Development & Innovation
Innovation is a part of our DNA here at Foodback. We always seek what’s next, and helping our customers become the best version of themselves. One of the key ingredients is to listen closely to them, and combine that with knowledge from world-class researchers and our very own Development and Innovation team.
Our Technology
Our Way of Working
Open Positions
Tech Blog
Our Technology
Good tech is not a goal in itself, it’s an enabler to build good solutions that actually make a difference. Our solution today works, and is well received by our customers – but we want more, and have plenty of unresolved challenges.
Customer Feedback
The core of what we do is to gather feedback from the full spectrum of end-users. The happy, the angry, but most importantly, the silent majority. We do this with fast, intuitive and fun feedback, always inviting people to leave feedback as close to the actual experience as possible.
Exciting opportunities moving forward:
- Get even closer to the customer: Make sure that Foodback is always a natural part of the customer journey, wherever they are.
- Balance integrity and usability: Foodback should always be simple, and not require login. To do this requires a perfect mix of cutting edge tech and great design.
Data and Insight
We have lots of data, and probably the most structured and standardized set of feedback data for restaurants in the world. We use this data to learn and improve in many areas, such as understanding how users engage with Foodback’s analytics and constantly improve our solution.
Exciting opportunities moving forward:
- Advanced, but simple visualization: We have just scratched the surface on how to present our data. We will continue to find ways of presenting advanced insights the simplest way possible.
- Monitor all aspects of our products: “Eat your own dog food” is a commonly used phrase within software development. We are doing just that. If we want to enable our customers to become data driven, we need to make sure we do exactly that ourselves.
Improvements
Today we are serving our customers detailed symptoms of what’s wrong, and making it easy to continuously improve. No other solution can do this with the level of detail we are, but it’s not enough, we want more!
Exciting opportunities moving forward:
- Using machine learning to find hidden insights: Anybody can do simple statistics and show average scores. We are digging deeper, and will use more machine learning to find hidden insight in our data in combination other data sources.
- From reactive to proactive: Our goal is to serve suggestions for improvements before our customers even know about it. That can only be done with data from many different sources.
Infrastructure
Scalability has been key for us since the beginning. Foodback runs on AWS with a micro-service architecture, and operates 24/7 across the globe. We have automated deploys and close monitoring of our environments, and have infrastructure-as-code. Our DevOps culture is tightly embedded in the entire team.
Exciting opportunities moving forward:
- Automate, automate, automate: We want to automate where automation makes sense. Though not automate too much, as Elon Musk did with the Tesla Model 3 production, we’re not fools 😛
- Always proactive: We want to know when something is wrong before it happens. To achieve that, we need world class monitoring and automatic scaling everywhere.
Our Toolbox
No need to re-invent the wheel. We have a toolbox of well known languages, frameworks and components that, combined in a smart way, create great products. Only when we meet the limits of those tools, will we create our own stuff.
Exciting opportunities moving forward:
- Constantly reduce friction: We have automated a lot but not everything. We still have improvements on reducing even more friction during development, deployment, and after release.
- Tool collaboration: As people, we’re pretty good at collaborating in Foodback and we want our tools to do the same. Data needs to seamlessly flow between apps, so we can enable all departments to work efficiently.
Customer Feedback
The core of what we do is to gather feedback from the full spectrum of end-users. The happy, the angry, but most importantly, the silent majority. We do this with fast, intuitive and fun feedback, always inviting people to leave feedback as close to the actual experience as possible.
Exciting opportunities moving forward:
- Get even closer to the customer: Make sure that Foodback is always a natural part of the customer journey, wherever they are.
- Balance integrity and usability: Foodback should always be simple, and not require login. To do this requires a perfect mix of cutting edge tech and great design.
Data and Insight
We have lots of data, and probably the most structured and standardized set of feedback data for restaurants in the world. We use this data to learn and improve in many areas, such as understanding how users engage with Foodback’s analytics and constantly improve our solution.
Exciting opportunities moving forward:
- Advanced, but simple visualization: We have just scratched the surface on how to present our data. We will continue to find ways of presenting advanced insights the simplest way possible.
- Monitor all aspects of our products: “Eat your own dog food” is a commonly used phrase within software development. We are doing just that. If we want to enable our customers to become data driven, we need to make sure we do exactly that ourselves.
Improvements
Today we are serving our customers detailed symptoms of what’s wrong, and making it easy to constantly improve. No other solution can do this with the level of detail we are, but it’s not enough, we want more!
Exciting opportunities moving forward:
- Using machine learning to find hidden insights: Anybody can do simple statistics and show average scores. We are digging deeper, and will use more machine learning to find hidden insight in our data set.
- From reactive to proactive: Our goal is to serve suggestions for improvements before our customers even know about it. That can only be done with data from many different sources.
Infrastructure
Scalability has been key for us since the beginning. Foodback runs on AWS with a micro-service architecture, and operates 24/7 across the globe. We have automated deploys and close monitoring of our environments, and have infrastructure-as-code. Our DevOps culture is tightly embedded in the entire team.
Exciting opportunities moving forward:
- Automate, automate, automate: We want to automate where automation makes sense. Though not automate too much, as Elon Musk did with the Tesla Model 3 production, we’re not fools.
- Always proactive: We want to know when something is wrong before it happens. To achieve that, we need world class monitoring and automatic scaling everywhere.
Our Toolbox
No need to re-invent the wheel. We have a toolbox of well known languages, frameworks and components that, combined in a smart way, create great products. Only when we meet the limits of those tools, will we create our own stuff.
Exciting opportunities moving forward:
- Constantly reduce friction: We have automated a lot but not everything. We still have improvements on reducing even more friction during development, deployment, and after release.
