Once upon a time there was a scary era in the tech industry where 9 out of 10 startups failed each year. In 2023 alone 3,200 venture-backed companies closed their doors because of the common disease. The symptoms leading to their death were the same:
- Low retention – users sign up but never return;
- High Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC) – spending more to acquire customers than they bring in revenue;
- Unscalable technology – early shortcuts lead to system crashes under real user load;
- Missed launch deadlines – delays that kill momentum and burn investor confidence;
- Unclear monetization strategy – no viable way to generate sustainable income;
- Feature overload – too many unnecessary features while core functionality remains broken;
- Rising technical debt – quick fixes turn into costly development nightmares.
While searching for a solution, a survey was conducted involving 481 software engineers whose last project was successful and 119 specialists who encountered failures. Its results revealed the practices and steps necessary to ensure the success of technical projects. The most significant practices are outlined below, along with their percentage of influence on discovery development efficiency:
- Projects had clearly defined requirements before development began – 97%;
- Requirements were accurately based on the real-world problem that needed solving – 54%.
- Projects had a complete specification – 50%;
- No significant changes were made late in the development process – 7%.
The answer is clear: traditional Agile practices without proper Discovery phase failed 65% of the time. In contrast, projects that employed comprehensive engineering methodologies demonstrated a failure rate of only 10%.
Tell us about your project and we'll come back with solutions
What is the Discovery phase?
In software development, "discovery stage" refers to the initial phase where stakeholders collaborate to understand the project's goals, identify user needs, and define the scope, requirements, and feasibility of a project before any significant development begins. This phase helps teams avoid costly mistakes, scope creep, and technical inefficiencies by ensuring they build the right product for the right audience with the right technology.
Why do we know Discovery matters?
80% of our customers are non-technical entrepreneurs who we fully support as development partners. The main goal of such a partnership is to provide them not only with a solution that works well, but also with all the necessary documents that describe the process from start to finish, including all the features and scenarios. This allows them to develop and scale the product without having to rewrite it from scratch.
Learn how to become our partner
Some of our clients are turning to product rebuilds. Often, these projects don't have an initial specification that our team can take to work right away. It takes time to refine and learn the details, which builds into the estimation of the project and delays the release. If we had done a Discovery, we could release the product more cheaply and quickly.
We treat the discovery phase like the architectural plan for a construction project. Before workers start building a skyscraper, an architect creates detailed plans that specify:
- What needs to be built – Scope and Requirements;
- Which materials and techniques should be used – Technology stack and Integrations;
- What the final structure should achieve – Business goals and User needs.
If a construction team skips this step, they may be able to build something, but it probably won't be strong enough, efficient enough, or useful enough. It can even be ruined at any time. The same is true for software teams. Without discovery, they risk building the wrong product, using the wrong technology, or burning budget on unnecessary rework.
What’s the profit?
Project discovery phase allows you to think through business processes and finalize the scope of work and get transparent project estimation. As the result you’ll receive the full description of the project, which includes the following steps:
1. Introduction
- Meeting with the client to discuss business goals.
- Conducting competitor and benchmark analyses.
- Describing the product concept, its business goal, and target audience.
- Identifying and describing the technical stack of a product.
2. Backlog
- Identifying and matching all epics by role.
- List all system functions.
- An approximate estimate of each function.
- Identifying the scope of the first version of the product.
3. Prototyping
- Creating website map or mobile app screen layout.
- Organising user flow for critical scenarios.
- Preparation of a detailed description of functionality for client review.
4. PERT estimation
- Three scenarios for calculating development hours: minimal, average, and critical.
The entire development process is described here.
The final documentation will be presented in any tool or service you prefer – Fibery, Confluence, Google Docs, Notion, etc.
Duration, Cost and Value of the Discovery Phase
The duration and cost of the project discovery process depends on the complexity of the product and the scope of the project. On average, it lasts from 2 weeks to a month and a half.
With limited start-up budgets, not all companies find it necessary to allocate funds for even this small phase of work. But according to the IBM Systems Sciences Institute, the cost of fixing a bug discovered after a product release can be 15 times higher than during development and 100 times higher than during the design phase.
Why you may not skip Discovery phase
Skipping the project discovery process often leads to overlooked vulnerabilities, inefficient workflows, and costly mistakes that could have been prevented early. Here are most common examples of such issues and tools which help to avoid them:
Yeah, but it's not gonna happen to me
Most businesses that refuse to discourage the discovery phase in Agile have common arguments. And, as a consequence, problems.
Common barriers | Consequences | Proofs |
❌ "We don't have time for Discovery" | Releasing an unprofitable product and wasting time on post-release corrections. | It costs 6 times more to fix a bug found during implementation than it does to fix a bug found during the discovery phase IBM Report. |
❌ Project discovery is too expensive for our budget | A week of missed product discovery leads to four weeks of wasted development time. If a product is urgently needed, it can be released and then rewritten. However, this does not avoid additional costs. | Technical debt in the U.S. has grown to $1.52 trillion due to rushed product decisions CIO Report. |
❌ Our stakeholders already know what to build | Internal assumptions are no substitute for real user validation and selecting the right technology stack. | 33% of products have a lifecycle of less than one year Journal of Political Economy. |
❌ We can fix issues after launch | Fixing problems post-launch costs significantly more than addressing them in discovery. | Improvement costs can vary widely, from $20,000 for simple products to over $1,000,000 for complex or highly innovative products APQC Research. |
❌ "The team will stay motivated even if some features fail" | Constantly working on unvalidated features crushes morale and increases burnout. | 73% of developers report burnout when working on projects without clear purpose Developer Pulse Report, 2023. |
❌ "Market validation isn’t necessary – we just need to launch" | Missing market needs leads to skyrocketing customer acquisition costs (CAC) and business failure. | Product teams waste $600,000 per year building features that nobody use Pendo Report. |
Project Development Horror Stories and Happy Endings
Why do we believe in the discovery services in software development? Because many years ago we were the kind of developers who skipped it and faced a lot of difficulties and failures as a result. Here are some real cases that led us to make it a necessary step while building a product.
