/omar-alqoroni.webp)Omar Alqoroni Co-founder at صحصح Sahseh March 20, 2024 Services behind this engagement ------------------------------- - [ Custom Software Development ](https://a2zweb.co/en/services/custom-software-development) - [ Chief Technology Officer as a Service (CTOaaS) ](https://a2zweb.co/en/services/chief-technology-officer-as-a-service-ctoaas) - [ Tech Hiring Support ](https://a2zweb.co/en/services/tech-hiring) - [ Tech Auditing & Strategy Consulting ](https://a2zweb.co/en/services/tech-auditing-strategy-consulting) More case studies ----------------- - [ Treïs Group Treïs Group: the due diligence behind a SGD 20M investment ](https://a2zweb.co/en/case-studies/treis-group-technical-due-diligence-carsharing) - [ EpicSoft Asia UCubix: a B2B game licence distribution platform, built and run ](https://a2zweb.co/en/case-studies/ucubix-b2b-game-licence-distribution-platform) - [ Discova Discova: an independent architecture audit for the leadership team ](https://a2zweb.co/en/case-studies/discova-enterprise-architecture-audit) [ All case studies ](https://a2zweb.co/en/case-studies) Want the same read on your stack? --------------------------------- Every engagement above started with one conversation about what was actually blocking the business. 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