- Tool collaboration:As people, we’re pretty good at collaborating in Foodback and we want our tools to do the same. Data needs to seamlessly flow between apps, so we can enable all departments to work efficiently.
Technology that we use
Our Way of Working
A key ingredient to Foodback’s success is our culture. The variety of people, skills and a solid dose of humor pushes us forward to reach our goals. Here’s a list of things you can expect working at Foodback:
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Things you will experience working at Foodback
- 💡 Inspiring offices: If you’re working locally, we’re located at places that bring that vibrant scale-up feeling. In Sandnes, we even have our own indoor Italian street.
- 🍻 Remote and local events: We have regular “lønningspils” and our very own “Online shenanigans” to socialize between cities.
- 👨💻 A steady development rhythm: You will join a team on a mission, where we strive to give you the rhythm you need to get sh*t done.
- 📅 Foodback Week: Twice a year, we all meet for a full week of inspiring workshops, planning and social events, to make sure we’re all aligned.
- 🔍 Transparency: We have regular all hands meetings to make sure everybody is aligned. Missed out? Easely read-up on our colorful Miro board.
- 🙋🏼♀️ Low threshold communication: For everything in-between, we stay in touch in one of the topic channels on Teams.
- 🌍 Geo-what? Every day after lunch, we try to sneak in a quick game of Geoguessr. Get dropped a random place on earth, walk around in street view and guess where you’re at. Don’t tell our boss 🤐
- 🎁 Sharing is caring: Have a topic you want to share? It’s always welcome. If it’s suitable, we can even do a blog post about it.
- 😎 #Fyttikatta: Just one of many weird (and funny?) local things you will experience. You just have to be there.
Some of Our Innovation Projects
Since the very beginning of our journey, we have taken lead or participated in many innovation programs. We strongly believe in the power of combining research, customers and our own teams to create valuable innovations to the industry.
Food (R)evolution
A cross-discipline project, aiming to move all us regular folk toward more sustainable food choices. We do this using canteens as the test arena for new products, fueled by technology from Foodback and research from Nofima. A 3 year project with a total frame of €2 million. Read more here.
Foodback for Pre-paid meal
In 2019, we assembled a team of researchers, customers, and even competitors, to see if Foodback could be proven for pre-paid meals. And guess what, we figured it out! Six months later we signed some of the largest canteens and take away chains in Norway. The project was partially funded by VRI Rogaland.
Foodback – First Edition
Through funding from Innovation Norway, we ran a €1 million project to build the framework of what is Foodback today. We had a challenging (in a good way) pilot and excellent researchers to back us along the way. One of them even had a PhD in meal experiences, imagine that!
Cross-functional and Zero Silos
In order to deliver valuable products to customers, we cover a wide range of disciplines. Suffice it to say, we have a zero-silo policy, and all teams work cross-functionally.
Product Management
Owner of backlog, specification wrok and priorities. Makes sure there is structure and a plan in everything we invest in.
UX / Design
Responsible for creation of the best user experiences (incl. design), interactions across devices, cultures and languages.
Development / Testing
Responsible for back and front-end development. And in the end, testing.
DevOps (Infrastructure)
Utilize and configure the cloud to ensure security, performance, compliance. Be up and running at all times!
Data Science / Analytics
Deep dive into our data to spin up ideas for products, features, reports etc. Tight cooperation with researchers and product management.
Who you’ll work with
Daniel Chaibi, CTO and Co-Founder
Daniel is the Chief Product & Technology Officer and Co-Founder at Foodback, running a small but productive development team of eight people. He is passionate about creating great user experiences that truly make a difference for customers. Outside the office, Daniel enjoys most of his time with his wife and 3 kids, where he is the Head Chef. His latest toy is an Italian pizza oven from Ooni. Whatever time is left over he spends watching Liverpool, trying to stay in shape, and socializing.
Open Positions
Do you want to join a team of passionate developers and have a big impact on a product? We are looking for new team members to join our development team and be a part of building our best-in-class guest feedback platform!
Open Application
If you have relevant experience from scale-ups and believe you can strengthen our team, please reach out. Fields we want to power-up are Product Management, Data Science, DevOps, UX/Design,
Tech Blog
Here’s where you can learn about exciting stuff that happens behind the curtains.
Foodback Powers RC Show 2024 – Canada’s Leading Foodservice & Hospitality Expo
Foodback Powers RC Show 2024 - Canada’s Leading Foodservice & Hospitality Expo We're thrilled to announce our continued partnership with Restaurants Canada Show (RC Show), the foremost event for Canada's foodservice and hospitality industry. As the official feedback provider, Foodback is set...
5 Key Take Aways from UMAMI Arena 2023
5 Key Take Aways from UMAMI Arena 2023 In 1976, Apple launched their legendary Apple I, made in the garage of Steve Jobs' family home in Los Altos, California. In 2014, we here at Foodback had our equivalent moment, the launch of our first product, the digital bill folder. It may not have been...
How Norway is improving sustainability by changing the way you shop
In early 2020, one of our customers at Foodback, Coor Service Management, came to us with a very exciting project, Food (R)evolution. Through a program called Floke, they had put together a team looking for challenges in the food supply chain.
Foodback launches single Covid-19 check-in, menu and feedback QR code for restaurant trade
Foodback has just launched Foodback Portal & Check-In, a new solution for the restaurant trade allowing diners to check-in, look at and order from the menu, and rate their meal.
Foodback Expands to Take Away & Delivery
What about the eating establishments that do not hand out the bill after the meal? Take Away? Canteens? Cafés? Hotel Breakfasts? All important meal experiences, where feedback is equally important.
