This is because of the visual development environment offered by low-code platforms that allows developers to use the drag-and-drop feature to develop the apps. While this has proved to be a great advantage in accelerating development speeds, it has also generated a general view that low-code development is for simple apps and that complex software still needs a traditional development approach.

Benefits of Low-Code Platforms in Developing Complex Software Low-code platforms such as Mendix and OutSystems help developers build complex software by simplifying the development process. Some of the advantages of using a low-code platform include:

Automating Processes: Manual coding takes time and is prone to human errors. In low-code development, flexible apps can be created by automating processes. The tasks can be broken down and integrated to simplify even complex processes.

Device-Neutral Apps: It enables the creation of apps that can be used on any device, making it easy for users to access data and collaborate from anywhere, anytime.

Optimizing Resource Utilization: The fact that even non-technical users can develop apps using low-code platforms lowers the cost of development while improving productivity. As it speeds up the development cycle, it also is time-effective and allows faster time to market.

Improved Customer Delight: Low-code development allows users to respond to changing market trends quickly and improve customer service.

Better Risk Management and Governance: Businesses can cope with changing regulatory environment better as low-code development facilitates greater responsiveness.

Greater Adaptability: Keeping the apps up to date and meeting newer requirements is easy as low code does not require complex coding.

Mendix is available in free and pro versions, with the Pro enabling complex workflow management and external integrations through either low-code modeling or Java code.

It is cloud-based and makes IT project management and native collaboration easy.

OutSystems allows the creation of native apps at the click of a button. Once the app is configured and the keys/certificates added, the platform generates the native builds for Android and iOS along with the required content and plugins. It does not even need the installation of Java and Android Studio to build for the mobile.

5 Best Practices for Low-Code Development

To effectively leverage the low-code development platform for faster development of apps, implementing the following 5 best practices will be beneficial:

Best Practice #1 Understand Your Platform: Though low code needs very little coding skills, some basic technical skills are still essential to use the platform effectively. Some time spent understanding the platform capabilities will improve the quality of the apps being developed. Some of the key features the developers and users must be familiar with are platform integration, UI design, API generation, and so on.

Best Practice #2 Reuse Components: Low-code platforms such as Mendix and OutSystems also offer several out-of-the-box components that can help developers jump-start their app-building process. Focus on developing unique features and use the pre-existing features for the rest of the common functionalities.

Best Practice #3 Connect with the Community: Low-code platforms have a vibrant community that can help with developing robust apps. Reach out to the community to solve issues, have questions answered, and collaborate where needed to improve customer experience.

Best Practice #4 Ensure Good UI/UX: Low-code platforms such as Mendix and OutSystems provide easy and ready-to-use UI frameworks and come with standardized components. They enable customizing the user interface and speed up the development process.

Best Practice #5 Improve Security and Governance: Regulatory requirements make security and governance essential. Therefore, developers must ensure that apps developed using low-code platforms are compliant and secure. Permission-based access to data and protection of personalized identifiable information (PII) or sensitive IP must be ensured with sufficient management and oversight policies and rules put in place.

Indium to Facilitate Low Code Development

Indium Software is a leading low-code development company whose team of expert’s custom-develop complex systems with low-code/no-code solutions at low cost. Our low-code development services provide businesses with the tools and expertise they need to quickly and easily create powerful software applications without extensive coding knowledge.

We work with a variety of low-code development platforms including Mendix, Microsoft PowerApps, and OutSystems, leveraging the unique features and capabilities of these platforms to provide end-to-end solutions and low-code platform recommendations based on unique business needs. The use cases range from optimizing the sales process, to automating business operations, improving customer relationship management, and building web/mobile apps. These include business process automation to data analysis, workflow management, and IoT applications, across industries such as healthcare, finance, and retail. We work with cross-functional teams, especially Advance Analytics and data engineering teams to include AI in the solution.

Our services cover selecting and implementing the platform best suited for our business needs; and customizing and integrating the low-code platform with other systems including APIs and databases. We also provide low-code QA services, maintenance, training, and support for the low-code platform.

FAQs

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Low code platforms help small to medium-sized enterprises build business applications quickly and easily thanks to the drag-and-drop interfaces, among other tools. The digital revolutions have kept businesses searching for less tedious development solutions and more graphically enhanced ones. This has resulted in low-code business solutions gaining popularity in the corporate world.

There are various platforms created to simplify the software development process. Here we will focus on the best low-code solutions for creating and deploying low-code applications in small and medium-sized businesses. But first, let us review some of the characteristics of low-code business solutions.

