Good pickup. I've founded two startups and ran a 25 strong...

Good pickup. I've founded two startups and ran a 25 strong product team for a major miner's big data platform - so I know a thing or two about SAAS (my current venture aims to make SAAS products easier to plan, design and deliver products make for non technical people).

My take on Vitor's hire date and targets for him are:

• 2-3 months to complete user research, capturing requirements/features
• 1-1.5 months to create mockup screen designs, another month find feedback and validate
• 2-3 months for frontend Web/App proof of concept
• 2-4 months to complete backend/server basic functionalist
• 2 months to secure and harden the system.

With the right team the above could be done in MAYBE 7 months, but I would not feel to confident about the quality and ability to scale

The guys who create value though are the software engineers/developers - these guys write the code, not the UXer: they make sure it works well and does what the customer wants. How many engineers have been hired? If there are two front end guys and 3-4 backend guys, and 1-2 cloud engineers, the above will easily be achievable.

I think we won't see a platform release until after June, but would be pleasantly surprised prior to that.