Software for your own business
Best for: One company, with its own rules
- No sign-up, plans or renewals to build
- Quicker to finish and simpler to run
- Can become a product later, if others in your trade ask for it
SaaS product development · From Udupi, across India
Build it once, sell it to a whole trade
We build subscription software that many businesses sign up for, each with its own users, data and plan, and we keep looking after it once it is live. Two products of our own are already live, and our studio in Udupi is open to visit.
- One core job first
- sell the first version, then add the rest
- Each customer apart
- own users, data and settings in one system
- Hosting sized to today
- no server fleet before you need one
- All in your name
- code, data, hosting and gateway accounts
In short
What is SaaS product development?
SaaS product development is building one piece of software, sold as a service, that many businesses sign up for and use by subscription, instead of software made for a single company. Each business keeps its own users and data inside the shared system. Whirl Designs builds SaaS products in Udupi, coastal Karnataka, for founders across India, and runs two industry products of its own on its ERP Sutra platform.
Start here
A product to sell, or software for yourself?
A SaaS product is harder to get right than software for one company, because strangers must sign up, pay and trust it with no one there to explain it. So the first question is whether you need one at all.
A product for one trade
Best for: Many businesses that do the same work
- One system, with each customer's data kept apart
- Sign-up, plans and GST invoices built in
- One update reaches every customer at once
A product that already exists
Best for: A problem many tools already solve well
- Accounting, CRM and HR tools are hard to beat with a new product
- Buyers can sign up for one today
- We can connect it to your other systems instead
Not sure which card fits? Most founders are not at first, and sorting that out is what the first call is for.
Our work
Two products we run on our own platform
ERP Sutra
Software products · Karnataka
ERP Sutra is our own product arm, not a client project. It is one shared platform layer with two industry ERPs built on top: Facet for diamond and jewellery manufacturing, and Rebar for reinforcement-steel contractors. Both are live with paying users, rather than sitting in a pitch deck.
Sign-in, roles, the audit trail and backups were solved once, in the shared layer, so each product did not have to build them again. The platform runs on ordinary shared hosting rather than a fleet of servers, and the restore procedure has been drilled for real, not assumed.
- Facet follows each lot from rough to finished piece, including work issued to and returned by karigars (artisans), with wastage accounted for
- Facet raises GST e-invoices through ClearTax, with the signed QR code drawn by software we wrote ourselves, and access can be limited down to a single action
- Rebar covers bar bending schedules, site-wise material use, sub-contractor bills and weekly labour runs, and produces PF ECR, ESI and Form 24Q output
- Rebar backs up the database and the files together, with checksums that show each copy is whole, and its restore has been tested end to end
Also built by us
Facet — Diamond & Jewellery ERP
Manufacturing ERP · Private system
A full manufacturing ERP for the diamond and jewellery trade — rough to polished, karigar job work, stock at every stage, and GST e-invoicing with a QR code generated in-house.
Rebar — Construction ERP
Construction ERP · Private system
Site-to-payroll software for reinforcement-steel contractors: bar bending schedules, sub-contractor bills, weekly labour runs and the statutory returns that follow them.
What you get
What a product needs besides its main screen
The feature you are excited about is often the smaller part of the work. These six pieces decide whether a business can sign up, pay and trust you with its data. Each one is in the written plan.
- Sign-up and sign-inA business creates its account, invites its staff and signs in safely, with password reset and one-time codes sent to email or phone.
- Each customer's data kept apartEvery record carries the business it belongs to, and every screen, report and export checks it, so one customer never sees another's data.
- Roles and an audit trailInside each customer account, the owner decides what managers and staff may open or change, and the system logs who did what, and when.
- Trials, plans and cancellationsA business can start on a trial, move up or down a plan, or cancel, and its limits and access change on their own, with a reminder email before each renewal.
- An admin console for your teamYour team can look up any customer account, extend a trial, help someone who is stuck, and check which features are actually used.
- Backups and a plan for bad daysBackups of the database and uploaded files are proved by restoring them, not just trusted. A written plan says who is called, and what customers are told, if the product goes down at 2 a.m.
How it runs
From an idea to paying customers
Real customers use the product before it is finished. That is how the right features get chosen, and the wrong ones get dropped.
Name the first customer
We start with who will pay and how they work today. If one or two of them can join a call, the plan gets sharper straight away.
A written plan for version one
One core job, the six pieces above, and a list of what waits for later. Nothing is built until you have signed off on it.
A mock-up to click through
Two or three future customers click through a mock-up of the main screens and say what is missing, while a change still takes minutes, not weeks.
