The Route Planner: A Patented Algorithm, Rescued from a Stalled Build
A US travel-technology startup with a patented route-specific social network and a proprietary distance-measuring algorithm was stalled: the previous freelance team had left a semi-functional website, no backend, no mobile apps, and no documentation. Envion took the project over with an 8-strong team, wrote the functional specification, engineered a proprietary calculation module on AWS to make the patented algorithm scale, and delivered the first Android version in six months — then kept building: scaling, billing, and an API that opened the platform to external services.
The challenge
The client’s product was genuinely innovative: chart a route on a map, and see the restaurants, cafes, stores, hotels, motels, and filling stations within a chosen distance along that route — with contextual information like sales, events, and current fuel prices, shareable privately with family and friends. Unlike standard geocoding, the client’s patented algorithm measures distance to businesses precisely along the route.
But when Envion was approached, the project was on hold. A previously hired freelance team had not met expectations; what existed was a semi-functional website that could display routes and associated businesses, with no backend, no mobile functionality, no proper documentation, and no efficient knowledge transfer. Requirements also kept evolving as the client’s B2B customers brought greatly varying business needs — which ruled out a rigid fixed-spec approach.
Decision path
Envion put together an 8-strong team — six software engineers, a QA engineer, and a PM — and adopted Agile, because the requirements were a moving target by the nature of the business.
The first decision was to rebuild the foundation: guide the client through requirements gathering and produce a detailed functional specification for the whole system — website, backend, and mobile as one route-planning, advertising, and information-sharing platform. The second was the algorithm problem: calculating the distance to every business within a user-specified corridor created excessive server load. Envion solved it with a proprietary calculation module and an Amazon-services infrastructure built to support those workloads.
Envion contribution
Envion delivered the system end to end: the functional specification, the backend, the mobile applications, the proprietary calculation module implementing the client’s patented distance algorithm at scale, and the AWS infrastructure behind it.
After the first Android version went live six months in, the engagement continued into scaling the system, adding billing functionality, and — critically for the client’s growth — creating an API that enables integration with external services, turning a standalone app into a platform partners can connect to. Businesses advertising through the app submit their contextual information through the client’s website, feeding the same integrated system.
Delivery
Six months to the first live Android release; the project then ran as a multi-year programme. The stack was deliberately pragmatic: PHP, C#, Java, C++, Objective-C, Swift, Go, with MongoDB, SQLite, and PostgreSQL with custom PostGIS for the geospatial core — plus the open routing and geocoding toolchain (OSRM, Nominatim, Routino, OSM), REST/JSON/XML interfaces, JNI for native computation, and AWS for infrastructure.
Agile delivery absorbed the constantly evolving B2B requirements without re-scoping battles — the methodology fit the business reality.
Outcome and evidence
The startup went from a stalled, undocumented half-build to a flagship product: a leading technology vendor in its domain, competitive enough to expand into new regional markets and business segments. A year and a half after release, the number of B2B partners — businesses advertising within the app — was still growing rapidly.
The API layer turned the product into a platform: external services can integrate with the route-planning system, and the same infrastructure carries the advertising and information-sharing business on top.
Evidence gate. This page publishes only what Envion's project records and client disclosure permissions support. Outcomes are added once verified against a baseline, a measurement period, and an approved source.
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