Before the build, not after.
Most SaaS engagements arrive after the MVP is already built — and broken. This one starts earlier: customer interviews, scope, architecture, and a fixed-band quote, all in writing first. Build only what passes the test.
THE WORK · LANE 05 — SAAS, END-TO-END
First interview to second-year scale.
Discovery, MVP, launch, and growth — one senior team, one runway, one accountable build, for software meant to be sold.
Auth, billing, permissions, observability, audit — production from day one. Weekly demos, milestone gates, and a fixed band quoted in writing before the first sprint is bought.
BAND $60K–$750K+TIMELINE 12 WEEKS – 18 MONTHSSENIOR, RETAINED
02 — THE SHAPE
The shape of a SaaS build.
SaaS is the longest lane in the shop — and the most decided-in-advance. Three things to know before commissioning one: where we come in, what you get, and where the band lands.
A product that ships, a team that stays.
Lean MVP through Enterprise launch. Auth, billing, permissions, observability, audit — production from day one, demoed weekly. Senior engineering retained through year-two scale, never required beyond it.
Where the band lands.
$60K–$750K+ over 12 weeks to 18 months, in three written bands — Lean MVP, Standard Launch, Enterprise — each fixed after discovery. The bands, measured below.
03 — THE CURVE
DRAWN AS A TEMPERING CURVE
Heat, quench, temper.
A SaaS build runs like a tempering schedule. Discovery studies the metal. The MVP takes full heat — auth, billing, permissions, and observability land in the first weeks, not the last. Launch is the quench: real customers, real payments. Scale then tempers the product in measured cycles, hardening it without cracking what already shipped.
PRODUCTION FROM DAY ONEWEEKLY DEMOS
Read the stack04 — THE BANDS
Three bands, written.
Every SaaS quote lands in one of three bands — fixed in writing after the Product Strategy discovery, with milestone gates you can hold us to.
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01
$60K–$120K 12–20 WEEKS
Lean SaaS MVP
The smallest product that can take real customers — and real payments.
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02
$120K–$250K 5–9 MONTHS
Standard SaaS Launch
MVP through paid launch, with the operational shell built around it.
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03
$250K–$750K+ 9–18 MONTHS
Enterprise SaaS
The deep end — larger scope, phased rollouts, a longer runway.
EVERY BAND — FIXED IN WRITING AFTER DISCOVERY · MILESTONE GATES AT EACH PHASE
05 — THE FIRST WEEKS
The first two weeks, scheduled.
SaaS discoveries run longer because validation happens up front. By the end of week two you hold customer signal, a written architecture brief, and a phased rollout plan.
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WEEK 01 — VALIDATION
Signal
Customer interviews, synthesized.
5–8 conversations with prospective users. We run them; you sit in. Every claim in the thesis gets tested against someone who would have to pay for it — pains, willingness to pay, and the riskiest assumptions, named.
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WEEK 02 — ARCHITECTURE
Blueprint
Stack, billing, auth, observability.
The multi-tenant data model written out, the Stripe billing flow drawn, auth designed org-and-role from the start, and the observability stack — Sentry plus OpenTelemetry — pinned before the first sprint exists.
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DAY 14 — FRIDAY
Gates
A roadmap with milestone gates.
A phased rollout plan — MVP, paid launch, growth — with a fixed-band quote, a milestone payment schedule, and a recommended cadence for the build. Proceed within 30 days and half the discovery fee credits toward it.
06 — QUESTIONS
SaaS builds, specifically.
Asked by founders before signing — including the equity one.
Why does SaaS get its own band, separate from custom apps?
SaaS architecture is materially different: multi-tenant from day one, paid billing wired up, a public marketing surface, support tooling, observability for paying users, and a growth-ready data model. The work is the build plus the operational shell — the quote bands reflect that.
Will you take equity instead of cash?
Almost never. Equity arrangements blur the engineer/operator boundary, create founder-investor confusion at later rounds, and don't pay rent. The default answer is fixed cash, fixed band — exceptions are rare and require a long pre-existing relationship.
What about pre-PMF — should I even build something?
Sometimes the answer is "not yet" — and the Product Strategy discovery exists to surface that. If the validation work shows the thesis is weak, we'll say so in writing. The discovery fee covers the work; you walk away with the thesis tested and your money saved.
Do you keep working with us after the MVP?
Optional. The common path is to build the MVP, then continue under Laurel Care ($4,500/mo) or Olympian Care ($10K+/mo) for active feature development. But it's not required — you own everything from day one and can operate without us.
How do we handle billing and payments?
Stripe is the default. Subscription billing, usage billing, hybrid — all first-class. Stripe Connect for marketplaces. We wire webhooks, dunning, refunds, and customer-portal export at launch. Other providers (Paddle, Lemon Squeezy) supported on request.
What if I want to raise — or sell the company?
You own the IP, the repo, the deploy, and the customer data. Investor or acquirer due diligence on the codebase is straightforward because the audit ledger, the deployment topology, and the architecture brief already exist in writing.
07 — BEGIN
Begin with the strategy.
The longest lane gets the deepest study — a paid Delphi Product Strategy first, with half the fee credited toward the build.
DELPHI PRODUCT STRATEGY SAAS & MVP
For new products and SaaS builds.
Validation before architecture, architecture before sprints — and if the thesis is weak, the brief says so in writing.
- 5–8 customer interviews, synthesized
- Technical architecture and risk register
- Fixed-band roadmap with milestone gates
$7,500–$15,000 · 2–4 WEEKS
Begin
PREFER TO TALK FIRST
Email the principal.
Outline the product in three sentences. The reply comes within one business day — from the person who would design and build it.
CREDIT RULE — 50% OF THE DISCOVERY FEE CREDITS TOWARD YOUR KICKOFF PROJECT RETAINER WITHIN 30 DAYS.