Enterprise Software Development vs Standard Software Development: What Is The Difference?

The concept of enterprise software has been around for quite a while. You may not hear about it a lot except in your office circles, but it has helped a lot of businesses across the globe bring more efficiency into its processes. In the past, people have even spoken against the concept saying that it is nothing but a marketing gimmick. However, it has now evolved into something whose benefits are experienced by businesses all over the world. People understand the importance of enterprise software solutions for businesses. It is why the demand for software development agencies in the UK and other parts of the world in enterprise software development has increased considerably over the years.

There has also been an increase in the number of project management resources; however, most of these resources are available to help project managers build better standard products for consumers. So there is still not a lot of focus on enterprise products. If you have been on both sides of the product development spectrum, you will realise how different things are when it comes to consumer and enterprise products. You would also know that building and scaling enterprise software solutions are much more demanding tasks. And these tasks require skills and knowledge that are both different and more comprehensive if you like.

What is enterprise software?

Enterprise software solutions help larger enterprises solve problems that are unique to them. Small businesses or individuals wouldn’t usually face these problems. For example, enterprise email is an application that serves a different purpose to what an individual would need for their email needs. Different email clients can fulfil individual requirements; however, when it comes to a large business, only a customised email solution would suffice. It is because an individual needs an email client to offer them a few services, such as sending, collecting, storing, and archiving of their emails.

On the other hand, a large enterprise has a lot more concerns. It needs to know how every person in the organisation will be used this email before coming up with a solution. How to bring servers and individual computers in sync with each other? How to ensure the security of highly sensitive data that could be shared over the email? Whether or not allow employees to access their emails from personal computers? The questions and concerns can go on.

What is standard or consumer software?

Standard software outsourcing services are products meant for the end consumers. They can be installed on the personal computers of individuals. Some people even use these solutions for their businesses, but they aren’t good enough for that. They have a limited feature set meant for use on a single home computer.

Difference between enterprise software development and standard software development

Let us now look at a few differences between these two types of software solutions meant for different uses and audiences.

• Enterprise software solutions are designed to solve a unique business issue for an entire community of users that include large groups of people. These solutions address a typical business need that all these people have. On the other hand, standard or consumer software solutions solve the needs of a single user.
• The enterprise software development company takes user feedback regularly to understand and fix the issues that they are facing. It is essential to keep enterprise users loyal. The voice of the customer, in this case, is critical. Things don’t work the same way when it comes to consumer software. Consumers often don’t have too many choices. They take what’s available. If they don’t like what the product offers, they are likely to switch to another product than raise concerns.
• Packaging and pricing for both standard and enterprise software are quite different from one another. The cost of ownership plays a vital role in driving sales for enterprise products. So, enterprise software development companies must think long and hard about the pricing before releasing the software. Consumer software solutions are usually priced based on the spending power of individual users.
• Enterprise software has specific engineering requirements, including localisation, hardware, interoperability, scalability, security amongst others. All these factors need to be taken into account right at the start of the development cycle. Features and functionalities in the standard software are decided by the software development company that is building it or the vendor that is marketing and selling it. Individuals don’t have their say in this process.

These are a few differences between enterprise software development and standard software development that will help you understand both these concepts in a better way.