FAQ
Questions we actually get asked
We run remote missions with international teams. AI as an engineering job, not a slide. Useful answers before a first call.
Do you work with international teams?
- Yes. Day-to-day work is remote, in French or English. Travel depends on the project and country. HQ is in Tunisia; your applications stay hosted where you decide, in the EU when your compliance or sovereignty policy requires it.
What does IT Empower Solutions do?
- We help CIOs, mid-market firms and business leads put a project back into production, get AI into daily work (often with an engineer on the floor), install a tool that fits, and keep it running: tests, maintenance, SRE. Entry point is a fixed-price IT assessment.
What is the difference between the IT assessment and the free website review?
- The IT assessment is a fixed-price engagement for blocked software, an IT landscape or an AI PoC: mapping, risks, a 90-day plan and run cost. The free website review is an initial look at a marketing or e-commerce website: conversion, mobile and visible security signals. They are separate offers.
What is an FDE?
- Forward Deployed Engineer: someone who stays with the business long enough for the tool to get used. Not a report. Not staff by the volume. Bounded mission, fee announced, then handover or maintenance.
How does a mission start?
- Usually with a fixed-price assessment. You get a map, risks, a 90-day plan, and a run cost. Only then do we start a recovery, an FDE mission, a custom tool, or maintenance — if the assessment says it is worth it.
What does the assessment cost?
- Most assessments stay under €2,000. The fee is stated after a first exchange, before we start. If the scope covers several applications or difficult access, it may sit outside that range. We say so immediately.
How long does the assessment take?
- Not the same for every project. A single tool with clean access is not a multi-app landscape. After a first exchange we state a duration and a fee: sometimes a week, often around ten working days, longer if the perimeter is wide or access is slow.
Why do AI projects stall?
- Because people start with the model, not the work. No narrow use case, no clean data, no security, no run budget, no hosting decision: the PoC stays a PoC. An FDE is often how you cross that gap — stay with the team until real use.
Do you also set up automated tests?
- Yes. Often right after a recovery: with no safety net, nobody dares to ship. We automate what actually breaks (business paths, APIs), hook it to CI, and write down what is not covered. Not 4,000 cases for a report.
How is this different from a large IT services firm?
- We stay a small delivery team. No sales pyramid, no mass staffing. You talk to the people who scope and who ship. The fee is readable. So is the perimeter.
Can you take over a project that already started?
- Yes. That is a large part of the work. We freeze the scope, map the code and production, restore a test path, then start shipping again. A rewrite is not the default move.
What if the documentation is missing?
- We start from the real system: repositories, environments, logs, databases and journeys people actually use. Missing documentation slows the assessment but does not prevent recovery. New documentation then becomes part of the deliverable.
What if the current supplier does not cooperate?
- We first inventory what you already control: accounts, code, DNS, cloud, backups, licences and contracts. We do not bypass access controls. The assessment identifies what is missing and the legal and technical path for recovering it.
Can you recover a legacy application?
- Yes, after reviewing versions, security, dependencies and testability. Older software does not automatically require a rewrite. We compare the risk and cost of stabilisation, gradual modernisation and replacement.
Can you work on our current cloud?
- Yes, when access can be limited and logged. We adapt to your hosting and operations when the architecture remains tenable. A cloud move is recommended only when it addresses an observed risk or requirement.
Where are applications hosted?
- Where you decide. If your compliance or sovereignty policy requires it, we prefer the EU. Otherwise we follow your current operations. That choice is part of scoping, not a surprise at the end.
Do you work in French?
- Yes, and in English. French is not limited to one country. We follow the language of your teams.
Do you come on site?
- Yes, when the work needs it: scoping workshops, UAT, go-live. Day-to-day is often remote, so we do not bill travel for nothing.
How do you handle GDPR if HQ is in Tunisia?
- For processing subject to GDPR, hosting, remote access, logs and subprocessors are defined with the client at scoping. Applications can stay in the EU; any access from Tunisia must be covered by the contractual mechanism and security measures appropriate to the engagement.
Will you sign an NDA?
- Yes, as soon as a file is sensitive. We sign before opening access. Cases on this site stay anonymous: we do not name clients. A logo is published only if the organisation agrees, without the case write-up. We do not invent metrics (lead time, run cost, adoption).