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SaaS development · Switzerland

SaaS developer in Switzerland.

I design and build SaaS products in Switzerland, from architecture to deployment: authentication, roles and permissions, a Postgres data model, Stripe payments and subscriptions, transactional email, dashboards, an admin interface, analytics and production infrastructure. One person, from an empty repo to the first version that holds up in front of a real customer.

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Updated

In brief

Where
Zürich, Switzerland — remote across Switzerland and Europe
Format
Fixed fee — one price, agreed before work starts
Typical timeline
4 to 6 weeks for a v1 ready for a first customer
Range
CHF 20’000 – 45’000 for a SaaS v1, depending on scope
Stack
Next.js · TypeScript · Postgres · Stripe · Resend · Vercel
Built and run
Atamatax · Horvera · Wabiro (in production) · SponsorsMetrics (private beta)

A SaaS is not a website with a login. It is a system: accounts, data that belongs to someone, money moving, emails that have to go out, errors that must be visible before the customer sees them. What I deliver is that system — not a mock-up that resembles it.

I work from Zürich with founders and small companies across Switzerland and Europe, in English and French. The format never changes: a scope call, a fixed-fee proposal, a 4-to-6-week sprint with a demo every Friday, then the full hand-off — repo, accounts, pipeline.

01 — Scope

What SaaS development includes

The parts a SaaS product must have the day someone pays to use it. I build all of them; the scope decides which ones your v1 needs.

Authentication and sessions
Email + password, magic link or OAuth depending on the audience. Server-side sessions, reset flows, email verification, brute-force protection.
Roles and permissions
Owner, member, admin, read-only — modelled in the database, enforced on the server, never merely hidden in the UI.
Data model
A Postgres schema laid down first: entities, relations, constraints, indexes, versioned migrations. It is the most expensive part to redo later, so it is the first I stabilise.
Payments and subscriptions
Stripe Checkout or Billing, signed webhooks, subscription state synced to the database, invoices, failed payments, trials and plan changes.
Transactional email
Welcome, confirmation, receipts, alerts, reminders — sent through Resend from a verified domain, with React Email templates and a send log.
Dashboards and exports
The screens the customer lives in every day: filterable lists, detail views, bulk actions, CSV export. Server-rendered, fast, no phantom state.
Admin interface
Your back office: view an account, refund, deactivate, fix a record, understand what happened. Without it, support happens in SQL.
API and integrations
Typed endpoints, Zod validation, API keys if third parties need to read your data, connectors to the services your customers already use.
Analytics and observability
Product events (PostHog or Vercel Analytics), structured logs, error alerts, an audit log on sensitive actions.
Security and compliance
Server-side validation everywhere, rate limiting, secrets outside the code, data scoped per account, Swiss FADP / GDPR compliance by design.
Deployment and operations
Vercel, preview per branch, migrations in the pipeline, backups, documented environment variables — and all of it belongs to you.

02 — Vocabulary

Prototype, MVP, v1, production SaaS: four different objects

The four words circulate as synonyms. They describe four levels of demand — and four budgets.

Prototype
Demonstrates an idea. May be shaky under the hood; nobody is going to live in it. Useful to raise, test, convince. Throw it away afterwards — never “finish” it.
MVP
A catch-all. A polished prototype for some, a reduced v1 for others. The only useful question: can a real customer use it and pay without you intervening by hand?
V1
The first version that survives its first customer: auth, solid data, real payments, email, handled errors, admin. It is what I build — see SaaS v1 development.
Production SaaS
The v1 plus what real life adds: monitoring, tested backups, exports, rate limits, tooled support, compliance, recovery paths. Part of it is built into the v1; the rest follows real customers.

The difference between these levels is not the number of screens but what happens when something fails. A prototype that breaks is a laugh; a v1 that breaks loses a customer. I detailed the distinction in Prototype or v1.

03 — Architecture

How I architect a SaaS

The data model first. Before any screen, I lay down the Postgres schema: which entities exist, who owns them, what is immutable, what is versioned. A SaaS with well-laid data can be evolved; a SaaS with a beautiful interface and vague data gets rewritten.

Then the application: Next.js with the App Router, Server Components by default, server actions for forms, API routes only where a third party has to call the system (Stripe webhooks, integrations). Strict TypeScript end to end, Zod validation at every boundary.

Business logic lives in pure, testable, versioned modules — not in components. On Horvera, the eligibility engine is a set of versioned rules that produces every answer with its trace and sources; on Atamatax, the tax situation engine maps facts to forms while showing its assumptions. The same principle applies to usage billing or a commission calculation.

Payments go through Stripe with signed webhooks; billing state lives in the database, never inferred on the client. Email goes out through Resend from a verified domain. Deployment is on Vercel with a preview per branch — the Friday demos happen on those previews. The details are in Next.js architecture for a production SaaS.

