Tech-Driven Success: How to Build a SaaS Startup and Thrive in the AI Era

Okay! My first opinion is that “Don’t think that the SaaS application market is going down due to this AI revolution; think of it as just getting easier and, mind my point, more efficient! Hence, everyone needs it.”

I am a guy who has seen the biggest technological boom in our whole human history. At that time, I was also thinking about startup ideas like Facebook, Twitter, Google. But now I am in college, about to complete my Bachelor’s degree in computer science, and now it feels like I am out of ideas, or ideas won’t work due to bad economics.

But before I explain how you can find ideas for a startup, we first need to learn how the SaaS tech actually works and the most used tech stack, so if you have an idea, then visualizing the optimized implementation becomes easy.

Now how to understand the tech of SaaS:

Learn system design (basics will be enough): GitHub Start skimming with this repo.
Javascript basics: Just start any one shot video start tweaking with javascript in different compilers.
HTML, Tailwind CSS.: Now HTML just understand the basics but tailwind CSS I can’t stress this point enough how much important it is and how it makes website development very easy.
Frameworks (Nodejs,React, Nextjs and typescript): Skimming of these documentation will be enough and learn about the as many frameworks you can start with documentation first.
Try building some easy projects of full stack:
Try cloning of big projects:
Case study of different saas systems.

After you have a good overview of the concepts mentioned above, you will feel like building similar startups like Facebook, Twitter, etc., is doable, just a little bit more complex.

Also, I would like to put additional stress on the subjects of System Design and Frameworks. When I started learning system design, which is not in my B.Tech curriculum, I felt like I was learning complete computer science engineering in one subject.

The tech industry is all about frameworks. For example, let’s say you want to develop a feature in a website that helps reduce the re-rendering of your SaaS application. You can do it using core concepts and long implementation of basic languages such as HTML, JavaScript, CSS, and you have to do it again and again for many applications. Then Facebook build a framework using the same core code — React.

My point here is that learning all these tech stacks is important because they are in constant improvement, releasing new versions very frequently, which gives different operational benefits for any SaaS business logic, helping reduce cost and improve the quality of the SaaS application.

Having the basics to implement these frameworks will help you build faster and more efficiently. For a prototype SaaS application, I would use Next.js 14, React, TypeScript, Tailwind CSS, Convex (BaaS), Clerk (Authentication and user management), and Vercel for deployment.

Ideas ???

Now, if you are thinking about how you can build your own startups with these, then there’s a word that has been floating in the industry or say everywhere: “SPOF” (Single Point of Failure). Now, if you are in India, think what would happen if WhatsApp exits India. Put simply, it will disrupt the market; that’s why all governments need more than one provider of a service to avoid a single point of failure. Governments also support such startups; you just have to come up with something different or something extra.

That’s one way to start, but to build a real startup that actually solves a real problem, try exploring different markets, see the real problem, and try to visualize solutions with technology. That’s all I can say about your billion-dollar idea.

You also have to understand that this industry works on efficiency, so if you understand the system very well and you find something that will increase efficiency, then it’s a goldmine.

Understand that having these skills on your resume and live SaaS applications will also help you land a good job.

That’s all I have to say about SaaS and startups. Let me acknowledge that all the above content is my own understanding from all the exposure to technologies I have had, and I am still learning about all these to build such startups one day. I am NO industry expert.

Hit clap if it helped you understand the world a little more and contact me if you have a cool collaboration idea.