Fears and problems when choosing a low-code solution

If you thinking about using a low-code solution, probably you asked some of these questions already.

• Is it worth being afraid of low-code solutions and problems with their scaling?
• Can low-code solutions pump money out of a business for development?
• Does low-code cost programmers and how to minimize costs?
• Does low-code bind to its creator and how to achieve independence?

I’d like to present to you my opinion, confirmed by more than 20 years of successful work in IT companies, fintech companies, and IT team, as well as experience in using low-code platforms in the fintech company.

Choosing a low-code platform, many companies face some concerns related to switching to it. This is both the fear to become dependent on the vendor, and the fear to acquire the wrong solution: wasted money without the expected result. Also, developers often worry that they will cease to be in demand, and will lose their jobs.

An objective and logical approach will help to get rid of fears of choosing the wrong platform. This requires small but thorough work.

First, you need to decide on the selection criteria. What exactly will the platform be used for? For backend development, API, websites, mobile applications, routine automation, ETL\ELT, or for something else? This will narrow down the range of potential platforms and vendors.

Don’t choose a platform that you will grow into that has a large set of functions that may come in handy only sometime in the future. Start with a highly specialized solution.

Then create criteria that are important for your company. What will be the weight of each criterion, metric that you will use to evaluate platforms? When studying platforms, involve a fair number of employees who will use it for development in the future.

Attract those who will use the development results, that is, applications created on this platform.

It’s best to work with each platform independently — you shouldn’t rely on advertising slogans, popularity, or attractive prices. Use a free trial period that almost all vendors provide to figure out if a platform meets your needs. Only with this approach, the choice will be objective, and fears will dissipate.

Now I will answer the questions highlighted at the beginning of this article.

Is it worth being afraid of low-code solutions and problems with their scaling?

No, there is nothing to be afraid of. The right platform will allow you to scale your solutions flexibly enough. For example, in our company we were choosing the platform according to the following criteria: it should work equally efficiently on any servers — cloud (AWS, GC, Azure) and on-premises, scale horizontally, and have balancing tools. Check the availability of scaling. Indeed, it’s not available on all platforms. Carefully consider how the platform works: in what language it is developed, what technologies it uses, what restrictions are stated (several technologies have their limitations and special requirements), and other features. Some platforms provide the source code of the resulting solution — this is a major asset.

Can low-code solutions pump money out of a business for development?

Such outcomes are possible. Therefore, it is important to carefully approach the choice of the platform. Pay attention to the following points: licensing and billing model, how rich the platform is in functionality that you need. Also, the interface should be user-friendly enough to do without consultations from the platform vendors. Study carefully the licensing policy and try to calculate the potential costs for 3–5 years, taking your growth into account.

Does low-code cost programmers and how to minimize costs?

Again, it strongly depends on the characteristics of the platform. There are expensive products that cost hundreds of thousands of dollars per year and that provide very extensive features, functionality, outstanding performance, and flexibility. Still, some platforms cost one thousand dollars per year and have a narrow specialization, while they quite adequately perform specific tasks. Let me use our company as an example once again. We figured out the following criteria when choosing a platform — Total Cost of Ownership (including the cost of licenses, the cost of people who maintain it, etc.) must be approximately 10% of the classic development. And we managed to achieve this.

Does low-code bind to its creator and how to achieve independence?

Again, this depends on the platform. For example, we use a platform that generates source code that can be downloaded and used at your discretion. What’s more, the code is decent, it’s written in GO. So if at some point we have decided to break off relations with this platform provider, we could have continued to exploit the received code. If necessary, we could have refined it on our own.

Conclusion

Do not be afraid to switch to low-code platforms — it is worth making a deliberate choice. Introduce the platform into your IT infrastructure gradually. Prepare yourself and the team for the fact that low-code platforms have some limitations. Most often they are not critical. Choose the platform based on the criteria that are important to you and it’s going to be fine!

I’d love to hear your thoughts on the above in the comments and feel free to connect with me on LinkedIn.