UPSTREAM · FAQ
Common questions, answered.
The questions founders, CFOs, CTOs, and procurement leads ask in sequence before signing. Sorted by category. If yours isn't here, email hello@alliedbiz.tech.
Engagement & process
How does the engagement start?▾
Free 30-min Stack Review. We deliver a 1-page CFO memo in 3 business days. About 60% of reviews convert to a paid Audit ($2,500, refundable against build). About 75% of audits convert to a fixed-price rebuild. Then ~75% of rebuilds convert to Managed Upstream. No deck pitch, no "let's get our solutions team on a call."
What's the typical timeline from first call to live cutover?▾
Single tool: ~6–10 weeks (1 wk audit + 4–6 wks build + 2–3 wks pilot/cutover). Combo bundle: ~12–18 weeks. Managed Upstream: starts the day after cutover. Renewal-window planning: if you have a vendor contract renewal in 90 days, we'll fast-track to ship before that window where possible.
Who's on the engagement team?▾
Senior engineer (12+ years experience), AI-paired (Anthropic Claude + Cursor + internal tooling) for ~3–5x throughput. Partner-level oversight on every PR. For Combo Bundles or Enterprise managed, a 2–3 person team. No junior-only engagements, no offshore handoffs.
What if your engagement runs over the fixed price?▾
We absorb it. Fixed price is binding on us, not flexible. The 5-day Paid Audit is specifically designed to surface complexity before quoting — that's why we charge for it. If unforeseen complexity emerges, we eat the cost (within reason; if your environment turns out to have ~10x more integrations than disclosed, that's a different conversation).
Pricing & commercials
What's the price range?▾
Single-tool rebuilds: $9K–$24K. Combo bundles: $48K–$98K. Managed Upstream: $1.2K/mo Lite, $4.2K/mo Pro, $9.5K/mo+ Enterprise. Full pricing page →
What's the payment schedule?▾
Single tool: 40/40/20 (engagement / pilot ready / cutover). Combo bundle: 30/30/30/10. Managed: monthly in arrears, Net-30. ACH, wire, or major credit cards (3% surcharge for cards). USD or local-currency by mutual agreement.
Are vendor infrastructure costs included?▾
No. AWS, Anthropic, OpenAI, Stripe, Twilio, Postmark all bill direct to your accounts. We never resell infrastructure. The wrapper-margin recapture comes from cutting out the SaaS layer, not from us marking up your AWS bill.
Do you offer discounts?▾
Combo bundles already discount vs separate rebuilds (10–20% off, by sharing data layer + auth). Beyond that, no negotiated discounts. The list price IS the negotiated price. We'd rather price fairly upfront.
Security & compliance
Are you SOC 2 / ISO 27001 / HIPAA certified?▾
Allied BizTech is ISO 9001:2015 certified (quality management). Builds we ship are SOC 2-ready architectures — auditor-friendly logging, access controls, encryption-at-rest, audit trails. We're not your auditor — you'll engage a SOC 2 auditor — but we make their job ~80% easier. HIPAA-grade builds are quoted separately based on PHI scope. Full security page →
Where does my data live?▾
Your cloud, your account. We deploy to your AWS / GCP / Azure. Your data never sits on infrastructure we control. For Managed Upstream, we have access to operate it — but the bytes are on your tenancy. Cancel and revoke our access; data stays put.
What about LLM providers retaining my prompts?▾
For builds involving Anthropic Claude / OpenAI: we set up zero-retention enterprise contracts on your accounts. Your prompts and outputs are not used for training, not retained server-side. This is stronger than what most third-party AI vendors (including Harvey, Jasper, etc.) offer by default.
Do you sign DPAs / BAAs?▾
Yes. Standard DPA template included in the procurement pack. BAA available for HIPAA-regulated work. We're a sub-processor in your data flow only insofar as you grant us access to your environment for the build/managed work.
Ownership, IP, exit
Who owns the code?▾
You do. Code is in your GitHub repo from day one. We have deploy keys (revocable). The MSA assigns IP to you on engagement signing. No "our framework, our license" lock-in. Plain MIT or your standard internal license.
What about the rebuild patterns? Are they Allied BizTech IP?▾
The architectural patterns and approaches we bring are general engineering knowledge — not protected IP. Your specific implementation is yours. We don't sublicense or restrict reuse. We can ship the same patterns to other customers; you can fork your build to do whatever you want.
What if I want to cancel Managed Upstream?▾
30-day notice. We hand off to your team or your new vendor — runbooks, monitoring access, deploy pipelines. No exit fees. No clawback. The code is already in your GitHub. The portability IS the point.
What if Allied BizTech goes out of business?▾
Your code, your AWS account, your runbooks. You're not dependent on us continuing to exist. Worst-case scenario: you hire one SRE/DevOps to take over — the architecture is documented, the patterns are standard, no proprietary platform lock. Source-code escrow is available on request for additional belt-and-suspenders.
Question not here? Email hello@alliedbiz.tech — we'll answer within 1 business day. Or:
Book 30-min Stack Review →Why this works: AI-paired senior engineers raise the floor on quality + consistency · 250+ products shipped · direct vendor billing — you keep the wrapper margin. → The full method
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