A few friendly users first
A small group uses a new build every week or two, so most problems surface before sign-up opens to everyone.
Open sign-up
Payments, invoices, welcome emails and the admin console go live, on hosting and gateway accounts in your company's name.
Version two, from real use
Usage numbers and support requests decide what gets built next, and the people who wrote the first version keep improving it.
Not a fit
When a SaaS is the wrong move
We would rather say this on the first call than halfway through the build.
- No one outside your company has said they would pay for it yet. Talk to a few possible customers first, then call us.
- You want to sell to every kind of business at once. Pick one trade first. A product made for everyone fits no one well.
- The businesses you want to sell to already use a product that works well for them. A copy with a new name rarely makes them switch.
- No one on your side will sell the product and talk to its customers. We can build and look after the software, but a product needs an owner who meets buyers every week.
Questions
Questions founders ask us
How long does SaaS product development take?
Plan on three to five months for a first version that businesses can sign up for and pay for. What makes it longer is the number of user roles, connections to other software such as Tally or a courier service, and heavy reports. A few early users are on the product from about halfway through, well before sign-up opens to everyone.
What is a SaaS MVP, and what should it include?
A SaaS MVP, or minimum viable product, is the smallest version a business will pay to use: one core job done well, plus sign-up, roles, billing and a way to ask for help. Extra reports, more roles and links to other software wait until paying users ask for them. A simple test: if a feature would not change a buyer's mind about signing up, leave it for version two.
What is multi-tenant SaaS, and how is each customer's data kept apart?
Multi-tenant SaaS is one system shared by many customer businesses, where each business, called a tenant, can only ever see its own records. Before launch we create test accounts for two businesses and try to reach one's invoices, reports and files from the other, through every screen and export. Sign-up opens only when every attempt fails.
Can you set up subscription billing with UPI AutoPay, cards and GST invoices?
Yes, we connect an Indian payment gateway so your customers can renew by UPI AutoPay or card auto-debit, and the system tries again when a renewal payment fails. Each charge produces a GST invoice with your GSTIN, and the customer's GSTIN when they have one. A refund or a downgrade gets a credit note linked to the original invoice, rather than an edited invoice.
Who owns the code and the customer data?
Your company does. The code and the customer data belong to you, and the hosting and payment gateway accounts are opened in your company's name, not ours. If you later hire your own developers, they get the code and written notes on how the product runs, where it is hosted and how to restore it.
Will the product keep up as the number of users grows?
Yes, if it grows in steps. The first version goes on hosting that suits its first customers, and ERP Sutra's two products, both with paying users, run on ordinary shared hosting. As use grows, the same code moves to a private server of its own (a VPS), then to bigger ones, and we warn you before the current hosting reaches its limit. Hosting can stay in India if your customers need that.
Can you turn our existing software into a SaaS product?
Often, yes, whether we built it or someone else did. We first read the code, check its backups and security, and give you a written report. Software made for one company then needs three things before others can use it: every record labelled with the business it belongs to, a way to sign up, and billing. Urgent faults get fixed before any of that starts.
Can we meet you in person to plan the product?
Yes. Our studio is in Udupi, and founders from Manipal, Mangaluru, Karkala and Kundapura are welcome to come in for planning sessions. Founders elsewhere in India work with us over video calls and shared screens, with the same written plan and the same regular releases.
Worth reading first
SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT
Engineering you can build on.
Clean, documented, tested code on a modern, proven stack — the foundation that keeps your saas & product development fast and dependable for years.
Next.jsNode.jsStripePostgreSQLRedisDockerAWSNext.jsNode.jsStripePostgreSQLRedisDockerAWSNext.jsNode.jsStripePostgreSQLRedisDockerAWSNext.jsNode.jsStripePostgreSQLRedisDockerAWSNext.jsNode.jsStripePostgreSQLRedisDockerAWSNext.jsNode.jsStripePostgreSQLRedisDockerAWSNext.jsNode.jsStripePostgreSQLRedisDockerAWSNext.jsNode.jsStripePostgreSQLRedisDockerAWS
export default function Dashboard() {
const { data } = useQuery("/api/stats");
return <Chart data={data} />;
}
✓ rendered in 42ms
Ready when you are
Let's build something that lasts.
Describe the businesses you want to sell to and the job the product does for them, and you will get a written plan for version one.
50+
projects shipped for local & global clients_
100%
of the code is yours to keep_
9
real, live projects on our work page — from our Udupi studio_