Video: 10 Minute IT Jams - Who is OutSystems?

OutSystems wants to change how companies build software. With a recent surge in demand, the low-code platform, which allows businesses to design and deploy custom applications more quickly, is placing agility and innovation at the heart of its growth in Australia and New Zealand.

"OutSystems has been around since 2001 and was formed in Lisbon, Portugal, by a group of developers who thought that there had to be a better way to write code and build applications," said Paul Arthur, Vice President for Australia and New Zealand. He explained that, in its 19-year history, the company has developed a "very rich product that effectively automates and visualises the code writing process, to allow people to develop faster, more agile solutions for their enterprise".

This approach has found new relevance amid the disruption triggered by the pandemic. "COVID-19 has brought into very clear relief the fact that agility is one of the key traits that businesses need," Arthur said. He noted that, while many businesses once sacrificed flexibility in favour of lower costs or rigid standardisation, the world had shifted. "Every company is now a software company," he said – not literally, but in the sense that "software has a role to play in pretty much every business, across any of the industry sectors".

In Australia, this means a renewed focus on custom-built technology. "People are now trying to use software to become the differentiator of their business," Arthur explained. Instead of relying exclusively on off-the-shelf packages, which can make companies "the same as everybody else", organisations are seeking tools that provide a unique customer experience and more efficient operations.

OutSystems' low-code model is seeing rising interest. "There's definitely a move to use things like low-code application development platforms to create differentiation of experience for their customers, and create differentiation of their cost base within their infrastructure," Arthur said.

The company has felt the impact. "We've had to ramp up. We've been hiring more people to actually meet the demand of what our customers and our prospects have come to us for, because people are starting to look to use the technology in more compelling ways," he said. To meet these needs, OutSystems has released new functions, including workflow building, "not just building applications from a visual perspective for end-user client experience, but actually building internal workflows to connect many disparate systems".

OutSystems is now used by organisations both large and small, according to Arthur – with more than 100 customers in the ANZ region and some 1,500 globally. Their clients range from resource companies to finance and retail, healthcare, and government. "Our applications and our solutions actually fit any organisation that wants to use software to improve their customer or employee experience, or the efficiency of their IT business," he said.

These customers mostly use OutSystems for three areas. The first, Arthur said, is "digital experience – creating this omni-channel, seamless experience for their customers so they can move from web to mobile to desktop and back again, with a level of consistency of experience that allows them to obviously interact more efficiently".

He cited a specific case: an Australian customer, Universal Business Team, used OutSystems to rapidly create a new application "that allowed their volunteers to actually take to market a rapid relief food package delivery process under COVID in under six weeks to react to the demands of people who may be stuck at home and weren't able to actually get out to the shops during the first lockdown phase". OutSystems provided both the mobile app for volunteers and the integration with scheduling systems to orchestrate deliveries.

The second key use is what the company calls "digital core". This involves modernising legacy systems that might otherwise block innovation. Arthur explained, "Many of those systems, although not broken, are limiting their ability to innovate." For example, the revenue office in the Australian Capital Territory used OutSystems to "wrap around one of their legacy systems, to take advantage of our systems' more mobile and visual interfaces and our ability to connect through multiple APIs to many different technologies". The ultimate goal: migrate to entirely modern, flexible platforms.

Arthur is keen to challenge the notion that low-code is only suitable for simple or superficial apps. "Whenever you use the word low code, it can be quite emotive," he said. "People often think it's just for building apps, maybe for front-end mobile; it's not something that's robust enough for an enterprise or for building a live application." But he insists this is a misconception. Low-code, as OutSystems defines it, is about "the automatic automation and visualisation of coding. The code that's created underneath the platform is as powerful and as strong as any manually created code – it's just done in a more efficient and agile manner".

He also pointed to reduced "technical debt" – the complex, undocumented, and often outdated legacy code that can plague older IT systems. "The platform writes the code, you direct the platform to create the code, and what that means is you're not building yourself legacy and you're not building yourself technical debt, because the platform is always updating that core code," he said.

Looking ahead, OutSystems is doubling down on accessibility. "We really believe in our product and we like people to be able to touch it and feel it," Arthur said. He encouraged anyone interested in "building new applications in a rapid and agile way" to try the platform for themselves, highlighting the ease with which new users can develop "usable applications in a matter of hours".

Arthur's message to organisations exploring their digital potential is clear: "It's not low code, it's low workload of building code."