Custom mission apps
EdgeLance forward-deployed engineers build the app your workflow needs on mission software that already works, without a year-long custom build.
Integrator build or EdgeLance
The software acquisition pathway gives a program one year from first funding to its first fielded release,1 and Naval Postgraduate School researchers found many programs need more development than that window allows.2 A custom build starts from requirements. Every app built on EdgeLance so far started from working software, and most reached a working prototype in days to two weeks.
Custom integrator build
Built on EdgeLance
Illustrative phases on one time scale. Test and accreditation follow the program's own process on either path.
Your assumptions
Three-year cost, 3 units
Custom build by an integrator
$13.7M
$5.4M for the first unit, $4.2M for each one after
Built on EdgeLance
52-67% lower
Estimated range. Savings grow with every unit, because each one reuses what the first one built.
A first working app can be running in days, and every added unit reuses the configuration the first one proved.
Directional estimate, not a quote. Integrator cost is team size times rate times 1,920 hoursa year, sustained after first release; each added unit pays the rework share plus its own sustainment. The EdgeLance range assumes reuse cuts 40 to 55 percent of the first unit's three-year cost and 60 to 75 percent of each added unit's. Ask for an estimate on your mission.
The default labor rate reflects fully burdened ceiling rates for senior and expert software developers on a GSA Alliant 2 schedule.3 For an estimate on your own app, use the app finder.
How it works
The mission blocks carry the common work. The engineers spend their time on what makes your mission different.
Forward-deployed engineers work beside the people who will use the app. They learn the workflow, the formats, and the kit before they write anything.
Planning, sensing, AI, tasking, sync, trust, and review already work. The engineers pick the blocks the mission needs from the catalog.
New engineering goes to the mission's own rules, data adapters, and screens. Operators test every iteration on their own hardware.
The app ships as one signed package with its software bill of materials and installs air-gapped on the unit's devices.
Your developers extend the app with the same catalog and tools. The next unit starts from the configuration the first one proved.
App finder
Three questions narrow fifty app ideas to the ones that fit your team. Pick one, or describe your own, and a few more questions give you an estimated build time against a custom integrator build.
Question 01 / 03
Built so far
Each was built for a government solicitation or pilot proposal. Reuse carried the common work; the new engineering is listed for each.
App 01 / 08
Turn long staff traffic into concise products without dropping required facts.
Shared capabilities reused · 5 of 11
Two ways to buy
Run EdgeLance
License EdgeLance and run it on the unit's own hardware. Mission templates set models, sync, and approval policy for the mission, and the team is planning, sensing, and tasking from the first day.
Build on EdgeLance
Our forward-deployed engineers sit with your operators and build the app your workflow needs on EdgeLance's working blocks. The engineering goes to your rules, your data, and your screens, not to rebuilding what already works.
Sources
Start with a requirement
Tell us the mission, the users, and the kit. Forward-deployed engineers will show you a working app on your hardware.