Software development for companies in Düsseldorf – custom, maintainable and with AI

Altora Technologies UG is based in Ratingen, just a few kilometres from Düsseldorf city centre and the airport. For companies from Düsseldorf, the district of Mettmann and the entire Rhineland, we are a partner who is easy to reach both for personal meetings and for digital collaboration.

Together, our team has more than 35 years of experience in software development. This experience ranges from classic business applications to modern cloud platforms and AI-supported automation. We know how projects run, where they typically fail and how to plan them realistically.

An honest assessment from the start is important to us. Not every project needs custom development. If an existing standard solution covers your requirements well, we tell you openly in the initial consultation instead of selling an unnecessarily large project.

Our focus is on web-based applications that run in the browser and can be used on PC, tablet and smartphone. These include internal administration and planning tools, customer portals with login, booking and reservation systems, reports and dashboards, as well as extensions to existing systems.

Often the goal is to digitise processes that still take place in Excel spreadsheets, email inboxes or on paper today. A custom application bundles this information in one place, ensures consistent data and relieves your team of recurring routine work.

Another focus is platforms where the software itself is the business model, such as marketplaces, booking portals or SaaS products with several customers. Scalability, security and a clean architecture count from the very beginning here.

What sets us apart from many development service providers: we run productive online platforms ourselves. We developed Friend-Park and a booking platform for Düsseldorf Airport entirely ourselves and are responsible for them in live operation – including booking logic, price calculation, online payment and customer communication.

As a result, we know the topics that only become visible in everyday operation: load peaks during the holiday season, errors in interfaces to payment providers, requirements for data protection and logging, or the question of how to deploy changes without disrupting ongoing operations.

This experience flows into every customer project. We do not only plan what a feature should look like, but also how it will be monitored, maintained and developed further once the software is in use.

Our technical basis is Microsoft .NET and ASP.NET Core with C#, as well as Microsoft SQL Server and Entity Framework for data storage. This platform is developed by Microsoft over the long term, is already established in many companies and is suitable for small applications as well as for extensive business software.

For hosting and scaling we use Microsoft Azure where it makes sense. Existing systems are connected via REST APIs and webhooks, for example to payment providers, communication channels such as the WhatsApp Business API or your existing specialist applications.

When choosing technology, our rule is: proven, well-documented tools instead of short-lived trends. Software we build should also be understandable and maintainable by other developers.

We do not integrate artificial intelligence for its own sake, but where it measurably saves time or enables better decisions. Typical examples are evaluating and classifying documents, automatic reply suggestions in customer communication or analysing large amounts of data.

An example from our own practice is our AI-supported SEO tool, which evaluates data from Google Search Console and a website crawl and derives prioritised recommendations from it. The AI formulates suggestions, but the rules and decisions remain traceable and under human control.

We make sure AI features are integrated securely: external content is treated as untrusted input, results are validated, and sensitive data is only processed where this is justifiable under data protection law.

Every project starts with a free, non-binding initial consultation – in person in Ratingen or Düsseldorf or by video, as you prefer. We clarify which problem is to be solved, which systems are already in use and what time frame is realistic.

We then prepare an offer, based on a specification for larger projects. Depending on the project, billing is either a fixed price for clearly defined tasks or time and materials for ongoing development. During development you regularly receive usable interim versions instead of a black box.

After testing and acceptance, we support the introduction in your company. We remain at your side afterwards too: with maintenance, security updates, bug fixing and the continuous further development of your software.

We work with companies of different sizes: with start-ups that want to implement a clear product idea, with medium-sized businesses that want to modernise an established system landscape, and with businesses that finally want to map a specific process digitally.

What matters is not the industry or company size, but a clearly defined task and the willingness to contribute to the project – for example with expertise, test data and timely feedback. The better we understand your processes, the better the software will fit.

If you also want to be found more easily online, we can combine software development and search engine optimisation. SEO requirements such as clean URLs, structured data and fast loading times are then planned in from the start.

Software incurs most of its costs not during development but during later operation. That is why we focus on a clear architecture, understandable code and automated tests. This way, changes can still be implemented with reasonable effort years later.

We do not treat security as an afterthought. Access rights, encrypted connections, secure storage of credentials and traceable logging are part of every project. Secrets such as API keys do not end up in the source code but in a protected configuration.

For delivery we use automated build and deployment processes where appropriate. This reduces errors during updates and ensures that new versions go live in a controlled and reproducible way.

Many projects start with an Excel file that has grown over time, is edited by several people at once, regularly causes version conflicts and whose formulas only one colleague still really understands. A web application replaces such files with a central database, clear input forms and defined access rights.

A second common scenario is customer portals. Instead of sending documents, status updates and invoices by email, customers log in to a protected area and find all information about their orders there. This reduces queries and makes a professional impression.

Thirdly, we modernise existing applications that have become technically outdated. Instead of rewriting everything at once, we replace individual areas step by step. This keeps operations stable and significantly reduces the risk of a large, lengthy migration.