Custom Built or Standardized Software: What Works Best?

Research has revealed that choosing between custom software and standardized solutions remained a significant challenge in 2024. A Qt Group's commissioned study conducted by Forrester Consulting found that even with platforms in place, a significant portion of development in the embedded software space is still custom-made, highlighting the complexities and trade-offs inherent in platform engineering.

These challenges are particularly acute in industries with diverse use cases or fleets, such as industrial vehicles. Here, tier-one suppliers often handle production-ready software, leaving OEMs to grapple with a critical decision: how much control to retain, especially when user experience, functionality, and brand identity are key to their products and future success.

Here’s a quick breakdown of what works, what doesn’t, and how to make the best choice for your projects.

Custom-Built Solutions: Balancing Complexity and Speed

Custom development is often the best way to produce highly specialized or unique products and is frequently the only viable solution due to complex or one-off requirements. But keep in mind these custom solutions often end up serving as the foundation for an internal development platform or at least the beginnings of one, even if that’s not its intention. That being said, custom solutions typically work best in the following cases:

• When distinctiveness matters: Unique user experiences or brand-defining features require bespoke solutions to stand out.

• When complex hardware demands it: Specialized tools or features that standard platforms can’t accommodate are well-suited for custom approaches.

• When one-off designs suffice: For specific needs that don’t require scalability, custom solutions can address the challenge quickly and efficiently.

• When legacy systems force it: Built environments established in the past cannot be easily updated but companies cannot afford to drop them due to the risk.

Yet, custom development becomes problematic when it’s applied to repetitive tasks or a range of products with similar requirements. Starting from scratch for every project not only leads to inefficiencies but also increases liabilities and costs, delaying time to market and often causing budget overruns.

Platform Engineering: A Framework for Scalability and Future Growth

Platform-based development is an evolution in how organizations approach embedded software, moving away from one-off projects to a systematic, reusable framework. This approach is ideal for product families that share variations but require consistency. Platforms thrive in scenarios like these:

• Streamlined development: Reusable components accelerate timelines and reduce workload duplication.

• Cost efficiency: Leveraging shared frameworks optimizes resources and ensures scalability.

• Future-proofing: Platforms support continuous improvements and simplify updates, ensuring products remain competitive.

However, a platform approach isn’t without its pitfalls. Overemphasizing platform readiness or trying to address every edge case can stall progress, leaving legacy systems untouched and overwhelming teams with unnecessary complexity.

Hybrid Solutions for Legacy System Integration

Legacy systems are a significant hurdle, particularly in industries with fragmented tools and bespoke hardware. The solution? A hybrid strategy: 

• Incremental modernization: Gradual migrations, like those that Qt can enable, allow integration of old and new components within a single HMI to allow the progression of the design, use cases, and functionality without overwhelming users.

• Unified components: Building internal design frameworks that accommodate diverse inputs simplifies future upgrades and ensures compatibility.

Diving into modernization without understanding the current system and having a clear goal or target state often results in costly missteps. Misaligned priorities or unrealistic expectations can derail progress, especially if decision-makers don’t involve developers early to help scope the proper development order and priorities between the current and target states.

Custom or Standard? Follow our Checklist

Balancing the trade-offs between custom and standardized approaches requires clarity, so here’s a handy checklist to guide your choice:

✓ Evaluate Product Diversity

• Prioritize custom solutions for products with excessive unique requirements.

• If similarities exist across product lines, a standardized platform may offer you greater efficiency with configuration covering the final needs.

✓ Assess Long-Term Goals

• Are you building for scale and reusability across product lines or verticals? Opt for a platform approach.

• Is this a one-off project or proof-of-concept (PoC)? A custom solution could save time and resources by focusing on the immediate needs and validation.

✓ Calculate The Fit

• If a platform meets, say, 90% of your needs, adopt it and customize or configure the remaining 10%.

• If it is closer to 60% or even less, the customization effort and limitations may negate the benefits of standardization or even cause a higher cost or longer development cycle.

✓ Prioritize High-Impact Areas

• Focus on modernizing critical components first, such as items or elements that can be complex, used across areas, and might change. Also, think beyond just digital HMIs to the integrations and functionalities such as standardizing sensor inputs or tactile controls (buttons, switches, scroll wheels), which might be different but ultimately drive the same elements or functions.

Platform Engineering Pitfalls to Avoid

Missteps in platform strategies often stem from misjudging maturity. Overpromising platform readiness can lead to delays, excessive customization, and missed opportunities to standardize efficiently. To avoid these issues:

• Emphasize reusability: Platforms should be able to span most, if not all, of the product lines. Focus on enabling modular customization without hindering the scalability and unique requirements of specific lines.

• Maintain realistic expectations: Platforms aren’t a one-size-fits-all solution; they require thoughtful implementation and iteration to get right.

• Foster collaboration: Ensure alignment between leadership, development teams, and verticals to address fragmented systems effectively.

Practical Tips for Industrial Vehicle Companies

Industrial vehicle companies must carefully balance reliance on tier-one suppliers for production-ready software with maintaining control over user experience, functionality, and brand identity.

My three tips are:

1. Focus on differentiation: Invest in innovation where it counts. Build reusable components for routine features, like gauges, but differentiate with unique, value-added capabilities.
   

2. Adopt a scalable framework: Choose a platform that supports various hardware types while allowing for customization where needed. Qt’s platform-agnostic nature and flexible building blocks offer a great starting point for anyone looking to build a platform by ensuring compatibility across devices and the flexibility to build to your business needs.
   

3. Address legacy systems proactively: Modernize high-impact areas first to create a scalable foundation, and don’t be afraid to combine or rebuild when necessary. Platforms are a living part of your organization and should never be looked at as finished or decided.

In conclusion, don’t overemphasize out-of-the-box readiness and cover every unique business need when designing platforms. While standardization is essential, there is value in the ability to customize and expand solutions to meet unique and future needs. By balancing flexibility with reusable and scalable components, companies can innovate faster and deliver value, meeting diverse customer demands without the constraints of a rigid framework or overly custom solutions.

To explore these ideas further and gain insights from executives across industries, read Qt Group’s commissioned study conducted by Forrester Consulting - "Fostering High-Quality Embedded Software Development". This research shines a light on the immense benefits, maturity, and challenges of platform engineering in the embedded software landscape. It's a source of inspiration and motivation for your future endeavors.

Read more also about Qt in Industrial Vehicles.