Rescue and stabilize
Software Project Rescue Services
Software project rescue is a structured takeover of a codebase that a previous team left stalled, unstable, or unfinished. Kiwimesh starts with a four-week audit and stabilisation: we document what exists, fix what is breaking production, and give you a written path forward. Then you decide whether we continue the build, hand it to your team, or both.
“Our last dev team left us with a mess. We need someone to fix it.”
Inherited a codebase nobody understands? Features taking three times longer than they should? We step in, audit what exists, stabilize the product, and build a path forward without starting from scratch.
What this covers
- •Technical debt assessment
- •Codebase audit and documentation
- •Legacy system stabilization
- •Team handoff and runbook creation
- •Ongoing maintenance and on-call support
Best for
Companies post-bad-agency, acquired products, internal tools in disarray
Typical engagement
4 weeks audit, then optional T&M
How it works
What happens, in order.
01
Week 1: access and triage
We get into the repositories, infrastructure, and issue tracker, reproduce the worst problems, and rank them by user impact. You get a triage list by day five.
02
Weeks 2 to 3: stabilise
We fix the production-breaking issues first, add monitoring and error tracking if there is none, and put the deployment under version control and CI so every change is reversible.
03
Week 4: document and decide
We deliver a codebase map, a technical-debt register with cost to fix, and a recommendation: continue, refactor in phases, or rebuild a component. With numbers, not adjectives.
04
After the audit
Either a fixed-price phase to deliver the next milestone, a forward deployed engineer working alongside your team, or a clean handoff with runbooks. Your call, no lock-in.
What you get
Deliverables you can hold us to.
- Triage list of production issues ranked by user impact, within five days
- Stabilised production with monitoring, error tracking, and reversible deployments
- Codebase map: services, data flows, third-party dependencies, secrets inventory
- Technical-debt register with estimated cost to fix each item
- Written recommendation: continue, phase the refactor, or rebuild a component
- Runbooks and handoff documentation your next team can use
Questions
What people ask before they book a call.
Do we have to start from scratch?
Usually not. Most rescued codebases have salvageable parts, and a rewrite throws away tested behaviour along with the bad code. We recommend a rebuild only for specific components where the cost to fix exceeds the cost to replace, and we show you that math.
What if the previous team will not hand over access?
We have done takeovers with no handover at all. We work from what you control: hosting accounts, domain registrar, app store accounts, and any repository access. The first week includes recovering or rotating credentials so the previous team cannot affect production.
Can you work in our stack?
Our core stack is TypeScript, NestJS, Next.js, React Native, Python, and PostgreSQL on AWS, and we have rescued projects in PHP, Laravel, Django, and legacy Microsoft Access and VB applications. If the stack is unusual we tell you in the first call.
How is the rescue priced?
The four-week audit and stabilisation is a fixed fee agreed before we start. Work after that is quoted as fixed-price milestones once we know the codebase. We do not bill open-ended hours on a codebase we have not seen.
How fast can you start?
For a rescue, usually within one to two weeks. The first week is access and triage, so the earlier we have credentials, the faster the useful work begins.
Related work
Where we have done this before.
Healthcare · B2B SaaS
Veterinary pharmaceutical reference SaaS
Legacy desktop app to cloud-native SaaS — zero data loss
Replaced a Microsoft Access / VB desktop product with a NestJS + PostgreSQL + Next.js SaaS. Built a B2B API distribution channel, Stripe billing, and clinical-grade governance.
Read the case study
HR Tech · SaaS · Enterprise
HR performance management platform
Zero-downtime AWS migration for a live US SaaS product
We stepped into a live, third-party-hosted platform and migrated it to AWS without a minute of downtime. Established CI/CD, agile process, and a full UI overhaul.
Read the case study
Tell us where you are. We'll tell you what it takes.
A 30-minute call, then a written scope and price within three business days.