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Decision aid

Microsoft Cloud or custom software?

We deliver both — and we'll tell you honestly which path fits. On this page you'll find a decision matrix with 12 criteria plus a self-assessment. This is meant as a buyer's aid, not a sales pitch — since we deliver both stacks, we have no incentive to push you toward one side.

45-min architecture conversation Go to matrix
Twin pillars — no sales bias 12 criteria Self-assessment score Hybrid is often the right answer

Why this page

Pure Microsoft partners and pure custom shops each give you only half the answer.

Ask a pure Microsoft partner whether Microsoft Cloud is the right choice, and the answer is yes. Ask a pure custom-software shop whether building custom is the right choice, and the answer is also yes. Both are right within the scenarios their tools fit.

We've been building Microsoft Cloud for over 20 years and Independent Engineering in parallel for eight. We earn our living from both stacks, so we have no preference for which path you take — what matters is that you end up with a solution you can support. To that end, 12 criteria.

The matrix

12 criteria — where each approach wins.

One honest assessment per row. "Microsoft" here means the Microsoft Cloud standard products (Dynamics 365, Power Platform, Microsoft 365). "Independent" means custom software on open-source frameworks and EU-hosted infrastructure.

Criterion Microsoft Cloud Independent Engineering When which?
Time-to-value ✓✓ Standard configuration in production in 8–12 weeks ○ MVP in 12–16 weeks, complete platform in 6–9 months If you need immediate impact in a standard use case: Microsoft.
License costs (long term) ○ Per-user-per-month licenses scale with growth ✓✓ One-time build cost, then only hosting + maintenance With many thousands of end users or external users, custom is often cheaper.
Customization depth ○ Configuration + Power Platform extensions cover 70–85% of requirements ✓✓ 100% tailored to your process, no platform limits If standard covers 80%, Microsoft is faster. Otherwise custom.
Ecosystem integration ✓✓ Out-of-the-box integration with M365, Teams, Outlook, SharePoint, Power BI ○ Integrations have to be built one by one (via open APIs) With deep Microsoft 365 usage, free integration matters.
Sovereignty / data location ○ EU Data Boundary available, US Cloud Act remains a residual risk ✓✓ On Hetzner / STACKIT in Germany, no US access BSI requirements, NIS2 / KRITIS, BAFIN-regulated: Independent.
Vendor lock-in ○ Microsoft-specific, platform switch is expensive ✓✓ Open-source stack, any engineer can take over If you treat vendor lock-in as a conscious risk: Independent.
Recruiting / skills ✓ Many Microsoft consultants and users in the market ○ TypeScript/Next.js/Postgres engineers available, but specialists If you need to train many staff long-term: Microsoft.
Mobile / offline ✓ Mobile apps included, offline mode limited ✓ PWA optimization, offline-first possible With hard offline requirements (field-service reality), often custom.
AI integration ✓✓ Copilot built in, Foundry for pro dev, standard RAG ready ✓ Direct API access to OpenAI, Anthropic, Mistral, local LLMs Microsoft for M365-deep adoption. Independent for specific model selection.
Compliance & audit ✓✓ Microsoft Purview, Defender, Entra ID — compliance stack out of the box ○ Compliance tools have to be built yourself NIS2 + GDPR + audit requirements: Microsoft.
UX / brand experience ○ Microsoft's own UI, limited branding ✓✓ Complete UX and brand control For customer-facing portals or brand-driven UX: Independent.
In-house skill building ✓ Citizen-developer path via Power Platform ○ Engineering team needed, or external maintenance If you have no internal engineering capacity: Microsoft.

✓✓ clear advantage · ✓ advantage · ○ neutral or situational

Hybrid is often the answer

It's not either-or.

In practice, with many mid-sized companies we see: Microsoft Cloud carries the standard business, an Independent Engineering module covers a differentiating specialty. Examples:

  • CRM on Microsoft Dynamics 365 Sales — member portal as a custom platform on Next.js
  • ERP on Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central — industry-specific configurator as a custom application
  • Service tickets in Dynamics 365 Customer Service — field-technician PWA with strict offline logic, custom-built
  • Microsoft Copilot for internal adoption — separate AI agent for an end-customer chatbot with a dedicated model

We build these hybrid architectures routinely. Prerequisite: clean interface concepts and an honest assessment of what belongs where. That's the focus of our 45-min Architecture & Strategy advisory.

Self-assessment

Six questions, one tendency.

If you clearly answer "yes" to four or more of these questions, that points to Independent Engineering. Otherwise Microsoft Cloud is the more likely answer. This heuristic doesn't replace proper advice, but it gives a first tendency.

  1. Do you have BSI, KRITIS, NIS2, or BAFIN requirements that make EU hosting mandatory?
  2. Does your use case scale to several thousand end users (internal or external)?
  3. Is your application the business model itself (e.g., SaaS platform, marketplace, member portal)?
  4. Do you have specific AI model requirements outside the Microsoft stack (e.g., Aleph Alpha, local LLMs)?
  5. Is vendor lock-in a risk you consciously want to avoid?
  6. Do Microsoft standard products cover less than 60% of your core requirements?

In the 45-min architecture conversation, we walk through your answers point by point and translate the result into a concrete recommendation. With a clear hybrid setup, we also outline the interface concept directly.

45-min architecture conversation

Let's walk through your 12 criteria together.

In 45 minutes we classify your requirements and say whether Microsoft Cloud, Independent Engineering, or a hybrid architecture fits. If the answer is clearly Microsoft, we say so. If custom is a better fit, we say that too. If neither of us is enough, we recommend from our network.

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