Features of Low Code Business Solutions

Low-code business solutions are essential to enterprises for numerous reasons: from permitting them to create apps quickly and at an affordable cost to building and deploying apps without needing professional developers and offering a way for quickly prototyping and iterating new ideas and apps without detailed coding knowledge.

Here are some outstanding aspects low code business solutions deliver that make them more important for enterprises:

1. Declarative Tools

In low-code software, declarative tools are implemented through business rules and visual models. These tools help terminate the necessity of writing custom code. Therefore, additions or future changes become more manageable and minimize development time.

2. Rapid Mobility

Develop one and deploy it anywhere. With the invention of mobile devices such as tablets and cell phones, applications must be designed with cross-platform functionality. Low code development allows this to occur automatically without additional resources, coding, or effort.

3. Security and Scalability

Along with its advantages, low code development also has its shortcomings. When we focus on security and scalability, low code development was formerly employed in departmental, smaller, and less demanding capabilities. Nevertheless, today’s low code must be enterprise-grade. The proper platform has proven experience with large enterprises and entails all the required security certifications in place.

4. Drag and- Drop Interfaces

Typing lengthy strands of code to create software is highly time-consuming and difficult. Low code permits developers to visually develop applications, where you have a speedy launch.

What Are the Top 3 Low-Code Business Solutions for SMEs?

Here are the best low-code solutions for your small and medium-sized enterprise (SME):

1. Mendix

Mendix is an adaptable low-code business solution that allows you to create functional enterprise apps for any device. It incorporates features and necessary tools to create, test, and deploy apps and has been employed by at least 4,000 leading companies globally.

The Mendix platform could be deployed on a public or private cloud. Also, you can deploy it on-premises. Mendix employs the model-driven engineering (MDE) mode of development. This low-code solution includes reusable components and visual modeling tools for faster app development. It makes it easy for your business to embrace an Agile project management approach in managing your app development procedures from start to completion.

With the Mendix business solution, you can design your apps in the browser and code when necessary. It comprises a loaded collection with pre-coded App Sheets, which are pre-written logic modules that can be configured effortlessly.

Basic Characteristics

• Underpins external elements.
• Artificial intelligence (AI) assisted development.
• A broad range of built-in constituents.
• Can migrate, extend, or replenish existing systems.

2. Zoho Creator

Zoho is a renowned customer relationship management platform. Zoho Creator is a minimalist low-code business solution with visual aspects supporting app development. This platform permits developers to create fully functional cross-platform applications and directly publish them from the web.

Zoho Creator business solution allows enterprises to develop apps and workflows without needing to write codes. It is a full-stack product where you can build data-driven applications in the cloud without coding. With one or two clicks, you can choose from the available pre-built blocks, drag and drop them onto the canvas, and personalize them to build your app.

Zoho Creator platform provides a variety of ready-to-use enterprise application templates. Hence, your business can install and customize these apps to suit your needs. Besides quickly creating apps, this platform has intelligent reporting, data management, and team collaboration elements.

Basic Characteristics

• Exceptional customer support.
• Harmonious consolidation with other Zoho products.
• Improved aspects for developers, like the capability to add custom code.
• Variety of built-in templates for everyday apps.

3. Microsoft PowerApps

Microsoft PowerApps is a low-code business solution that enables you to build enterprise apps and quickly deploy them without writing codes. This platform allows you to effortlessly develop, share, and run applications. It employs a straightforward point-and-click procedure for developing functional applications.

Besides allowing you to create apps from scratch, this platform entails various predetermined templates that you can personalize for specific organizational needs. You can also consolidate the app with various systems and data to improve its functionality.

Basic Characteristics

• Capabilities of running applications on mobile devices.
• Drag-and-drop interface for easily developing app forms and screens.
• A collection of pre-built connectors to famous enterprise software apps.
• Capabilities to rapidly build personalized enterprise apps without coding.

Conclusion

There are various low-code business solutions for disparate users and purposes. Getting the right low-code platform could be difficult. Mendix, Zoho Creator, and Microsoft PowerApps low code platforms contain the functionalities and features every business needs to easily create functional apps. Aspects like data integration, scalable environments, collaboration tools, reusable components, visual modeling, and others permit automation of the software development procedures without needing technical expertise.

You can easily create working apps as a small or medium-sized enterprise. Therefore, promoting efficiency in navigating and addressing different enterprise issues that may arise in daily operations. The above low-code business solutions can assist business users and your application development team to operate more efficiently and improve your app development procedures.

