> What does "[going] into enterprise" mean? Going into enterprise means more than having just a behind-the-firewall solution. Deploying code behind the firewal

> What does "[going] into enterprise" mean? Going into enterprise means more than having just a behind-the-firewall solution. Deploying code behind the firewall means that you are at the mercy of the customer's environment and have to be much more forgiving than running in an "opinionated" SaaS environment. To wit, here is a laundry list of things you have to deal with for enterprise customers, and they all require time, money, and support. + Slower release cycle than SaaS - you may not be able to push updates to customer environments at will. They may require that they decide when to take updates, which means their codebase could be several months behind. (Not always, but it can happen). + Data & privacy laws, particularly for European customers. Do you love S3? A lot of companies don't, and governments especially don't. This means potentially rolling your own elastic file storage which must also be deployed behind the firewall. + You get into managing a cluster for the customer, not just a single instance. + Your software must fit the security scheme of the customer. In a SaaS environment, you typically have a great deal of control over the network topology. Behind the firewall, company policy may require that only certain ports be open. This might mean re-writing code to either serve a lot of protocols over port 80 or being on long support calls while people file tickets and wait for IT to punch open holes for you. (And then sometimes close them right back up, requiring you to repeat the cycle every time you deploy). + It's also not uncommon to have a dedicated team just for the enterprise customers, or even a dedicated team just for one enterprise customer. This requires hiring people who must be trained and brought up to speed. As I'm sure you're aware, engineer salaries are a big cost factor. + If time differences are too large or too inconvenient, you may need to hire people in other parts of the world. This means needing to comply with local laws and regulations. Which usually means hiring lawyers, additional HR people, etc. The list goes on and on. Deploying for the enterprise can be much more involved than what you might think.