Surge Build Operate Transfer

Enterprise EngineeringSri Lanka and Global

Own your engineering. We build the team, run it, then hand it to you.

A dedicated engineering and marketing team recruited for you in Colombo, operated by Surge on transparent cost plus pricing, and transferred to you as your own people, code and infrastructure. The alternative to renting a vendor forever.

Engineers in seven months

Ten seniors in the first ninety days, thirty by month five, the full team by month seven

Cost + 20%

Nothing hidden

Salaries and overheads passed through at actuals, itemised monthly, with the right to audit every line

36 months

Build, operate, transfer

Your team, your repositories and your infrastructure, handed over at a measured 95% readiness

Regulated

Built for banking

Designed around central bank outsourcing and technology risk directions, in an isolated, biometric access delivery hub

Why switch

Ten reasons to build your team with Surge instead of renting a vendor

Ordered by what it is worth to the business, not by feature.

Cost

Cost plus, with every line visible

Salaries, statutory contributions, devices, licences and office costs are passed through at actuals and itemised every month. Our margin is a 20% management fee on top, and you can audit any line with ten days' notice.

Under $40,000 per engineer per year, fully loaded

At full strength a 40 person team runs about $99,000 to $126,000 a month including our fee, which is $2,500 to $3,150 per person. A single senior hire in the United States or the United Kingdom costs several times that.

No recruitment fees, no rate card

Setup is priced once, as two months of the full team's cost base. The transfer is priced once, as nine months of the management fee. There is nothing per hire and nothing per hour.

Revenue

Marketing people in the same squads

The team is not limited to engineers. Performance marketing, SEO, content and creative roles are recruited into the same structure, so the products you build get launched and adopted, not just shipped.

Control

You own everything from day one

All intellectual property vests in you. Source code sits in repositories you control from the first commit. No proprietary Surge frameworks are allowed in production, so there is nothing to untangle later.

You approve every hire, and can remove anyone in five days

Each person is assessed against a role matrix you sign off, onboarded only with your written approval, and removed within five business days if you ask.

A team that actually becomes yours

Every team member is offered employment by you at transfer, we waive all non solicitation rights, service continuity is preserved, and a readiness index has to reach 95% before the handover certificate is signed.

Speed

Ten seniors in ninety days, forty people in seven months

Environments and pipelines are live by month three with security gates on every deployment. Delivery metrics are reported from month one, not after the team is complete.

Risk

Built for regulated industries

The model was designed around central bank outsourcing and technology risk directions: an isolated delivery hub with biometric access, managed devices only, annual penetration testing, disaster recovery targets and a software bill of materials.

Service levels with our fee behind them

Headcount, attrition, replacement times, test coverage, defect leakage and incident restoration all carry targets. Two consecutive months in the red is a breach, and the performance management fee is reviewed against results every quarter.

Proof

Three things you can check

Person team built for a licensed commercial bank

Three squads for digital channels, core services and payments, and platform reliability, built in Colombo over 36 months and transferred to the bank's own subsidiary.

700+

Specialists across three verticals

Delivery hubs in Sri Lanka and the United States, built over more than a decade. The recruiters, leads and security people who build your team already work here.

6 years

Running an embedded team for Shorelight

A 25 strong growth and product team inside a US client's own processes and infrastructure. The operating model behind the BOT is one we have run for years.

Reference conversations available on request under NDA.

The commercials at a glance

Size, cost and timeline

Typical engagement

20 to 40 people

Sized to a role matrix agreed in the first thirty days. Smaller teams work; the economics are best above twenty.

What it costs

Cost + 20%

About $99,000 to $126,000 a month for 40 people at full strength, plus a one time setup fee of two months' cost base and a transfer fee of nine months' management fee. Indicative, in dollars at 310 rupees.

Onboarding

First 10 in 90 days

Environments live and senior wave onboarded by month three, full team by month seven, stabilised and signed off by month nine.

Who you will be working with

Bhanuka Harischandra

Founder and CEO

bhanuka@surge.global
+94 11 433 7094

Lahiru Dissanayake

CEO, Services

lahiru.d@surge.global
+94 11 433 7094

Confirm who fronts BOT engagements and add direct numbers before this goes to a client.

How it works

Three phases over thirty six months

The phases overlap on purpose. Delivery starts in month one, not after recruitment finishes, and the transfer is planned from the first quarterly review rather than discovered at the end.

1. Build

Months 1 to 9

Recruit in three waves against a role matrix you approve, stand up the secure hub and every environment, publish the delivery playbook and RACI, then two months of stabilisation before sign off.

2. Operate

Months 1 to 24

Your roadmap delivered in two week sprints under your definition of done, with monthly reporting on velocity, DORA metrics, SLAs, headcount, cost and security, and a capability plan every quarter.

