The Real Value Behind MACH and Composable Platforms

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In the spirit of The Agile Alliance, a small but growing group of SaaS platform providers formed The MACH Alliance. I won't reiterate what they stand for, feel free to follow the link. What I want to briefly (I hope) call out is, for folks building a digital solution, "what's in it for them?".

You're thinking about the wrong thing

I find many folks, especially if they are technology focused, get hung up on the technical architecture surrounding MACH solutions. This "can" be valueable, but I find most orgnaizations that are focused on, say, "selling things other than software" don't really need THEIR solution to be MACH compliant and the principles behind a MACH solution are overhead. As a software consultant, I've run across a growing number of clients that say they want a "MACH Compliant" solution. Personally, unless you're building a platforms that is intentionally a set of APIs for other folks to use, pay for, and you manage, this is looking at the wrong dimension.

Real Value Cases

The real value propositions behind most platforms in this space are:
  • Openness: These platforms are intentionally designed to be integrated in a much more open manner. This means that you don't need "secret API docs" or "proprietary software tooling" to use thier software. They are all API addressable and rely on passing messages of a known format either with REST/GraphQL APIs or dropping messages into queues/event streams and listening for responses. This greatly reduces the need for SI partners with super specialized knowledge to use the platforms and instead opens the gateway to your consulting partners crafting a solution around your particular business opportunities.
  • Interoperability: While many legacy platforms have ways to integrate with other platforms, they are often coupled with baggage and very proprietary protocols, APIs, and even licensing problems that inhibit interoperability. MACH platforms are designed to work with other systems and "if there isn't an API to do it, there's a API/hook to expose an event that allows you to integrate another solution.
  • Pay for what you need: Legacy platforms tend to charge you for the engineering/support of components you might not even need. A vast number of clients use legacy platforms and pay for their internal order management, search, content management solutions, but then pay for "yet another platform" to actually fulfill those functions because the capabilities in this other platform more closely align with their needs. In contrast, MACH order management platforms don't even attempt to give you a content management/asset delivery platform, they are focused on transactional processing and order capture (for the most part), leaving other functions to be something you can integrate with their platform.
  • Do One Thing Well: Generally speaking, MACH platforms are really really good at one thing. Similar to the previous bullets, you aren't paying for Contentful to have an order capture, payment gateway, or catalog management capability...you're just paying for content management and/or digital asset management. The reality is, most platforms (especially large platforms recently attempting to become SAAS/Cloud tools) are a conglomoration of tools that have been retrofitted to work together, but this integration isn't really suited to any single business case except "selling software". This leads to a situation where folks try to buy "a one size fits all" solution, not realizing most of these solutions are "one size fits none".

The promise behind the MACH brand

I want to reiterate, the promise behind the MACH brand isn't technical in nature, but it is that you are buying a discrete set of functionality without the downside of paying for work, rework, or falling into a proprietary money pit that many legacy platforms can (without careful and thoughtful up front work) often become. Yes, you can still dig yourself into a hole with MACH platforms, but the overall negative impact of any single platform is mitigated by the inherent scope limitations that any single platforms consciously builds into their offering. The real value proposition is that you are empowered to use the best tool for particular problem domains and only need to invest in solving problems that are strategic to your business objectives.

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