Celebrating initiative: The story behind the Vega IT+ app

Curiosity in action

Our goal was simple: we wanted to give colleagues a way to enjoy their favorite places and make everyday purchases more accessible. That’s why we decided to launch the Privilege Program and introduce the Privilege Card.

Back in 2022, the Privilege Card was launched, a physical card offering discounts at cafés, restaurants, entertainment venues, services, and travel options in Novi Sad, Belgrade, Niš, and Zrenjanin.

While the card was useful and popular, colleagues often found it inconvenient to carry, and all the vendor information was stored in a single Excel file, which made it difficult to browse, search, or keep track of offers.

“The idea for Vega IT+ started in a simple but curious way,” says Vojin. “While learning Flutter, my team and I were preparing for a potential project with a similar concept. At the same time, we realized that we could make navigating discounts a lot more convenient, which would be useful for our colleagues.”

Looking for a better way to make discounts easily accessible, our colleagues suggested a digital version. Their initiative led to the creation of Vega IT+, transforming a simple idea into a practical, everyday tool that benefits everyone at Vega IT.

From idea to reality: Building Vega IT+

The journey to create Vega IT+ began as a small, self-initiated project. Vojin and Željko spent a few months quietly developing a prototype before presenting it to the company. They wanted to explore the concept and see if it could make employee discounts easier to use, all without having received the official “green light”.

Building the app came with its challenges. “The main challenge was to build the application without backend support, while directly handling and reading multiple Excel files, parsing them, and storing all that data on the user’s device, and still making everything run smoothly without putting too much load on the device,” explains Zeljko.

Once the prototype was ready, the team shared it internally. The marketing team quickly saw the potential and provided feedback on design improvements and additional features, helping polish the app into a tool that was not only functional but also user-friendly. The response was overwhelmingly positive, demonstrating how a self-driven initiative can create a lasting impact for the entire company.

After months of hard work and collaboration, Vega IT+ is now a fully functional internal app that makes exploring employee discounts easier than ever. The app allows colleagues to:

• Browse around 150 vendors offering discounts of 10%, 15%, or 20%.
• Search vendors by city or category, making it easy to find exactly what they’re looking for.
• View the location of each vendor on a map, so they can plan visits efficiently.
• Save their favourite vendors for quick access.

With an intuitive interface and real-time updates, Vega IT+ has transformed a once cumbersome process into an everyday tool that colleagues rely on to enjoy perks and savings across multiple cities.

The story doesn’t end here. Zeljko shares: “Future plans for the application include adding new functionalities, implementing notifications and alerts for new discounts, and potentially integrating the Vega IT+ app with the rest of the Vega IT system, timesheets, fuel receipts, FitLife registrations, and more.”

The power of initiative

The story of Vega IT+ is a reminder that thinking creatively, sharing ideas, and looking for opportunities to improve can make a real difference. Every suggestion, no matter how small it may seem at first, has the potential to spark change, inspire others, and create tools that make everyone’s workday better.

At Vega IT, we celebrate curiosity, initiative, and collaboration, and we can’t wait to see what ideas our colleagues will bring to life next.