The Low Code, No Code Landscape in 2020 Series
An Investment Thesis: Why you should pay attention to low code app development
Oh, hello world! Welcome to a deep dive into my current technical obsession: Low Code and No Code (LCNC) tools. My name is Monica Mishra and I’ve been an engineer my whole career, so I’ve been thinking about how and why we develop code the way we do for a while. It’s almost paradoxical to me that the better technology becomes, the more cluttered and complicated software development becomes.
As a result, today there are way fewer people who can build good software than those who want to and that creates a compelling entrepreneurial gap. LCNC tools fill that gap in a way that leads to better code, broader access to software creation, and unlocks the potential in technical and non-technical creators alike.
I spent some of the last year developing on the Salesforce platform, a big guy in the LCNC space, spent the past two months researching LCNC tools, and crucially, talked to lots of experts + founders of companies in the space. The result is this evolving 3-part series:
Part 1: What is the LCNC space and why is it interesting now?
Part 2: Technical definitions and segmentations of LCNC
Part 3: (La grande finale, if you will) My LCNC investment thesis and the antithesis!
Market maps are in both the 2nd and the 3rd sections, if you’re into that kind of thing.
Founders, if I’ve misplaced you or a friend on any of the maps below, please please reach out to correct me. This goes for everyone, send me your feedback, corrections, and questions — I’d love to hear from you.
sources and acknowledgements
This investment thesis is an evolving labor of love and I have the following non-exhaustive list of people and sources to endlessly thank. Without them, there would be no thesis. Hopefully this is just the beginning of my exploration of the space and this list will continue to grow. Please reach out if you would like to collaborate!
sources (sorted by relevance) | Forrester 2018: The State of Low-Code Platform Adoption, 2018 | Forrester 2019: Software for Digital Process Automation for Deep Deployments, Q2 2019 | Gartner 2019: The Magic Quadrant for Enterprise Low-Code Application Platforms | Emmanuel Straschnov, Co-CEO and Founder, Bubble, 2015: You Shouldn’t Have to Learn to Code | Paul Biggar, CircleCI, 2016: It’s the Future | Forrester 2019: Predictions 2020: More Changes for Software Development | Quick Base 2018: A Brief History of Low Code Development Platforms | Hackernoon 2016: How it feels to learn JavaScript in 2016 | Quick Base 2017: Myth-busting 4 Common Misconceptions About Low-Code and No-Code | James Currier, Managing Partner, NFX: The Next 10 Years Will Be About “Market Networks” | Declarative Assembly of Web Applications from Predefined Concepts. Perez De Rosso, S.; Jackson, D.; Archie, M.; Lao, C.; and McNamara III, B. A. In Proceedings of the 2019 ACM SIGPLAN International Symposium on New Ideas, New Paradigms, and Reflections on Programming and Software, of Onward! 2019, pages 79–93, New York, NY, USA, 2019. ACM | Paul Biggar, Founder, Dark, 2019: What is Dark? | Steve Krouse 2019: The Whole Code Catalog | Hackernoon 2018: Low Code Like a Pro | Forbes 2017: The Low-Code/No-Code Movement: More Disruptive Than You Realize | InfoWorld 2018: 4 essential features of modern low-code development platforms | BMC Software 2018: Low Code vs No Code: Is it The Future of Coding in the Enterprise? | Appian: Low Code Guide | Ryan Hover, Founder, Product Hunt, 2019: The Rise of “No Code” | Sedat Kapanoglu 2020: How is computer programming different today than 20 years ago? |
acknowledgements | Jeff Bussgang, HBS, General Partner and Co-Founder, Flybridge Capital Partners | Allison Mnookin, HBS, Former CEO, Quick Base | Ellen Chisa, CEO and Co-Founder, Dark Inc | Emmanuel Straschnov, Co-CEO and Founder, Bubble | Jesse Orshan, Co-Founder, WayScript | Patrick Leonard, CEO and Co-Founder, Sopris Health | Kevin Zhang, Partner, Bain Capital Ventures | Ali Rahimtula, Partner, Cue Ball Capital | Virtually every EC in the VCPE club at HBS, countless VC professionals who have come to campus, my one sectionmate who did the same type of VC I want to do, and my sweet family | thank you |
