FAQ
What we do, how it compares to hiring or outsourcing, what it costs, and how an engagement starts.
The short version of what we do and where we fit.
IsNull Softworks is an embedded QA and product ownership partner for small software teams and the fractional CTOs who support them. We provide QA engineering, product ownership, software engineering, and applied AI from one team that works inside your sprint, so the highest-impact bugs, features, and documentation ship first.
Engineering leaders at established small software teams, from 1 to 200 people across the US: founders, CTOs, and directors of software engineering whose teams have outgrown doing QA and product management on the side. Fractional CTOs also bring us in for the teams they support.
Large enterprises with their own QA and product organizations usually need a different kind of vendor. We’re also not the right choice if the goal is the lowest bid, or replacing human oversight with AI.
No. We work with teams building software inside many kinds of companies, including professional services, manufacturing, and wholesale and distribution.
IsNull, LLC is a US company, and we work with engineering teams across the US.
What our QA engineering covers, and how it fits your release process.
QA as a service means a partner provides your quality assurance on an ongoing basis instead of you hiring for it: test planning, manual and automated testing, regression testing, and defect reporting. IsNull delivers it embedded in your sprint, with product ownership alongside, so testing is tied to what the product is supposed to do.
Our QA engineers join your team’s workflow instead of testing from the outside. We test features and fixes inside your sprint, work from your user stories, and report findings in the tools your developers already use.
Both. We test by hand where judgment matters, such as new features and exploratory testing, and build test automation for the journeys that need checking on every release, so regression coverage grows over time.
Yes. Our QA engineering covers every feature and bug, whether your team built it or ours did.
Each finding is documented with steps to reproduce, evidence, and impact, then retested after the fix. Our engineers review every finding before it reaches your developers, so your team spends its time fixing what matters, not sorting noise.
How we run the backlog without taking the product away from you.
A fractional product owner runs your backlog part-time: turning goals into requirements and user stories, ranking bugs, features, and documentation by impact, planning sprints, and accepting finished work. You get product ownership without a full-time hire, working alongside your product lead or CTO.
We run the backlog alongside your product lead, not instead of them. We write requirements and user stories, plan sprints, accept finished work, and report to stakeholders.
Every bug, feature request, and documentation gap goes into one queue, ranked by impact on your users and your business. The highest-impact work ships first, and lower-impact items are scheduled rather than forgotten.
Stakeholders hear what was done and what shipped each cycle, including new features, bug fixes, and changes to roadmap timing, so nobody has to chase the development team for an update.
The options engineering leaders usually weigh us against.
A full-time hire takes months to recruit and onboard, and brings one person’s skills. IsNull brings QA engineering and product ownership with an established process, working inside your sprint, and the engagement can grow or shrink with your release schedule. If you later want the role in-house, we can help define it and hand off cleanly.
Outsourced QA often runs test scripts from the outside and sends back a list of results. We join your sprint and your tools, review every finding before it reaches your developers, and own the backlog alongside your product lead, so testing is connected to what the product is meant to do.
No. We add to your existing team. Most teams bring us in when developers are at capacity or nobody owns QA and product management, and we fill those gaps without a new hire.
The fractional CTO stays the technical lead. We step into the QA and product ownership roles on the teams they support and feed that work into the development process already in place.
What to expect before you commit to anything.
Pricing depends on scope: how many user journeys we cover, how much product ownership you need, and whether we’re also building. Work is quoted as a scoped project, a monthly retainer, or ongoing QA, and you get the price in writing, in the plan, before you commit.
We reply to every inquiry within one business day or less to schedule an intro call. After the call you get a written plan, and once it’s agreed we set a start date that fits your sprint calendar.
With an intro call. We learn about your team and release cadence, then send a written plan covering what we’ll test, what we’ll own in the backlog, what we’ll build, and how we’ll report back.
We haven’t published a free-trial offer. We agree the scope, pricing, and what would make a first engagement worthwhile before you commit.
We review the work together and agree the handoff. Ongoing work, access, and deliverables are only continued if you choose to, and are agreed explicitly.
How we use AI, and what we need from you to get started.
Yes, as a technique, not a replacement for judgment. AI helps us map applications and run checks faster, and our engineers review every finding and every change before it reaches your team.
Yes. Automated checks are useful evidence, not infallible judgment. We keep blocked and uncertain results visible, review findings by hand, and don’t treat a passing check as proof that the whole application is healthy.
Both. We build AI agents, assistants, and automation into your existing systems, and we test AI features with an approach designed for answers that vary from run to run.
Often, yes. An authorized review of a public or test URL can be a useful start. Source-based documentation, code changes, and isolated builds need more access and setup, agreed in the written plan.
No. QA is delivered as a managed service by our team. We handle setup, run the checks, review results, and help act on findings. That close involvement is part of the offering.
Next step
Send it with a few details about your team. We reply within one business day or less.
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