Some industrial commercial and customer processes need more than a content website.
We handle industrial web application development for guided product selection, configuration, request-for-quote workflows, controlled document access, distributor and installer services, and the internal approval processes that currently run on email. The work starts by simplifying a real process, then building only the software needed to make it more reliable and easier to audit.
Most of these tools live or die on their integrations. A configurator that cannot read the ERP, a quote workflow that cannot write to the CRM or a document area that does not know which revision is current adds work rather than removing it, so we confirm what each system can expose before the scope is fixed.
We map users, inputs, decisions, hand-offs, systems and exceptions before committing to development, because industrial web application development goes wrong most often when a custom tool becomes a digital copy of an inefficient manual process. The people to interview are rarely the ones who wrote the brief: the specifying engineer, the internal sales desk, the distributor placing the order and the plant that has to fulfil it each see a different part of the same workflow.
That mapping usually shortens the scope. Steps that exist only because a spreadsheet made them necessary disappear once the state is held in a system, and the remaining build is smaller, cheaper and easier to adopt.
Where a platform is complex, we define a first release that creates value on its own, validate it with the people who will use it daily, and build the next phase on what that release taught us. Security, roles, permissions and integrations are designed into those phases from the start rather than retrofitted once a second user group appears.
Phasing matters more in industrial projects than in most, because procurement cycles are long and internal approval is slow. A tool that reaches a distributor network in four months and grows from there tends to produce better requirements than a twelve-month build specified entirely in advance.
Some requests drift, during scoping, out of web application territory and into something else: logic that belongs in the ERP or the MES, a tool expected to drive equipment on the shop floor, or a calculation that carries engineering liability. Each of those has different governance, a different security review and a different cost base.
We flag that boundary as soon as we see it rather than at delivery, and we would rather recommend the ERP module, the specialist vendor or a narrower scope than build a web application into a role it should not hold.
Code Industrial is the industrial B2B practice of Code Barcelona, an agency building corporate websites and digital platforms since 2015. The same strategy, design and engineering team works on every industrial project, from the first scoping session through to life after launch.
The requests repeat across technical B2B businesses. Industrial web application development usually begins with one of these operational problems.
What comes up before committing to building software.
Typical examples include guided product selection and configuration, structured request-for-quote workflows, controlled access to drawings and certificates, distributor and installer services, warranty and returns handling, and account dashboards showing order and delivery status. The useful test is whether the process is commercially valuable, happens often enough to justify software, and is shaped by rules an off-the-shelf product cannot express without heavy configuration.
Yes, and that connection is usually the reason for building custom rather than buying. We agree data ownership, authentication, refresh frequency and failure handling before development starts, so the application fits the wider operating environment. The real constraint is what those systems can expose through an API, a middleware layer or a scheduled export, and who internally owns that access. We confirm both during scoping, because discovering mid-build that a system cannot supply what was assumed is far more expensive to fix.
Configure the product where your process resembles the one it was designed for. Build custom where the business logic is the differentiator, where the rules are specific to your commercial model, or where licence and configuration costs over three to five years exceed the build. We compare those routes openly during scoping, including the option of a smaller custom tool sitting alongside a standard platform rather than replacing it.
Pricing tiers, contract prices, discount matrices, minimum quantities and pack multiples normally stay in the ERP, which remains the source of truth. The application reads them for the authenticated account and applies them consistently across search, quotation and ordering. Where a rule exists only in a spreadsheet or in somebody’s head, scoping surfaces it and we agree where it should live before the build encodes it in a second place.
Yes, and that is worth designing for at the start even if the first release covers one market. Plant, market and language become attributes of the data and the user rather than separate deployments, so availability, pricing, units of measure, document sets and approval paths can differ by country without forking the codebase. Retrofitting that structure to a single-market application is one of the more expensive changes to make later.
It depends far more on integration and internal approval than on the interface. A self-contained tool with a single integration can reach a first usable release in a few months. A configurator drawing on ERP and PIM data, with roles for head office, plants and distributors, takes longer, and much of that time is spent confirming what the source systems can supply. We phase the work so something usable reaches real users early rather than at the end.
Custom software needs a named owner and a maintenance arrangement from day one. We agree who that is, and what the ongoing support covers, before development starts, because a bespoke tool without an owner accumulates problems faster than a standard website does. That arrangement usually covers monitoring, security updates, bug fixes and small adjustments as your commercial process changes, together with a route for planning larger changes.
Application work usually arrives with integration and portal requirements attached. These are the services it sits with.
Tell us what users need to complete, where the process breaks down and which systems hold the data. We will assess the right product scope and delivery phasing.