In addition to letting users familiarize themselves with all of Moscow's creative spaces, the platform also helps them select the right studio, space, or loft based on their needs. The key feature of the service is the export system: residents do not need to manually transmit bookings into their CRM system – instead, the aggregator itself will export and import data into any popular calendar.
“When developing our platform, we wanted to create a flexible, smart, and user-friendly search system that would offer a great experience to all of our users, from guest users to administrators. We’ve already worked out concepts for a PWA and a VK Mini App, which will go into production in the future,” notes Daniil Merenkov, the head of research and technological development at ITMO University and a co-author of the project.
Daniil Merenkov. Photo courtesy of the subject
The service (in Russian) is available for everyone, though some features are exclusive to logged-in users. The administrators carefully check all the venues and update the information on the website. The coming update will include a smart search feature that converts text into search criteria and filters. That is, a user will be able to enter a sentence or a phrase with no additional tags (e.g., “grab a coffee and take some pictures”) and see all the locations that match their request.
“There were 21 tasks at the hackathon, but the first one from the Moscow Agency of Innovations seemed most exciting. We’ve always wanted to build an aggregator because such technologies improve people’s lives and they are easy to improve further. Even during our pitch, the jury already lauded our work and team, contacting us the very next day to approve the pilot project,” shared Daniil Merenkov.
