"I'm not for integration and I'm not against it." — Richard Pryor
In redesigning a SaaS point-of-sale solution, users had made clear that the reporting functionality in the legacy platform was inadequate across every dimension. Reports didn't reliably export to spreadsheets. When they did, there was no control over the output format. Reports couldn't be amended within the platform.
We evaluated several third-party reporting applications and selected a vendor whose product was well-received. The integration worked well until the vendor released a major upgrade that required a license per-subscriber to the SaaS platform. What had been a $400 annual line item became over $145,000 per year.
The solution was to adapt an open-source reporting library to meet subscriber needs. The outcome was comparable and, in some respects, more maintainable. But the lesson was clear: any third-party integration that sits in the critical path of your product's value proposition needs a viable exit strategy. The best exit strategy is wholly owned and licensed code.
Roadmap Considerations
◆ Assess the compatibility of systems to be integrated — languages, databases, and dependency chains. ◆ Model data mapping, transformation, and validation requirements before beginning integration work. ◆ Evaluate API availability and suitability for your architecture. ◆ For every critical integration, define the fallback plan. What do you do if the vendor changes pricing, gets acquired, or discontinues the product?