04 — Cost and timeline

What SaaS development costs in Switzerland

A SaaS v1 built properly usually lands between CHF 20’000 and 45’000, fixed fee. At the low end: a tight scope — authentication, one core flow, payments, deployment. At the high end: multiple roles, dense business logic, third-party integrations, a data dashboard. Three things move the price: the complexity of the data model, the number of integrations, the expected level of finish.

The typical timeline is a 4-to-6-week sprint after the scope call and proposal. The price is fixed before work starts and does not move; if I estimated wrong, that is my problem, not your invoice. The full mechanics are in How much does it cost to build a SaaS v1 in Switzerland, and the SaaS cost calculator gives you a complexity band in five minutes.

Scope it with the calculator

Five minutes. A complexity band, not a quote.

05 — Hire?

Hire a SaaS developer, or have the v1 built?

If the SaaS is your business, you will need a team: the roadmap of a product people pay for does not stop. The question is the order. Hiring first asks the first engineer to build alone, with no peer to assess them, during the months the product has no customers yet. Having the v1 built first means reaching the hire with a product, customers and documented code to take over.

It is not always the right order: if your technical team already exists, reinforce it rather than outsource. The hire-or-outsource guide compares both with the real employer cost in Switzerland and a tool that can answer “hire”.

Is this the right service?

This makes sense if

  • You have real signals — a waiting list, a pilot customer, an investor watching — and you need the version you can show them.
  • Your product contains real business logic: eligibility rules, calculations, pricing, stateful workflows, fine-grained permissions.
  • You want one person accountable end to end, a price known upfront, and to leave with the repo and the accounts.
  • You are a small company replacing a manual process or a spreadsheet with a product customers will pay for.

It is not the right service if

  • You are still testing the idea and nobody will pay this week — a prototype costs a fraction and is what you need.
  • The product needs a team of three or more from day one, or hard real-time (trading, multiplayer).
  • You are looking for hourly staffing or a developer to slot into an existing team — I do not do staff augmentation.
  • You want to learn to build it yourself — that is what the Build School is for.

Proof — products I built and run

My own products, with their actual state. No client project is published yet.

How it works

Four steps, fixed scope, price agreed upfront.

  1. 01

    Diagnose

    20 minutes, free. Business model, workflows, risks and product scope. If I’m the wrong person, I say so.

  2. 02

    Architect and propose

    Within 48h: data model, system boundaries, integrations, UX — and one fixed fee with dated milestones. No “starting at”.

  3. 03

    Build

    4 to 6 weeks of controlled iterations. A demo every Friday on a Vercel preview. You watch the system grow live — no black box.

  4. 04

    Launch

    Payments, analytics, deployment, operational workflows. You leave with the repo, the accounts, the pipeline — and 30 days of 24h replies.

  5. 05

    Improve

    Measured iteration on real usage: a fresh fixed-fee scope per increment, or nothing if your team takes over. No hidden dependency.

The full process, guarantees and prices →

Frequently asked questions

  • How much does it cost to build a SaaS in Switzerland?

    A SaaS v1 built properly usually costs between CHF 20’000 and 45’000, fixed fee. The low end is a tight scope (auth, one core flow, payments, deployment); the high end is multiple roles, dense business logic and integrations. The price is fixed before work starts.

  • How long does it take to build a SaaS v1?

    Four to six weeks of sprint for a v1 ready for a first customer, with a demo every Friday on a preview. Scoping and the proposal take a week before that.

  • What is the difference between an MVP and a production v1?

    An MVP may still depend on you to work — a record fixed by hand, a payment checked by email. A production v1 stands on its own: authentication, real payments, email, handled errors, an admin interface. That is the version I build.

  • Freelancer or agency for SaaS development?

    An agency brings a team and reporting; you also pay for coordination and turnover. A senior independent developer carries the architecture and the code himself, fixed fee, with one point of contact. For a SaaS v1 the second option costs less and moves faster — as long as the product fits in one person’s hands. See Freelancer or agency in Switzerland.

  • What stack is suitable for a modern SaaS?

    Next.js (App Router) with TypeScript, Postgres for data, Stripe for payments, Resend for transactional email, Vercel for deployment. Supabase when managed auth and storage are needed quickly. It is the stack behind my own products.

  • Who owns the code?

    You do. The repo and the Vercel, Stripe, Resend and database accounts are created in your name or transferred at hand-off, with documentation of the environment variables and the pipeline.

  • What happens after delivery?

    Thirty days of replies within 24h are included. Beyond that, a new fixed-fee scope for the next step — or nothing, if your team takes over. The product is built to be taken over: no hidden dependency on me.

Further reading

Other services

Have a SaaS to build?

Write me one line about what the product must do the day the first customer pays. A 20-minute scope call, free, proposal within 48h.

Start a SaaS projectScope it with the calculator

danilson.daveigaramos.pro@gmail.com · Reply within 24h, Mon–Fri.