Introducing AX2, a Montreal digital development agency

OK, so here goes. I just created my new Medium account, and our company’s publication profile, so that we can start writing stories, sharing code, ideas and decisions we’re making along the way. Hopefully others not working at AX2 will read our articles. Actually, hopefully AX2 members will read our articles as well :P

The principle goal here is to get ideas out of our heads, have others respond, comment, discuss, and share their own experience, new perspectives and points of view.

AX2 has changed over time. It started out more than 15 years ago as 2 freelancers, and evolved (over a long period of time) into a company. For the longest time, we did a lot of small/medium websites and experiences, a great variety of projects. We went in different directions, at times exploring things outside of web development (software development, post-production, digital media management, marketing).

We were happy doing that, but recently, in the last 3–4 years, we began to to grow wary of certain aspects of our business. Going in multiple directions meant we couldn’t focus on things long enough to make them evolve as they should. It meant constantly tackling projects on a superficial level, and never for too long. Production for production’s sake.

So we paused to reflect. We read a lot about the current state of things, we questioned everything (including our clients), and we (unconsciously maybe?) started moving in a specific direction… 100% focused on web development.

It started subtly. But slowly it picked up steam.

We reviewed our clients and projects history, and we noticed that we could use the Pareto principle on our business: roughly 20% of our clients provided 80% of recurring business, so we focused on those clients and let all the others go, one by one; we weren’t complete assholes, we always made sure to point them to a few good providers we have worked with along the way.

We doubled-down on our remaining client projects, and given we were letting go of some projects, we began having more time to spend on our own ideas. We started developing for the sake of developing, and formulated a direction that reflected what we wanted to do, who we wanted to be.

What happened next might have been predictable, but we had to discover it on our own: we were much more focused, becoming more involved in our clients’ digital direction (and our own!), our client budgets grew, we were beginning to have a clear vision of what should be, and what could be.

So now AX2’s mission is a little clearer. We want to innovate in the digital development domain. We specialize in creating digital products and solutions that (we hope) defy the status quo, that create new experiences and opportunities for our users and clients, and that improve and optimize processes at all levels. And we have a constant desire to excel in our fields and to never stop evolving.

This is just the beginning. I hope we’ll be around for a while longer, contributing in a meaningful way to the evolution of the digital realm, working honestly and diligently for our clients, partners, users, and ourselves.