Building it yourself
Custom is never done – and hard to reuse
You can build your own data layer. Plenty of teams have, and many of those builds fit perfectly on the day they go live. Then the business grows with new sources, new channels, and higher bars, and the fit slips a little every month. Nobody files a ticket for it.
When you build your own data layer:
- Every change is yours to fix. In a custom build, each upstream change lands on your team or your agency.
- New channels mean new code. A custom build has to be reopened for every channel, market, or project.
- The bar keeps rising. A custom build meets each channel's bar on the day it ships, not after.
- The knowledge walks out the door. When the people or the agency behind a custom build move on, nobody keeps it fitting.
- Frontend waits for backend. Without a shared data layer, every new use case becomes a backend ticket.
We've seen this before
Is history repeating itself?
Back when CMSs were new, plenty of companies built their own. They fitted the business perfectly – until the business moved on. New integrations, new versions, new channels. The code stayed the same while everything around it changed, and the custom build that once felt manageable became the thing nobody dared touch.
Custom data layers are heading down the same road.
How to decide
Two questions decide it
Does it set you apart from your competitors?
Does it hurt when it fails?
A data layer rarely sets you apart. But when buyers – and the AI agents shopping for them – find you through your data, a failure isn't a technical fault. It's your shop closing its doors.
Three ways to go
Build, buy, or do it together
| Build it yourself | Buy a closed platform | Do-It-Together with Enterspeed | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Who owns the code | You – all of it | The vendor | You – Enterspeed runs the platform underneath |
| Time to first result | Months | Fast, if your needs match the product | Weeks |
| Fit to your business | Exact today – tighter every month as you grow | You adapt to the product | Exact – and it keeps fitting as you grow |
| New integrations and markets | Reopen the custom build | Wait for the vendor's roadmap | A new view of data you already have |
| Keeping up as the bar rises | Your team, every time the rules change | The vendor's roadmap | The platform – new standards become features, not projects |
| Scaling, hosting, and uptime | Your team | The vendor | Enterspeed – SLA per your agreement |
| When a source system goes down | Often, the page goes down with it | Depends on the vendor | The last version keeps serving |
| Security and compliance | Your team builds, documents, and audits it | Depends on the vendor | ISO/IEC 27001-certified ISMS, GDPR-compliant |
| Reuse across projects | Hard – it's custom | Limited to the product | Built for it – across projects and clients |
| Ready for AI agents | Something you'll need to build too | Depends on the vendor | Yes – Agent Context serves your catalogue without opening your core systems |
Do-It-Together
Do-It-Together – and stay in control
We don't want to take your developers out of your infrastructure. The people who run your systems should understand them and own the setup.
Do-It-Together means you don't have to choose between a custom build and a plug-and-play product. Your team's work happens at both ends – in your own systems, like your PIM, ERP, and CMS, and in the channels that use the data. Enterspeed keeps the part in the middle running.
What your team does
- Designs the schemas and compositions
- Builds the APIs and frontends
- Owns the codebase and the architecture decisions
- Keeps running the systems you already have
What Enterspeed does
- Connects your systems through Sync Connectors or the API
- Composes your data before anyone asks, so a read never waits on your systems
- Delivers it fast to every channel and AI agent
- Takes care of scaling, hosting, and maintenance
- Supports your team and helps with new integrations
Who gains what
Don't waste your developer resources
Developers are scarce and expensive, and a custom data layer ties up your most senior ones. With Enterspeed underneath, your developers spend their time where it makes a difference. What that looks like depends on where you sit.
Architects and tech leads
With Enterspeed, your team designs the data layer instead of maintaining point-to-point integrations. Your systems keep their authority, and you decide the shape each channel gets.
For developers →Heads of ecommerce
With Enterspeed, a new channel or market is not a new project. Launches stop waiting for backend work, and your best developers spend their time on what makes your webshop different, not on plumbing.
B2C retail and e-commerce →Agencies and integrators
With Enterspeed, what your developers build for one client works for the next – so it's work you can sell again, and your clients get to market faster.
Partner programme →From the people who build on it
What our partners say
Yes, Enterspeed provides extremely high performance, but a surprising side effect is the extreme speed of implementation. When using Enterspeed, all developers can quickly modify and combine data sources without having to wait for the backenders’ manual integrations between systems.
We’ve done headless for years, but this is the missing infrastructure piece we’ve been looking for. It effectively removes the friction between developers of different frameworks.
Using Enterspeed allows us to truly work cross team, cross platform, and cross framework. It is an enabler for real composability at scale.
Yes, Enterspeed provides extremely high performance, but a surprising side effect is the extreme speed of implementation. When using Enterspeed, all developers can quickly modify and combine data sources without having to wait for the backenders’ manual integrations between systems.
We’ve done headless for years, but this is the missing infrastructure piece we’ve been looking for. It effectively removes the friction between developers of different frameworks.
Using Enterspeed allows us to truly work cross team, cross platform, and cross framework. It is an enabler for real composability at scale.
Yes, Enterspeed provides extremely high performance, but a surprising side effect is the extreme speed of implementation. When using Enterspeed, all developers can quickly modify and combine data sources without having to wait for the backenders’ manual integrations between systems.
We’ve done headless for years, but this is the missing infrastructure piece we’ve been looking for. It effectively removes the friction between developers of different frameworks.
Using Enterspeed allows us to truly work cross team, cross platform, and cross framework. It is an enabler for real composability at scale.
Frequently asked questions
Can't our own developers just build this?
They can, and some teams have. But building it is a project, and running it is a product – one that has to keep fitting through every new source, channel, and market for years. Most organisations can't sustain a product they don't sell.
Why not just federate our systems behind one API?
You can. Then every request waits on every system, and the answer is only as fast as the slowest one. Enterspeed composes ahead, when a source changes, so the read is a lookup – and the last version keeps serving if a source goes down.
Can't AI just build it for us?
AI makes the first build faster, so you reach more channels sooner – and have more to keep fitting. It helps most when it writes the shaping once, not when it reshapes data on every request. And AI running on undocumented assumptions doesn't fail loudly. It fails confidently.
Do we lose control of our code?
No. Your developers write the schemas in code, build the APIs and frontends, and own the codebase. Enterspeed runs the platform underneath.
Do we need to replace our PIM, ERP, or CMS?
No. Enterspeed carries your data; it never owns it. The systems you already run keep authority over their own data.
Can our agency work on it?
Yes. Agencies and integrators build and run solutions on Enterspeed, and JAKALA and Novicell are among our Gold Partners. If you already have an agency you like working with, we're happy to bring them in. Read about our partner programme.
How do we get started?
With a free demo on a sample of your own data, so you see what Enterspeed does before you commit to anything. Book a demo.
