Iceland · Agentic software engineering

Software Development for Iceland: Six Shared Hours a Day

Iceland stays on GMT all year and Ankara stays on UTC+3, so a team there working with engineers in Türkiye shares six office hours every day, in January and in July alike. The harder questions sit elsewhere: how your users' personal data may be handled from a country outside the EEA, how the contract is set up across borders, and whether outsourced work can still count toward an R&D tax credit.

Curiosive is a software studio in Ankara, Türkiye. We build products end to end or join an existing team on monthly engagement, with AI coding agents doing the volume of implementation and a senior engineer reviewing every diff before it merges. Repository, database and hosting accounts are opened in your name or connected to accounts you already hold, so the code is yours from the first commit.

Start a partnership From $2,000 per month

24: published portfolio projects
5+: years building for production
12: countries the work runs in
100%: of code read by a senior engineer
1 day: to hear back, from the engineer

Time zones: how Ankara and Iceland working days overlap

Iceland is on UTC+0 (GMT) in winter and in summer, and Ankara is on UTC+3 all year, so Ankara is always three hours ahead and the gap never shifts with the seasons. When our day starts at 09:00 in Ankara it is 06:00 for you. When your day starts at 09:00, it is 12:00 in Ankara, and our day ends at 18:00 Ankara time, which is 15:00 your time. That leaves six shared hours, 09:00 to 15:00 on your clock. In practice three hours of work are done before your morning starts, so a written handoff with what shipped, what is blocked and what needs a decision is waiting at 09:00. Reviews and decisions that need both sides belong inside the shared window. Work runs on Türkiye business hours, so we do not offer evening cover, and the weekly call fits easily inside the overlap.

The GDPR has applied in Iceland since the EEA Joint Committee decision entered into force on 20 July 2018, and is given effect through Act No. 90/2018, with Persónuvernd as the supervisory authority. Its transfer rules come with it. As of 2 October 2026, Türkiye is not on the European Commission's list of adequacy decisions, so a studio in Türkiye working on personal data needs another Chapter V tool, such as the Standard Contractual Clauses in Implementing Decision (EU) 2021/914, with the controller to processor module where we act as your processor. Under Clause 14, both sides warrant they have no reason to believe the destination country's laws and practices prevent compliance. EDPB Guidelines 05/2021 add that remote access is a transfer when the transfer criteria are met, even if data is only displayed on a screen for support. It pays to decide early which tasks need production access at all.

Contracting from Iceland with a studio in Türkiye

Iceland is not an EU member. It is one of the three EEA EFTA States, with Liechtenstein and Norway, under the EEA Agreement in force since 1 January 1994, which brings EU internal-market rules on services into the country but excludes the customs union and monetary union. For you, working with us is a cross-border services contract with a studio outside the EEA. There is no long contract to begin and no lock-in: scope and budget are agreed in writing after a discovery call, and our published prices are starting points in US dollars. Data processing terms that name the transfer tool belong alongside that agreement. Decisions are recorded in writing, a releasable increment ships every week and there is one short weekly call, which suits a team that prefers written decisions to meetings.

Iceland's R&D tax credit and buying engineering from abroad

Under Article 10 of Act No. 152/2009, companies with Rannís-certified R&D projects can deduct 35% of eligible costs from assessed income tax if they are small or medium-sized, or 25% if large, up to a cost ceiling of ISK 1,100,000,000 per operating year. Under Article 11, any deduction above the income tax assessed is paid out, which matters to a company not yet making a profit. Purchased R&D services count only if bought from unrelated companies, universities or institutions in the EEA or in states with which Iceland has a double taxation or information-exchange agreement, and they are capped at 20% of the ceiling. Whether work bought from a studio in Türkiye qualifies depends on that test, so it is worth confirming with your accountant before you plan a budget around it.

How agentic software engineering works on our monthly engagement

An engineer writes a scoped task with acceptance criteria and the boundaries the agent must not cross. A coding agent such as Claude Code or Cursor reads the existing code, plans, implements, writes tests and runs the type checker, linter and test suite before proposing a change. A senior engineer reviews every diff, agents never merge their own work, and continuous integration re-runs the checks. Data models, authentication, permissions, payment paths and anything touching personal data stay with engineers. This makes volume cheaper. It does not make review optional. For scale, our shipped work includes the Zing Coach (zing.coach) rebuild for a US client with 1M+ users, the RateItAll (rateitall.com) revival with 12M+ reviews, and the Detailed SEO Extension for a UK client, used by 600,000 SEOs and maintained through its acquisition by Ahrefs.

Proof

Published project examples

design.computer

Release Coach AI

Inspire Film

Reveal Software

Poppin

Zing Coach

AI-accelerated development

from$2,000

per month

Senior engineers building your product with AI coding agents: web, mobile, SaaS or browser extension, reviewed before anything ships.

Web, mobile, SaaS and browser extensions
AI-assisted delivery under senior engineer review
Scope and capacity agreed in writing, renews monthly

AI-accelerated development, billed monthly. We confirm scope, capacity and start date in writing before checkout.

Questions

The things people ask before starting.

How many working hours overlap between Iceland and Türkiye?

Six hours, every day of the year. Iceland is on GMT and Ankara on UTC+3, and neither shifts with the seasons, so the overlap runs from 09:00 to 15:00 on your clock, which is 12:00 to 18:00 in Ankara. Our day starts at 06:00 your time.

Is Türkiye adequate under the GDPR for transfers of data from Iceland?

No. As of 2 October 2026, Türkiye is not on the European Commission's adequacy list, while the GDPR applies in Iceland through the EEA Agreement. Giving a studio in Türkiye access to personal data, which can include remote access that only displays it on a screen, needs a Chapter V tool such as Standard Contractual Clauses.

Can outsourced software development count toward Iceland's R&D tax credit?

Only within limits. Purchased R&D services qualify if bought from unrelated providers in the EEA or in states with which the country has a double taxation or information-exchange agreement, and they are capped at 20% of the ISK 1,100,000,000 cost ceiling. The project itself must be certified by Rannís.

How does a software development monthly engagement with Curiosive work?

Work runs as AI-accelerated development, starting from $2,000 per month, with scope agreed in writing. There is no long contract to begin. You get async written decisions, a releasable increment every week and one short weekly call, with the code staying in your accounts throughout.

Solutions

Locations

What happens after you write to us.

01
You describe the product
One paragraph on what you are building, roughly when you need it, and who it is for. No brief, no form with fifteen fields.
02
You get a reply within a day
From the engineer who would do the work, not a sales team. If we are not the right fit we say so, and where possible we point you somewhere better.
03
You get a scoped plan
Scope, price and timeline in writing before anything is committed. You decide with the numbers in front of you.

No long contract to begin, no lock-in to our tooling, and the code is yours from the first commit.

Start a conversation

Contact

Looking for an engineering partner for the long haul?

A short note about the product, the timeline and who it is for is enough to start. You will hear back from the engineer who would do the work, not a sales team.

hello@curiosive.com See what we have shipped

Ankara / Türkiye · Working across European and US time zones

Software Development for Iceland: Six Shared Hours a Day

Time zones: how Ankara and Iceland working days overlap

Contracting from Iceland with a studio in Türkiye

Iceland's R&D tax credit and buying engineering from abroad

How agentic software engineering works on our monthly engagement