Why Business Software Lags Behind

If we zoom back to the year 2000, new devices called personal digital assistants (PDAs) were hitting the market. They were not real pocket computers like we have today, but these R&D teams understood the overall marketing and consumer behaviour that was going to work in the years to come. They needed to be simple, stylus-friendly and easy to navigate without any computer training.

Early PDAs still had the concept of multiple apps in one interface (Credit: Handspring Visor, 1999)

But then came the era of cloud computing and software-as-a-service (SaaS), where every startup was rushing to replace the next spreadsheet with a pleasant database that could be run on the web. Procurement departments embraced them to get away from spreadsheet chaos, and employees learned to use them due to company policy.

But what have we lost along the way?

B2B Software is designed for RFPs, not Users

The procurement department does not care about the experience of the end user who will be using the tool day-in day-out. Their focus is on checking boxes on a list of features and whether they are compliant in storing data.

Most SaaS today is at best poorly optimised for a mobile user journey (Credit: Cloudview Partners 2025)

However, for consumer apps, the focus shifts to whether the interface will work in the real-world, and whether the overall experience of using the app with match the day-to-day routine as the user goes about their day on a mobile device.

The fix: As well as meeting the important requirements of the procurement department, the UI and functionality of the software should be reverse-engineered from the day-to-day needs of the employee who will be using the tool throughout their day. Just as this influenced the functionality that was developed for OnePal, this would lead to new design choices and functionality that capitalise on the mobile interface and glasses in the coming years.

In OnePal, the backend CRM is connected to interactive membership passes on mobile, collecting rich data unmatched by other CRMs on the market

We need Ecosystems. Not Apps

'There is an app for that' does not work.

Information needs to intergate between each business app, while also giving businesses the flexibility of linking files from the software they already use.

All OnePall apps run in the cloud, syncing information between team members

This is a why a digital cloud hub is a more flexible solution for most businesses, whatever their industry:

1. The software is simple to use, like a consumer app.

2. All apps in the hub are mobile optimised, removing the need for additional training

3. The simple approach to each app means that you can integrate your other existing software

4. All the apps are connected and share information, like a mini cloud operating system

OnePal makes traditionally complex business processes plug-in-and-play