As well as lessons we've learned at the cost of failure and mistakes which you may avoid in the early phase of software development.
👀Lesson 1: Do a Reality Check Before Realizing
Our client asked us to develop a solution for parsing subscribers to the channels of a large video hosting company. In the middle of development, we realized that the hosting company itself could not provide us with this data. We were honest with the client and explained that the goal of the projects might not be achieved. At first he was upset, then he decided to change the idea a bit. But nothing worked out and the project was canceled after six months.
After some time, another client asked us to explore the possibility of parsing Crunchbase databases. We stumped for a discovery phase, during which we found out that it was not possible. The client spent time and a small percentage of their budget on a study they couldn't have done on their own. But they didn't invest in developing an unprofitable product.
Just to compare:
30K+ | $2K |
Cost of a product that did not work | Cost of Discovery phase to avoid the failure |
✍Conclusion. Now, for every data parsing request, we first explore the capabilities of the platforms and let the customer know whether their problem can be solved or not.
💪🏻Lesson 2: Get ready to peak loads
We launched two travel applications. Both used third-party integrations with hotel and tour operator systems. The work of such a product is based on constantly updating data from other tour operators. In the first case, we simply customized the aggregator mechanism itself without going through the discovery phase. In the second case, we spent a long time testing how much load the system could handle and how to set up automatic data updates taking into account requests to third party systems.
A product that was not ready for complex scenarios soon stopped working. But we still continue to support and develop the application for which the discovery phase was performed.
Travel planning app and website with fully automated booking processes
Example of a successful travel app that includes discovery phase services
🥷🏻 Lesson 3: Decompose functionality into different scenarios
We took the request very literally and developed an online reservation system where the user simply selects a table by specifying the date and time. In reality, the restaurant needed a more complex system, where we had to provide the logic of pre-booking and separate the bar and kitchen menus, pre-payment, display of the reservation in the restaurant's admin panel, paid and free admission. We were way over budget, but we realized all the client's wishes. We have been working with this client for years, but before each new functional update we conducted research.
Online reservation system for restaurant and brewery Druzya
Read the full case study here
💸 Lesson 4: Prepare for additional costs in case of complex system development
One of our clients approached us to develop an electronic queuing system to serve visitors to stores, pharmacies, clinics, and other facilities. We estimated the budget, but specified that it would only be known during the discovery phase. We designed the first prototypes and discovered that the project was much larger than anyone had originally thought. The client ignored this fact and continued to assign tasks until the budget was exhausted without receiving the final product.
🔎Eliminate complexities at the outset
We successfully completed the development of a restaurant aggregator, but the client encountered a difficulty at the stage of finding and attracting partner establishments. Each restaurant had to be visited in person and connected manually. However, we were able to automate this process, thereby accelerating the product's scalability.
How to build a restaurant reservation app as an aggregator
How do restaurant aggregators work? We will explain all the details in the article
How to start with Discovery
The good news is that if you’re reading this article you may already know the benefits and necessity of the discovery phase in product development.
Once all the details are finalized, we begin the project evaluation process, which includes the following steps:
- Conduct stakeholder interviews to align on business objectives;
- Perform market and competitor analysis to identify opportunities;
- Define target audience & user personas for better engagement strategies;
- Run technical feasibility assessments to choose the right architecture and tools;
- Develop a prototype or wireframes to validate core functionality;
- Deliver a Discovery Report with findings, roadmap, and estimated budget.
Now you hold all the cards and can move confidently into the development phase. So how can we collaborate here?
Start with describing the essence of your project here
FAQ
What is discovery in software development?
Discovery in software development is the initial phase where project goals, requirements, target users, and technical constraints are identified. It helps teams align on vision, reduce risks, and ensure the product is built on a solid foundation.
What are the 7 stages of the software development process?
The typical 7 stages of the software development lifecycle (SDLC) are:
- Planning
- Requirements analysis
- Design
- Implementation (coding)
- Testing
- Deployment
- Maintenance and support
What does discovery mean in a project?
In the context of a project, discovery refers to the early exploration phase where stakeholders gather information, define objectives, understand the user needs, and assess feasibility. It sets the groundwork for a successful execution phase.
What is the discovery phase of an IT project?
The discovery phase in an IT project involves detailed research, stakeholder interviews, competitor analysis, and technical assessments. The goal is to clarify project scope, reduce uncertainty, and build a clear roadmap for development.
What is a software discovery?
Software discovery typically refers to identifying and documenting all software assets in an organization’s environment. It helps with software inventory, license management, and compliance tracking.
What is eDiscovery in software?
eDiscovery (electronic discovery) in software refers to the process of identifying, collecting, and producing digital information for legal cases or investigations. It’s commonly used in litigation to extract relevant data from electronic sources.
What is discovery in programming?
In programming, discovery can mean exploring unfamiliar code, libraries, APIs, or tools to understand how they work. It may also involve debugging, prototyping, or experimenting during early development phases.
