Agency Comparison
craftworks vs Waterglass
Two top-rated AI Development agencies in Vienna.
Comparison updated · Newest review
Side by side
Published data on both agencies. Where one side measurably differs, the dot marks it: the higher score, the lower published rate, the larger team, the more recent review. Which of those is an advantage depends on your brief.
| Attribute | craftworks | Waterglass |
|---|---|---|
| Editorial score | Higher score: 61.8/100 | 43.3/100 |
| Hourly rate | Contact for rates | Contact for rates |
| Team size | 10-49 | 10-49 |
| Location | Vienna, Austria | Vienna, Austria |
| Founded | 2014 | 2024 |
| Last reviewed | More recent review: Sep 7, 2026 | Aug 4, 2026 |
What we said about each
Our take on craftworks
Delivery evidence sits in the navio product line—published success stories describe visual-inspection systems running on production lines with measured outcomes, and navio itself is an MLOps platform with model retraining, blue/green deployment, out-of-distribution detection and edge rollout to Azure IoT and TTTech Nerve. Names and numbers sit on different pages: VERBUND, Wien Energie, voestalpine and ZKW Group are quoted by name and role in testimonials, while the recent success stories…
Reviewed Sep 7, 2026
Read the full assessment →Our take on Waterglass
Four named clients are published—InStaff, notus, HHLA Next and Heylog—but each is a single line rather than a case study, and the "read case study" links did not resolve at review. The stronger evidence is the venture side, which is verifiable independently: Notehouse, a HIPAA-compliant case-management product used by 250+ organizations and acquired in 2025, and Pxl, a QR and microsite builder with 100 million interactions now being rebuilt as an agentic business. The site is unusually straight…
Reviewed Aug 4, 2026
Read the full assessment →Best for
Where each agency measurably leads on the published data — team capacity, declared specializations, editorial scoring, and rates where both publish them. Use these to match an agency to your project priorities.
Choose craftworks if you need
- disclosed specialization in Manufacturing / Healthcare
- a higher overall editorial score
Choose Waterglass if you need
- broader service offering — also covers AI Agents and AI Automation
- an overall editorial score of 43.3/100
Strengths and watch-outs
Both upsides and risks, straight from our editorial assessments.
craftworks
Strengths
- Published outcomes carry numbers: 94% accuracy classifying bearings with 82% precision on defect type, 72% faster package inspection, 60% less time on manual toolkit checks
- navio covers the operational side most AI suppliers leave out—retraining, shadow deployments, data-drift and out-of-distribution monitoring, with deployment to edge hardware
- The VERBUND engagement is documented as a multi-year rollout, extended to the Drau and Malta power plant groups, linking their AKS measurement database to their GAMS optimization engine
Watch-outs
- The success stories with the strongest numbers are anonymized—ask which named client each deployment belongs to and for a reference you can speak to
- No rates published; anchor against the European range on our rate index and clarify whether navio is licensed separately from the delivery work
- Generative AI is listed as a service but no success story documents a generative deployment—ask for one with an outcome if that is your project
Waterglass
Strengths
- Operates what it builds—monitoring, model changes and new requirements are named as an ongoing service, not a handover
- European hosting with model residency in Germany or the EU on request, documented per data flow
- Two acquired products of its own, so the AI-build claim is testable outside client references
Watch-outs
- Client work is published as one-line summaries with no reachable case studies—ask for a reference you can speak to
- The company is recently formed and publishes no headcount; ask who would staff the build
- Vienna-based and open about it: on-site days in Germany mean travel, remote for the rest
Service coverage
Where the two overlap, and where each covers ground the other does not.
Only craftworks
None.
Only Waterglass
Industry coverage
Where the two overlap, and where each covers ground the other does not.
Frequently asked questions
- Which scores higher overall, craftworks or Waterglass?
- craftworks scores 61.8/100, 18.5 points higher than Waterglass at 43.3/100. Both portfolio quality and business credibility feed into the score — see our methodology for the full breakdown.
- When should I consider both craftworks and Waterglass?
- Consider running parallel discovery briefs with craftworks and Waterglass if your project spans multiple workstreams, you want competitive proposals to compare scope and approach, or you're undecided between the specialization angles each brings (see the Best for cards above). Most engagements ultimately go with one — but the parallel-brief phase is a low-cost way to validate fit.
Read the full reviews
A side-by-side is a starting point. The full assessments carry the portfolio analysis, documented engagements, and the evidence behind every strength and watch-out above.