SaaS Replacement

Assess. Replace. Own.

What the AI era means for your stack and your budget

The era of one-size-fits-all enterprise software is ending. AI has changed the economics of custom development and for the first time, mid-market and enterprise companies can replace expensive SaaS subscriptions with purpose-built platforms on their own infrastructure. Lower total cost of ownership. Full control over your data and your roadmap.

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SaaS replacement

The SaaS Contract You Signed Three Years Ago Deserves a Second Look.

For years, buying enterprise software off the shelf made economic sense. Building custom was expensive, slow, and risky. That calculation has changed.

AI-assisted development means an experienced engineering team can now build and maintain what previously required a much larger one. The platforms that cost €100–500k per year in licensing fees are increasingly being replaced by custom-built alternatives, running on cloud infrastructure you already own, at a fraction of the running cost.

This is already happening: enterprise leaders are renegotiating renewals, questioning lock-in, and asking which workflows they truly need to own.

Read more →

Turn SaaS Spend Into a Strategic Asset

SaaS renewals are an operating expense. The platform we build with you sits on your balance sheet, integrates natively with your data warehouse, and evolves on your roadmap, not your vendor's.

We convert your highest-cost SaaS subscriptions into owned, custom-built platforms that deliver the same functionality (often more) at lower total cost of ownership. No per-seat pricing. No vendor lock-in. No roadmap you can't influence.

  • Full ownership of your platform, your data, and your integrations.
  • A predictable engineering cost that replaces an unpredictable licence bill.
  • A system your team understands and can extend, not a black box maintained by a third party.
Replace SaaS with AI
Download our SaaS Replacement Guide →

Where the Business Case Lands First

Analytics & BI - Qlick (or other BI tool) → BigQuery Stack

Replace BI tool with a metric layer built natively on BigQuery, dbt, and your existing data infrastructure. Structurally cheaper and your semantic layer becomes a real, versionable asset owned by your team.

Analytics & BI - Qlick (or other BI tool) → BigQuery Stack

Customer Data Platform - Segment → Warehouse-Native CDP

CDP logic belongs next to your data warehouse. Replace Segment with identity resolution and reverse ETL built on BigQuery, covering 80% of use cases at a fraction of the licence cost, with full data residency.
Customer Data Platform - Segment → Warehouse-Native CDP

Integration Platform - MuleSoft → Cloud Run

MuleSoft's per-connector pricing scales exponentially. From around 20 integrations, a custom integration layer on Cloud Run becomes structurally cheaper, easier to maintain, and fully under your control.
Integration Platform - MuleSoft → Cloud Run

iPaaS - Boomi → Custom Integration Layer

Enterprise iPaaS pricing is hard to justify when your flows are stable and low-volume. We build lightweight, maintainable integration layers that do the job, without the overhead or the renewal anxiety.
iPaaS - Boomi → Custom Integration Layer

How We Deliver a SaaS Replacement

Three phases. All three are required for the business case to hold -  we design for the full lifecycle from day one, not just the build.
Instead of handing you a migration roadmap and walking away, we work through every stage alongside you: the decision, the build, and the ongoing operation. Here is what that looks like in practice:

Assessment

3–4 weeks

We build a detailed TCO model for each tool you are considering replacing: licence costs versus build-and-run costs, a technical scorecard, and a prioritised migration roadmap. One architect and one account lead. You leave with a clear decision framework — and the numbers to take to your CFO.

Outcome: go / no-go per tool, with full cost model and roadmap. 

Co-Build

3–9 months

A Crystalloids team of 3–6 engineers builds alongside 1–2 of your own engineers. Not for you, with you. The goal is a platform your team fully understands, can extend, and will be proud to own. Every architectural decision is made together, and documented.

Outcome: a production-grade platform, a capable internal team, and no black boxes.

Managed & Handover

12–24 months

A small Crystalloids team runs and improves the platform while we build your internal capability in parallel. Handover criteria are defined explicitly at the start, you always know what 'ready to own it' looks like.

Outcome: a fully operational managed service transitioning to in-house ownership on a clear schedule.

Kevin
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Why Crystalloids?

A successful SaaS Replacement is not just an engineering challenge. It requires deep platform knowledge, the ability to make architectural trade-offs in front of a client's CTO, and the discipline to build for long-term operability, not just delivery speed. This is where Crystalloids stands apart.

Built on Google Cloud, Not SaaS Dependency

We have been building on Google Cloud since 2006. BigQuery, Cloud Run, Pub/Sub, dbt, we know these tools deeply enough to replace the SaaS layers built on top of them. No platform allegiances. No preferred vendors. Just the right stack for your situation.

How we work →

20+ years of Google Cloud expertise

Crystalloids was among the first companies to adopt BigQuery. With 50+ certifications and multiple Google Cloud specialisations - including a Premier Partner status - we have delivered complex data, integration, and AI projects for some of the most demanding enterprise clients in the Netherlands and beyond.

See our specialisations →

Tailored to Your Stack, Your Team, Your Timeline

No two License Replacements are the same. We start from your existing infrastructure, your team's capability, and your renewal window, then design a migration that minimises disruption and maximises the asset value of what we build together. You stay in control throughout.