The post Top 3 Low Code Business Solutions for Small- To Medium-Sized Enterprises appeared first on Indium.

The latter would, in fact, necessitate additional spending on purchasing software tools to develop, test, and deploy the code, with constant upgrades needed to meet the growing needs of the company. It would require documentation to ensure business continuity even if the developers leave and new ones take their place.

Today, though, the answer may not be so straightforward. Some of the advantages of COTS – Commercial Off-the-Shelf software continue to hold true, but the tools for custom development have undergone a massive change. Some of the earlier limitations no longer exist or have become negligible. Advantages have gone up, pushing businesses to consider custom development with low code.

Cases in Point

One of Indium Software’s clients is a pioneer in precision healthcare with progressive research and development. To facilitate interactions between physicians and patients from across hospitals, research centers, universities, and advanced community sites, and to meet its specialized business requirements, the client wanted to develop proprietary technology for diagnosis. It partnered with Indium to turn its business requirements into live functionality.

Indium adopted Robust Application Development (RAD) to improve the reach of R&D in precision medicine. The Agile POD team focused on quality checks on the features developed for every sprint by an integrated quality assurance. This resulted in reduced technical debt and higher quality output on each build. Integrating the performance monitoring and testing throughout the project ensured efficiency,consistent and better database retrieval performance as part of the project.

In another use case, Indium Software proposed Mendix for the end-to-end development of a platform for a real estate aggregator. It allowed agent onboarding, messaging, chatting, and email communication. It also enabled property listing with pictures and customization of each search function for faster and more accurate discovery. Around 20,000 agents were quickly onboarded to deliver a strong digital experience for the users. The complete ecosystem was built on a microservice architecture to enable better scalability and reliability of software.

Why Opt for Low-Code Instead of COTS

COTS software is advantageous to businesses for several reasons.

• It is easily available.
• The costs are predictable. It is typically taken as annual licensing as there is very little customization possible, and this is a long-term cost after the implementation.
• It is ideal for businesses that need a simple, straightforward solution that fits their needs.
• Complex systems can be deployed quickly, and the solution could be up and running in a few days.
• The vendor takes care of support, updates, and patches. The update takes place in the background, with minimal or no disruption to the business.

However, one size does not fit all. For businesses requiring specific functionality or objectives, it may not be the best solution. Moreover, since the COTS software is developed for a wide range of applications, it may have features that are redundant for specific purposes. This can add to the costs and make it unwieldy. As the business grows and expands, its needs will also evolve, making this investment incompatible, difficult to integrate with new tools, and noncompliant.

Low-code development helps overcome many of these challenges and bestows many advantages. Some of these include:

• Low-code platforms such as Mendix enable adopting a visual approach to development. Its intuitive drag-and-drop interface allows even technically unskilled business users to quickly develop features and applications that meet their needs better.
• It incorporates reusable components that shorten the development time. There is a large community of developers contributing to the component’s library (Marketplace), which is available for reuse. Indium’s marketplace components are prefixed with IndiuMX.
• The communication tools integrated with the development platform facilitate collaboration.
• These features also lower the cost of development, providing businesses with greater control over their product.
• It enables the creation of highly customized software that will help solve specific business problems.
• Low code integrates with the IT infrastructure easily. Its microservices approach also makes it flexible and scalable, allowing software to evolve along with the business.
• Mendix provides tools for the application development lifecycle, enabling streamlining of requirements management, project management, version control, testing, and deployment, amongst others.
• Developers can also use agile development practices and DevOps tools to shorten the development cycle and speed up the time to market.

For More Info, Kindly Check out Our Success Story

Indium Software for Low Code Development

Indium Software provides low-code development for facilitating innovation, experimentation, and faster delivery of enterprise-grade apps. Indium has built a team of Mendix experts who have more than 5 years of experience developing low-code solutions for businesses to achieve in months which earlier took years.

We enable the following:

• Empower businesses by setting up Mendix architecture and design to establish a robust architectural foundation
• Handpicked Mendix App Development experts assist in the development of web, mobile (hybrid & native), UI/UX solutions
• Our Mendix QA team assists in end-to-end testing using the Mendix test suite and shift-up QA model
• We are a Mendix Reseller Partner who can help with your licensing needs

We have more than two decades of experience in the development of cutting-edge software, application modernization, and data analytics. Our formidable strength in software development, DevOps, and low-code development is a winning combination aimed to launch you on your next trajectory of growth. To know more, visit Click Here

FAQ

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