From idea to paying customers in weeks, not quarters
I build and run my own SaaS products, so I know what it takes to get from a spec to people paying you. You get one senior developer who covers architecture, back end, front end, payments, hosting and launch.
Sound familiar?
- You have a validated idea but no technical co-founder
- An agency quoted six months and a six-figure budget
- A previous build stalled, and you need someone to finish it and make it production-ready
- You need the MVP to hold up once the first real customers arrive, not just a demo
What you get
- Paid discovery workshop, then a written scope and cost estimate
- Production web app: sign-up, accounts, payments (Stripe), admin and email
- Cloud hosting, CI/CD, backups and monitoring set up in your own accounts
- Full source code and ownership: no lock-in
Ways to work together
Every engagement starts with a small, paid, fixed-price first step. That's where requirements are gathered and the scope and cost estimate for the rest of the work are written, so you know what you're committing to.
Discovery & scope
from £1,500
Workshop, user flows, technical architecture and a cost estimate for the build.
MVP build
from £12,000
A launch-ready product with payments, auth, admin and hosting. Estimated during discovery.
Ongoing support
from £900 / month
Hosting, updates, fixes and new features on a monthly retainer.
Common questions
How much does it cost to build an MVP?
A paid discovery and scope starts from £1,500. A launch-ready MVP with payments, accounts, admin and hosting starts from £12,000, and the actual figure for your product is estimated during discovery, once the scope is written down. Ongoing support and new features start from £900 a month.
Why start with paid discovery?
Because a build estimated from a short conversation is a guess. Discovery turns the idea into user flows, a technical architecture and a written scope, so the cost of the build is based on what you actually need and you can decide with real numbers in front of you.
Who owns the code and the accounts?
You do. Hosting, payments, email and source control are set up in your own accounts, and you get the full source code. There's no lock-in, so you can bring the product in-house or move to another developer whenever you choose.
Have you built and run SaaS products yourself?
Yes. I design, build and run my own live products, including Lineplate, which turns 3D CAD assemblies into technical documentation in the browser, and My House Move Plan, StoryPrompt and AccessDrop. So I deal with sign-up, payments, hosting, support and the problems that only show up after launch myself.
Can you take over a build that has stalled?
Yes. That includes apps started by another developer or agency, and apps built with AI tools that work as a demo but aren't ready for real customers. The first step is a review of what's there, so you know what can be kept, what needs fixing and what it will cost before any further build work.
Related work
Lineplate
A browser app that turns 3D CAD assemblies into finished technical documentation: hidden-line drawings, exploded views, ballooned parts lists and multi-page assembly manuals, kept up to date when the design changes.
Read the case study Financial services SaaS · 2018 to 2023Secure client-messaging SaaS for financial advisers
Co-created with a financial-services partner: a multi-tenant platform that let advice firms exchange messages and documents with clients securely, built for GDPR and FCA confidentiality. I architected, built and ran it in production for five years.
Read the case study E-commerce · 2019 to 2024E-commerce rescue and Shopify migration for a Scottish food brand
Stabilised a struggling online shop, then moved it to Shopify in about eight weeks. The store took orders from the first day, and a second European store followed.
Read the case study Own SaaS productMy House Move Plan
A personalised week-by-week house-move plan for UK households, with ready-made change-of-address letters and PDF export.
Read the case study Own SaaS productStoryPrompt
A year of weekly memoir prompts by email. Answers are collected without a login and typeset into a finished PDF book.
Read the case study Own SaaS productAccessDrop
Digital-download delivery for Etsy sellers: checks Google Drive, Dropbox and Canva links and produces branded PDFs with QR codes.
Read the case study E-commerce automationAutomated print-on-demand pipeline for a book publisher
Personalised children's books go from web order to a commercial printer with no manual steps: each order generates a print-ready PDF and is submitted to the printer's API automatically.
Read the case studyHave a project in mind?
Tell me what you're trying to achieve, and I'll reply as soon as I can to say whether it's a fit and what the fixed-price first step costs.