3. Transfer

Months 24 to 36

Structured knowledge transfer, environments and pipelines moved under your control, every team member offered employment by you, and sixty business days of hypercare after the handover certificate.

How fast the team arrives

Cumulative headcount by month. Ten senior people first, so the architecture, pipelines and ways of working are set before the volume hires arrive.

How readiness to transfer is measured

Weighting of the transfer readiness index. Tracked from month thirteen, 80% by month thirty and 95% before the handover certificate.

The team

What forty people looks like

The role matrix from a licensed commercial bank engagement. Yours is agreed in the first thirty days against your roadmap, and marketing roles can be built into the same squads.

Roles in a 40 person banking team, organised as three squads: digital channels, core services and payments, platform and reliability.

Service levels the team is held to

Measure	Target
Contracted headcount available	90% or more at all times
Annual attrition	10% or less
Replacing a leaver	21 to 60 business days by seniority
Removing someone at your request	5 business days
Unit test coverage	80% or more every sprint
Production defect leakage	Under 5% of sprint scope
Restoring a P1 incident	Under 4 hours
Notifying a P1 security incident	Within 4 hours
Fixing a critical vulnerability	48 hours

Reported monthly as red, amber or green. Two consecutive months in the red is a breach with a remediation plan due in ten business days.

What you get

More than headcount

A secure, isolated hub

A dedicated floor in Colombo with RFID and biometric access, CCTV, network isolation from the rest of Surge, managed devices and no personal devices, live from day one.

Engineering ecosystem by month three

Development, QA, UAT and production pipelines on your repositories, static and dynamic security gates on every deployment, infrastructure as code, monitoring and alerting, a software bill of materials.

A capability plan every quarter

Individual development plans for every person, cloud, Kubernetes, agile and security certifications funded inside the overhead, banking domain sessions monthly, and fortnightly knowledge sessions your people can join.

Reporting you can run the team on

By the fifth business day of each month: velocity, deployment frequency, change failure rate, time to restore, SLA status, attrition, itemised cost and security posture.

Marketing in the same team

The model is not limited to engineers. Performance marketing, SEO, content and creative people can be recruited into the same squads, so what gets built also gets adopted.

A transfer that is measured

A readiness index tracked from month thirteen, 80% by month thirty and 95% before the handover certificate, with a knowledge gap register that must be empty of serious items.

Reference

Built for a bank first

A licensed commercial bank

Sri Lanka, regulated by the Central Bank

A 40 person digital engineering team built for the bank in three recruitment waves, operated for 24 months across three squads covering digital channels, core services and payments, and platform reliability, then transferred to a bank subsidiary with all people, code, environments and intellectual property. Priced as cost plus a 20% management fee, with a one time setup fee and a transfer fee that pays for the waiver of non solicitation and sixty business days of hypercare.

Every hire approved by the bank before onboarding, with individual NDAs
Squads working to the bank's own agile lifecycle, definition of done and release governance
Compliance with the central bank's outsourcing and technology risk directions built into the contract
Quarterly salary benchmarking against SLASSCOM surveys, visible to the bank
Performance management fee reviewed quarterly against KPIs, so part of our margin is at risk

Pricing

Cost plus, priced once at each end

Salaries and overheads at actuals, a 20% management fee, a setup fee at the start and a transfer fee at the end. Nothing per hire, nothing per hour.

Monthly

$99K to $126Kfor 40 people

Cost base plus the 20% management fee at full strength, which is $2,500 to $3,150 per person per month. Scales with actual headcount during the ramp.

Management fee

20%of cost base

Covers delivery management, retention, governance, quality assurance and the risk we carry. The only margin in the monthly invoice.

Setup fee

About $187Kone time

Two months of the full team's cost base, paid before commencement. Funds the hub, the recruitment and the environments.

Transfer fee

$173K to $220Kat handover

Nine months of the management fee on the last year's average cost base. Pays for the waiver of non solicitation, the people transition and sixty business days of hypercare.

Where a monthly invoice goes

Share of a full strength monthly invoice. Salaries and overheads are passed through at actuals; the management fee is the only margin.

Three years for a 40 person team

Indicative annual totals in thousands of dollars at the upper salary band, including the 20% management fee and 8% annual escalation. Setup and transfer fees are separate.

Included in the cost base

Salaries benchmarked quarterly against SLASSCOM surveys, with every adjustment approved by you
Statutory employer contributions, devices, licences and office costs at actual cost with zero mark up
Certifications and training funded inside the overhead and reported quarterly
An 8% annual escalation for Sri Lanka salary inflation, written in rather than negotiated later
Year three billing falls as people transfer, since partial transfers are expected from month 24

Indicative, in dollars at 310 rupees, from a 40 person engagement. Your figure depends on the role matrix agreed in the first thirty days.

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