Dreamware / Services / Software Engineering / Platform & Marketplace Development
Platform & Marketplace Development
Multi-tenant SaaS platforms, two-sided marketplaces.
About this service
Platforms and marketplaces have a different set of engineering concerns than regular applications. Multi-tenancy means every decision about data isolation, configuration, and customisation affects all your customers. Marketplaces require matching, trust, transactions, and dispute resolution to be built in from the start.
We've built SaaS platforms with complex permission models, white-label capability, and per-tenant configuration. We've built two-sided marketplaces where the matching logic and trust mechanisms are the core product. These are hard engineering problems — and getting the data model and architecture wrong early is expensive to undo.
We take a strong opinion on the right architecture for platforms: proper tenant isolation, configuration-driven behaviour where possible, and clear separation between the platform layer and the tenant experience. We design for the moment when you have 200 customers with different needs, not just the first 10.
How Dreamware approaches this
Platform architecture is where we invest the most upfront thinking. Multi-tenancy strategies (schema-per-tenant, row-level security, separate databases) have different tradeoffs for different scale and compliance requirements. We make this decision deliberately with you, understanding your growth trajectory and data requirements.
For marketplaces, we design the trust and transaction layer carefully: payment flows, escrow where appropriate, dispute resolution paths, and the review and reputation systems that make two-sided markets work. We integrate with Stripe or equivalent for NZ-compatible payment processing.
What you get
- Platform application — multi-tenant, deployed, and ready for your first customers
- Tenant management system — onboarding, configuration, and administration interface
- Billing integration — subscription management and payment processing
- Platform documentation — architecture, tenant configuration guide, and operational runbook
- Test suite — covering tenant isolation, billing flows, and critical platform functionality
- Onboarding flow — the experience your new customers have on day one
Investment guide
Platform and marketplace projects typically run $60,000–$250,000+ NZD. MVP SaaS platforms with core multi-tenancy and basic billing typically run $60,000–$100,000. Full-featured platforms with complex permission models, white-labelling, and marketplace mechanics sit significantly higher. We recommend a paid architecture design sprint ($8,000–$15,000) before full build commences.
All pricing in NZD excluding GST. Fixed-price engagements where scope allows — we'll confirm pricing after a free scoping conversation.
Ready to get started?
Book a free conversation. We'll tell you honestly what's realistic, what it costs, and how we'd approach it.