Rx Spark | Case Study
Rx Spark
Mobile App
Rx Spark
Rx Spark had built a successful mobile app in the pharmacy discount space, but was hitting the limits of its capacity and technology. Pristine Tech was brought on to keep development moving forward and push toward a best-in-class mobile app for their industry.
The Situation
The pharmacy discount space is a growing market, with patients and providers looking for affordable medications nationwide. Rx Spark’s app had engagement, and they were trying to grow the functionality. In addition to their core service of discounted pharmaceuticals, their PBM partners needed a stronger streamlined process for building rebranded versions of the app.
Pristine Tech was approached to figure out how to get the mobile app to the next level. Based on our conversations with RxSpark to understand the business case behind their development needs, we discovered that the mobile app would need adjustments to the UX/UI to streamline customer navigation and increase user engagement and voucher usage metrics. They needed a mobile app that would be easily adaptable to new features and services as they expanded what their platform offered. We also discovered that this was a special situation because RxSpark needed a mobile app that would stand out while also being adaptable to be used by dozens of PBM partners to have their own version of the RxSpark app.
The Limits of Expo
Pristine Tech began working with the RxSpark mobile app built in React Native with Expo and pushed its functionality further. However, we quickly realized that Expo’s limitations were increasingly outweighing its added value. “The app was running on an older version with features that had been deprecated and would require extensive upgrading, which would definitely create new issues to address. We knew the client was trying to minimize time to market, and we wanted to find an alternative to the refactoring their requests would require.” said Lorik, the lead developer on the project.
We determined that the client would either need to refactor the app in Expo to achieve their goals or rebuild the mobile app purely in React Native. Our assessment showed that rebuilding the app was the best way forward. It would be faster, cheaper, and create a device-agnostic code base that would be much better for launching and maintaining PBM partner apps. A pure React Native code base would eliminate the need to rebuild the app for each partner launch or rebranding and would allow us to build custom features more easily because we could use Swift or Kotlin as necessary without relying on Expo’s library of extensions.
The Goal
Qualitatively, RxSpark needed a fast and clean mobile app for finding medication discounts. The e-commerce experience needed to be fast and intuitive. It also needed to be easily adaptable to any partner’s branding.
Technically, RxSpark needed a back and front end that prioritized ease of maintenance and adaptability. It needed to be scalable, and easy to add new features and services. Since RxSpark had plans to expand the products available through the app in connection to the online store, it needed to be able to handle a rigorous search function with detailed output.
How We Did It
Pristine Tech prides itself on building trusted relationships where we are able to function as tech advisors when necessary in addition to our core development skills. That trust meant that when we recommended RxSpark needed to essentially start over with a new app, they understood why it was the best way forward financially, and believed we would get them to success. We worked in Node.js, React.js, MongoDB, and React Native to achieve the scalability and adaptability they needed. Not only was this cheaper than refactoring the Expo app, it saved them money in the long term with less work to maintain and expand.
The Result
RxSpark has processed thousands of prescriptions, and launches new partner apps on an almost weekly basis. The disruptions to business when launching new app builds and new partners have been minimized. Their development timeline includes a strong feature set that will strengthen their competitiveness with patients and PBMs, and they know that this timeline is achievable with the mabile app they have backed by our development team. “We’re now in a good position to take advantage of new opportunities and it’s all thanks to the work of Pristine Tech.” said RxSpark’s founder.