Brian Luerssen

I've been doing some version of no-code for a while. I've worked in a lot of different industries, and in each we had some version of embracing no-code or low-code tools. And when you look back at when I was first getting into technology, I would building websites with Dreamweaver or Visual Basic.

We started building Draftbit after trying to build a different business — a mobile app. We were sort of just frustrated, even with great co-founders, at hard it was to get the first version of our mobile app out the door. We realized that we really were passionate about making it easier for us, or anyone, to get our first version out and iterate on it.

It's interesting to talk about no-code, because at Draftbit we also give you the source code — so we live in this weird gray area between code and no-code.

I think the terminology is one thing, but what I really think about is this whole space is helping everyone build. There is enormous value in enabling the billion people on the planet who use software to be able to create their own, whether they're technical, semi technical, non technical, whatever level of technical they are — there's going to be a tool and a platform that will help them actually build their own software.

Je pense que la raison pour laquelle cette catégorie explose est que dans les deux prochaines années, il y aura un milliard de personnes qui auront grandi en utilisant des logiciels. Et ils ne veulent pas être redevables à des gens qui peuvent créer des logiciels. Lorsque nous avons commencé en 2018, nous ne l’appelions même pas no-code, nous voulions simplement aider les gens à créer des applications mobiles plus rapidement. Je pense que les termes « low-code » ou « no-code » sont moins importants que de simplement donner aux gens le pouvoir de créer de vrais produits et de leur donner un levier pour créer.

You can start a business for cheaper, you can iterate faster, you won't have to raise money as early or its easier than ever to bootstrap businesses without investors.

The other benefit of a no-code platforms is that, for all different types of businesses, you can focus on being good at your core business — you can skip becoming an expert at all things software if that isnt important.

Further, the ability to create personalized software is super interesting and something we don't talk about enough. What if people could create their own personalized CRM, their own personalized sales workflow, their own personalized warehouse management tool, their own personalized order delivery platform? Would they rather create their own rather than use someone else's off the shelf platform that's not quite true to their business? We'll see.

Finally, for many builders inside of large companies, we hear that they don't have access to engineering resources, or IT resources, or consulting resources — so they will just have a team of three or four people. They can use no-code platforms to make progress quietly. I think we're going to have people who can make their careers in large enterprises by cutting through the bureaucracy — no-code platforms are a huge tool to allow people in big companies to have a big, big impact.

Je sais que beaucoup de personnes dans ces rôles pourraient commencer par se demander : "Vais-je perdre mon emploi à cause de ces plateformes ?". Je ne le pense pas. Les plates-formes sans code sont apparues parce qu'il y a une telle pénurie d'ingénieurs en logiciels, de concepteurs et de chefs de produit, et que tout le monde veut construire. Je ne pense pas que ces rôles vont disparaître - je pense que les personnes occupant ces rôles seront toujours nécessaires pour construire quelque chose de vraiment génial, mais qu'elles ne seront peut-être pas nécessaires pour construire quelque chose de basique. L'avenir du no code est de permettre aux développeurs et aux concepteurs de se concentrer sur ce qu'ils savent faire et de ne pas s'inquiéter de ce qui ne vaut pas la peine de leur consacrer du temps.

De plus, ce que vous obtenez en réalité avec le monde du no-code, c'est une véritable collaboration, qui permet aux équipes d'éviter une grande partie du travail de "mise en file d'attente" et de faire le travail elles-mêmes directement. Dans la plupart des entreprises de logiciels, 98 % des personnes de l'organisation ne font que mettre en file d'attente le travail à réaliser par les ingénieurs. Par exemple, si vous faites du travail de conception, vous finissez par créer des histoires et des spécifications, et cela va simplement dans un tracker pour qu'un ingénieur le mette en œuvre. C'est tellement inefficace - pourquoi ne pas simplement mettre en œuvre les changements de conception vous-même ? Une véritable collaboration signifie construire ensemble. Je pense que les outils no-code et low-code nous permettent à tous de travailler ensemble.

I think bad dev shops will fade away. I think good dev shops, good agencies, good consultants will be building more, better, faster with these tools.

The dev shops that just bill you based on hourly — those are actually staffing firms. And I think those things will go away because no code will just eat into their ability to overcharge you for a billable hour of an engineer’s time.

On the other hand, I think there's a ton of small agencies and companies with very creative people, or very smart consultants who know a specific industry, who will be empowered to build their own tools and platforms instead of contracting with others. And I think they become better consultants and better agencies when they directly build what they want.

I'm so excited by this — the ability to build personal apps and tools is something that's never been possible unless you were a software engineer. So that means we'll see people building things like small group apps, or a family app that just helps your family stay organized and have fun together, etc. Things like that.  I think those capabilities are really compelling and interesting, because it lets people create the tools they need to solve their problems instead of wait around for somebody else to create it for them.

Re: Kids —  I think you'll see people creating toys and games, new social networks, and new all kinds of interesting things that, frankly, are hard to predict right now.

Re: Economic Disparity — I think the ability to create software is something that is super important for everyone. And because software is going to touch everything, it shouldn't just be available for an elite group of people to be the ones building — it should be possible for everyone to have access. The tools we create for humanity needs to be accessible to everyone. I think more people will become software developers, but I don't think you should have to become a software developer to build an idea.

Very quickly. Why would you present someone something like if you could just have them experience it directly? Why would you build something that's fake if you could build something that's real, right? I  would say five years. I think it'll be that fast.

We have schools asking us now — so maybe zero to six months from today. Certain people are going to take to learning software and logic and complicated algorithms and other people are not and there's many students out there who can build great things, but who will never be interested in becoming software developers.

I don't know. This is a hard question because over time I'm not sure you'll ever be able to tell the difference.

We're naturally more in the low-code space currently — and I think we'll see both types of platforms add features from each other. The more and more “consumer” you get, I think people don't want that much code, right? But the more you need to build something complicated, with logic and business rules, etc — you're probably going to want some code in the mix.

If we're all doing our jobs well, hopefully soon. It takes time for businesses like that to grow and become that popular, regardless of their technology choices. Turbotax didnt become dominant overnight. I would say within the next two to five years.

I think we should all make this a goal for it to happen in the next 10 years.

I think it's much more likely to be 10-15 years.

I think it'll depend on what type of leader we have. I think there will be newer elected officials that will build apps as a way to grow their footprint. And certainly their teams will be using these platforms very quickly to build and iterate faster.

I don't know that I have any one particular story that stands out — I think we're in the early days. We have a Draftbit user who's a young kid and he's just figuring out how to build stuff, but he's not a software engineer. Those are the types of people that we love, because they're trying to build and they're trying to make progress. And our platforms are early and incomplete and don't always work and they keep trying also we love them for their passion.