Android experience since 2009 · EU-based
Your Android app still works. The platform underneath it moved on.
We take over Android apps that were built years ago and nobody maintains any more — upgrade them to what Google now requires, make them build again, fix what broke, and keep them alive. Our engineers have been shipping Android apps since version 1.6.
One working day to a human reply, with a date for your written triage. Not a sales call.
Our engineers have been building Android apps since Android 1.6.
Our engineers have shipped Android since the platform was a year old. Every deprecation your app tripped over, we lived through when it was still called a new feature.
Eclipse and Ant, Gradle, JCenter, support-library to AndroidX, Java to Kotlin, scoped storage, background limits. We know which of them your app is stuck behind.
A registered Bulgarian company, Elisoft EOOD, VAT BG206008244 — check it in VIES before you write to us. EU invoice, intra-EU reverse charge, GDPR under the same rules you already work to.
This is usually how it starts
Play Console is warning you about the target API level
From 2026-08-31, an app that is not updated must target Android 15 (API 35) to stay visible, and any app that ships an update must target Android 16 (API 36). Apps that miss it are not deleted — they stop appearing for new users on devices running a newer Android version than the app targets.
The developer who built it is gone
No one left in the company knows how to build the project, the signing key is in someone’s old laptop, or the agency that shipped it no longer answers.
The build no longer builds
Old Gradle, an abandoned plugin, a dependency pulled from JCenter, an SDK that stopped shipping. It compiled in 2019 and nothing since.
It crashes on new phones
Scoped storage, background limits, notification permission, exact alarms, foreground service types — every Android release retires something your app still relies on.
What we do
One job, in several shapes: an old Android app that has to keep working.
Compliance rescue
Get the app to the required target API and back into the Play Store, with the behaviour changes of every skipped Android version handled one by one.
Build revival
Resurrect a dead toolchain: Gradle and AGP upgrades, dead repositories, replaced dependencies, a reproducible build on current hardware and CI.
Takeover & handover
We adopt an app nobody owns: Play Console ownership, signing keys traced, the code documented, a runbook you can hand to anyone later. If the app was never on Play App Signing and the key is truly lost, no one can update that listing — we will tell you that on day one rather than bill you to find out.
Bugfixing & support
A named person for crashes, ANRs, store rejections and user complaints — without a full-time Android hire on payroll.
Keeping it alive
A yearly cycle that keeps you ahead of the next deadline instead of firefighting it: SDK bumps, policy reviews, release when it is calm.
Honest exit advice
Sometimes the right answer is a rewrite, or shutting the app down properly. We tell you that before you pay for maintenance you should not buy.
How it works
Free triage
Send a Play Store link or the repository. Within one working day we reply saying whether we can help — and give you the date your written triage will land. What breaks, what the store requires, what it would take.
Fixed-price rescue
A quoted piece of work with a defined outcome — usually "builds again, targets Android 16 (API 36), submitted to review". You approve the price before we start. Review is Google's call, not ours, so we do not promise their verdict — we do promise to work the rejections until it is through.
Optional care plan
If you want it to stay fixed, a monthly retainer covers updates, deadlines and support. No lock-in — everything stays in your repository and your Play account.
What we have actually kept alive
Not launches. Apps that had to keep working for years after everyone had moved on.
A conservation field app, still shipping since 2018
52 consecutive releases without a gap, the latest in June 2026. It sits on compileSdk 36 today — the level Google now requires of any app that ships an update. Eight years of keeping one Android app current, in public, on GitHub.
Two consumer apps carried through a platform generation
A second-phone-number app and a video-chat app, 2018 to 2022. AndroidX migration work, support for Android 4 finally dropped, an abandoned image library swapped out. Ordinary, unglamorous upkeep on someone else’s codebase.
A field-sales app for a telecom
Five years of maintenance on a hybrid app, 2021 to 2026 — because not every app that needs keeping alive is native, and pretending otherwise helps nobody.
450 Android apps before any of that
Built and shipped in the Eclipse-and-Ant era, through Gradle, through the support library, through Java. Most of them are the kind of app that now needs rescuing.
What "keeping it alive" looked like, with dates
- 2019–2026targetSdk raised six times
On the same app, across seven years: 2019, 2021, 2022, 2023, and twice in 2026. This is the exact work the current deadline demands, done repeatedly, on schedule.
