Introducing Birth of LCDP.ai Low Code Development Platform

LCDP.ai is an exceptionally user-friendly and feature-rich low-code development platform.

In a nutshell:

Build backend services for various B2C or enterprise applications with just 1/10 of the workforce and 1/10 of the time.

Key Features:

• Ultra-low-cost private deployment ensures data security and compliance.
• High customization support with numerous system hooks for almost any business logic.
• Highly abstract, self-bootstrapping, and data-centric, where everything, including code and metadata, is treated as data. The platform is built using this approach.
• Native support for large AI models, allowing them to be used as the engine for logic development in the system.

Ideal Use Cases:

• Building internal management systems for businesses of all sizes, especially suitable for large enterprises due to our support for high customization and ultra-low-cost private deployment.
• Teams with business resources developing vertical industry solutions based on our platform, such as beauty industry ERP, Web3 privacy matchmaking, production line control MES systems, and more.
• Individuals or small teams can quickly undertake and deliver various information management application development projects for businesses.
• B2C applications, rapidly creating backend data management systems, building interfaces with consumer-facing applications, or using the platform as a FAAS to expose numerous business interfaces to frontend applications.

The Evolution of Our Low-Code Journey

Let me introduce how our small team's super user-friendly and highly customizable low-code development platform, http://muyan.io, was developed step by step.

The Beginning

First, let's talk about the background: After my former employer, IBM, cut a product line and all teams except me (a team of more than a dozen people was cut, leaving only me), I declined all retention measures, including promotion, salary increase, and retention bonus.

Then, because of the customer trust I had built up with clients, all existing customers came directly to me, not my former employer, hoping I could help with system maintenance and related subsequent development.

Since the former employer still had a lot of significant business with these customers, it was not good to fall out with the customers and not let me take over, especially since the complete layoff of all teams had already dissatisfied the customers. This was the first step.

The One-Person Company

Then, the customers entrusted all system maintenance and related new development to my one-person company... It was a time of trepidation.

I immediately registered a small company with 500,000 yuan (with an actual capital injection of 0). Then, I got the green light all the way, passing the supplier qualification review of these Fortune 500 companies 😂.

Then, through exclusive or competitive negotiations, all customers entrusted me with the original system's maintenance and development contracts.

The Decision for a low-code development platform

In the development process, there was no initial idea of developing a low-code development platform, but rather some manual development of add-on systems or support systems based on SpringBoot + Antd, because it was all custom development according to requirements, and at that time, the use of antd in enterprise applications was still relatively rare, and the UI was very new, so customer satisfaction was very high. This was the second step.

So how did we decide to start creating a general low-code development platform? During the process of building business systems with SpringBoot + antD, I strongly felt that in the more than ten years of enterprise application implementation and development I had done, there were many common system patterns, including business patterns.

• CRUD pages
• Quick object search
• Action definitions and implementations for specific objects, a few objects, or a class of objects
• Default value settings for fields on the interface, inter-field linkage, cascading, visibility, etc.
• Injection of some customized logic at certain nodes in the lifecycle of an object, such as creation, modification, deletion, and viewing
• Execution of specific code at system startup or at specific time nodes
• Flexible permission control, flexible configuration based on roles and user groups
• Flexible multi-step data collection forms, etc.
• Ability to flexibly add dynamic field definitions, etc.
• Flexible role-based dashboards, widget support, etc.

Based on this understanding, I decided to start from scratch and build a set of business development platforms that could flexibly perform the above and more customization. In my vision, this system should meet the following criteria:

• Modern interface (though slightly outdated now)
• Powerful customization features, and customization logic, etc., without deployment or service interruption
• All interface elements are driven by metadata, and no customization is required during project implementation except for page display CSS.
• Other various functions

The Development Journey

So, single-handedly, I started to develop such a low-code development platform.

During the development process, it was combined with the various enterprise application requirements proposed by customers to drive the development of the low-code development platform and avoid deviations.

After more than half a year of development, the first version of the product was completed, around the end of 2020.

After the first business project based on the platform was implemented at the customer's site, the customer was amazed by the powerful customization capabilities and ultra-fast development speed.

The IT department invited us for an exchange, and we found that we could actually play cards with Microsoft's Power Apps... something I couldn't even imagine 😆

Of course, at the end, the customer considered various factors and chose the low-code development platform of a large manufacturer as the development base for the entire group company, and we could only use the low-code development platform in the business department to develop related business systems.

Fortunately, the business department highly recognized our work, ability, and character, so it was a situation where the customer actively helped us find projects.

Embracing AI

Later, with the explosion of GPT, we realized that the low-code development platform product must have AI as the underlying infrastructure, as the base, to not fall behind in future competition.

So in 2023, we focused on introducing the Large Language Model (LLM) as the platform's basic capability, achieving the following effects:

In any customized logic of the system, the LLM large model can be used directly as the processing node.

Thus, our low-code development platform has become what you see now: a highly customizable, AI-native low-code development platform.

Current Work and Future Prospects

Currently, we are working on expanding the platform's domain model definition capabilities, with plans to make it the most distinctive low-code development platform in the world.

This function has already been developed and is currently being tested.

If you are intrested in this feature, please contact us for a related demo.

When this feature is fully tested and shipped, LCDP.ai low-code development platform will become the most distinctive low-code platform that can complete end-to-end development on the web interface and support highly customizable code development.

Register on https://discourse.lcdp.ai and connect with us there for more information and discussions about Low Code Development Platform.