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From Product to Platform: Scaling Strategy

Architecture, Product Management, Scalability, System Design
From Product to Platform: Scaling Strategy

From Product to Platform: Scaling Strategy

One of the biggest challenges for growing tech companies is the transition from a single product to a comprehensive platform. During my years as an architect and product manager at companies like iZettle, H&M, and P27, I've seen both successful transformations and costly mistakes.

Modular Architecture from the Start

The most common mistake I see is companies building monolithic products that later become difficult to break down. A successful scaling strategy begins with modular architecture from the start:

Product
 ├── Core Functionality
 │    └── Well-defined APIs
 ├── Service Models
 │    └── Clear Domain Boundaries
 └── Infrastructure
      └── Scalable Cloud Architecture

This structure enables gradual expansion without recreating the entire system as needs grow.

Identify Platform Opportunities Early

To move from product to platform, you need to identify three key elements:

  1. Common Building Blocks - Which components can be reused by multiple products?
  2. Standardized Interfaces - How can we expose functionality in a consistent way?
  3. Orchestration Capabilities - How can we allow third-party actors to build on our platform?

In my roles at payment platforms, I've seen how these principles create conditions for exponential growth. When we at iZettle expanded our payment infrastructure into a platform for small businesses, API design was the key to success.

Pitfalls to Avoid

Three common pitfalls I often discuss with my mentees:

  1. Premature Optimization - Don't build for 100 million users when you have 100
  2. Insufficient Abstraction - Overly specific solutions limit future possibilities
  3. Over-microservicification - Distributed systems are complex; don't break down too early

Checklist for Successful Scaling

  • [ ] Functional domains are clearly defined
  • [ ] External dependencies are abstracted behind interfaces
  • [ ] Data model supports multi-tenancy
  • [ ] Technical debt is continuously addressed
  • [ ] Infrastructure supports auto-scaling

I will delve deeper into each of these points in upcoming posts. Stay tuned for more on how we implemented these principles in practice when building P27's Nordic payment platform.