- 2020Support library to AndroidX
The migration that breaks a build in a hundred small places, on a codebase already six years old at the time.
- 2020Kotlin turned on, Java kept working
Kotlin added to a Java codebase that still ships Java today. Migrations that must not stop the releases are done gradually, not in a big bang.
- 2022Off a homegrown storage layer onto Room
Old CSV persistence retired in favour of Room and coroutines, without losing field data.
- 2024A 2014 dependency finally retired
AndroidAnnotations, added to the project a decade earlier, removed once it had outlived the platform. Legacy code usually outlives whoever wrote it.
- 2026Gradle and AGP dragged forward
Toolchain, AGP upgrade, deprecated flags removed, dependencies refreshed — the work that decides whether an old project builds at all.
- 2026Plaintext preferences encrypted
Android Keystore AES-256-GCM over data that had been sitting in shared preferences, plus R8 minification stripping logs from release builds.
This is the engineers' record, built up over roughly fifteen years of Android — most of it earned before Elisoft EOOD existed. We would rather say that than round it up.
What it costs
A price before the work, not after. Every rescue is quoted as a fixed sum against a written outcome — you approve it, then we start. No hourly meter, no surprise invoice.
Triage
What breaks, which API floor applies to you, and whether a rescue or a rewrite is the honest answer. Yours to keep.
Compliance rescue
Back into the Play Store: targeting Android 16 (API 36), every behaviour change between your version and now handled, submitted to review.
Build revival
A dead toolchain brought back: Gradle and AGP, dead repositories, replaced dependencies, a build that runs on current hardware and in CI.
Care plan
It stays fixed: SDK bumps ahead of each yearly deadline, policy reviews, crashes and store rejections handled, releases when it is calm.
Prices exclude VAT. EU business customers are invoiced under the intra-EU reverse charge. What your app actually needs is settled by the triage, before any number is agreed.
Who we help
Companies with one app and no Android team
The app is part of how you serve customers. It was built once, by someone who has since left. You need it to keep working, not a department.
Agencies with ageing client apps
You shipped it years ago and the client still calls. We work as your back office under your name, or take the client over with your blessing.
Owners of apps that still earn
The app makes money and needs almost nothing — until a deadline threatens to switch off the installs. We keep the revenue running.
Straight answers
What actually happens if we miss the deadline?
Your app is not removed and your existing users keep it. But it stops being discoverable or installable for new users on devices running an Android version newer than the one your app targets. In practice, new installs stop coming in. You can request a one-time extension to 2026-11-01 in Play Console — do that first, it is free and it takes minutes. It buys time; it does not fix anything, and the work still has to happen inside that window. (Source: Google Play policy page, read on 2026-08-26.)
We have no source code. Only the APK.
Tell us early. Sometimes the code is recoverable from an old machine, a backup, or the original agency. If it truly is gone, we will say so plainly and price a rebuild instead of pretending a patch is possible.
Who owns the code and the accounts?
You do, throughout. We work in your repository and your Play Console. If we stop working together, nothing has to move.
Do you take on apps you did not build?
That is the entire business. Every app we work on was written by someone else, usually years ago.
Is a rewrite not cheaper in the end?
Sometimes, yes. A rescue is worth it when the app still does its job and only the platform moved. A rewrite is worth it when the product itself needs to change. The triage tells you which one you are looking at.
There are people online who will do this for 30 euros. Why not use them?
For an app that still builds and is one version behind, that may genuinely be enough — use them, and we mean that. The gap shows up on an app that has not been built since 2019: a dead toolchain, six years of behaviour changes, dependencies that no longer exist, and a store listing you cannot afford to lose. That is days of work by someone who has seen it before, not a thirty-euro task. Our triage tells you which of the two you have, before you spend anything.
Where are you based?
Bulgaria, in the EU. We work with clients across the EU, contract and invoice inside the EU, and are used to remote handover of legacy projects.
Send us the app. We will tell you where it stands.
A Play Store link, a repository, or a build. Within one working day we reply — yes or no, and the date your written triage will land. It covers what breaks, what Google now requires, and what it would take. Please do not email an APK: Gmail and most corporate mail servers block them, even zipped. Send a link and we will tell you where to upload if we need the file.