GBCORP BLOG · IT SERVICES
Build a SaaS Platform? GBCORP's Answer
Can GBCORP build a SaaS platform? Yes. The harder question is what to build first. Five decisions made before any code decide whether a SaaS platform earns or only costs.
GBCORP builds SaaS platforms for founders and for established businesses turning their know-how into software: subscription products with customer accounts, plans and billing, an admin console, and the feature that customers actually pay for. It builds them on an engine where sign-in, roles, payments, notifications and consoles already exist, so the budget goes into the product itself. Before any build, GBCORP works through five decisions with the client, because they shape everything that follows.
Five decisions before building
| Decision | What it means | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|
| Who pays, and how | Monthly or annual, per user or per account, free trial or not | Sets the billing design and the first revenue date |
| Tenancy | One shared platform for all customers, with each customer’s data kept apart | Decided on day one; changing later is costly |
| Buy or build | Sign-in, payments, email, hosting: buy or reuse; the core feature: build | Keeps the budget on what is different |
| The smallest paid product | The one job a customer will pay for in the first month | Defines the first release |
| Running cost per customer | Hosting, email, AI and support per account | Decides whether the price can work |
The smallest product someone will pay for
Most SaaS founders plan too much for the first release. The test is simple: what one job would a customer pay for this month, even if nothing else existed yet? That job, with sign-up, billing and a console around it, is the first release. Everything else waits for evidence from paying customers, which is cheaper and more reliable than a roadmap written in advance.
Tenancy and data from the start
Every customer account is a tenant: its users, data and settings tied to it and checked on every request. Building this in from the first release costs little; retrofitting it after a hundred customers costs a great deal and risks a data leak. GBCORP’s engine is multi-tenant by design, so this decision is already made well.
Checklist before building a SaaS platform
- Name ten potential customers and the one job each would pay for.
- Choose the pricing model and a first price.
- List what you will buy or reuse, and what you must build.
- Estimate running cost per customer at ten, a hundred and a thousand accounts.
- Open the payment-gateway, cloud and domain accounts in your company’s name.
- Decide the figure that shows the product works: paying accounts after ninety days.
The numbers to expect
Scoping in one week, priced on its own, ending with the five decisions in writing and a fixed quotation. A first release with sign-up, billing, console and the core feature in eight to twelve weeks. Later releases at fixed prices. Customised or more complex functionality is quoted separately before any work starts.
A worked example
Consider a consultant who has spent ten years helping property managers schedule inspections with spreadsheets. She wants to sell that method as software. The scoping week settles the five decisions: monthly per-account pricing with a trial, one shared multi-tenant platform, sign-in and payments reused from the engine, a first release that does only inspection scheduling with reminders and a report, and a running cost per account well below the planned price. The first release goes to ten managers she already knows. Their use decides the second release, which turns out to be photo reports rather than the calendar sync she had expected.
What to buy, what to build
Sign-in, password resets, payments, invoices, email delivery, hosting and backups are solved problems. Building them again adds months and risk. A SaaS founder’s budget belongs in the part customers pay for: the workflow, the calculation, the report or the insight no one else offers. GBCORP’s engine supplies the solved parts, and the scoping week lists exactly which parts are reused and which are new.
Pricing that the costs support
A SaaS price has to cover running costs per account, support time and the share of development the founder wants to recover, with margin left. GBCORP estimates the running cost per account at ten, a hundred and a thousand customers in the scoping week. A price that only works at a thousand customers is a risk the founder should see before building, not after launch.
The first ten customers
A SaaS platform learns most from its first ten paying customers. Choose them from people you know, of the type you mean to serve, and watch how they use the product for a month. Their behaviour, not the founder’s plan, should decide the second release.
Trials and onboarding
A trial that ends in an empty account converts poorly. Sample data, a setup checklist and a short welcome sequence of messages help a new customer reach the moment the product proves itself, usually within the first session.
Security from the first release
Customer data separated per account, roles within each account, encrypted connections, backups and an audit trail of changes are built in from the start. Business customers ask about them before they buy, and they cannot be added cheaply later.
Ownership terms
Code in a repository the founder controls, documented with every release. Cloud project, domain and payment accounts in the founder’s company name. Data exportable at any time. No share of revenue, and no credentials retained after a hand-over unless a support contract requires them.
Questions we hear first
Can we start with a white label platform instead?
Often, yes. If your product is close to ordering, booking, loyalty or portals, a configured platform can test the market before custom work.
Who owns the platform?
You do: code in your repository, cloud, data, domain and payment accounts in your name.
Do we need a technical co-founder?
Not to launch. Many clients add their own engineers later, and the documentation is written for that day.
How do customers pay?
Through your own payment gateway, with plans, trials and invoices handled by the platform.
Where to start
The GBCORP Custom App Development product is the priced starting point; the GBCORP custom app development hub sets out the method. For what GBCORP builds for SaaS founders, read custom SaaS development for founders.
GBCORP operates across 17 countries on 4 continents through six pillars: AI & IT, Innovation, Sustainability, Infrastructure, Premium Business, and EV's & Solutions.
