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Rafsark
Joined 830 karma
0x581e5735d76c6a884c96f810b0e74f45ff49c33b

YC alumni (S21)

  4. Rafsark parent
    You are right! The issues usually happen when you add more complexity (tiers, discounts, credit notes, coupons, prepaid credits). Also, what I find very tough is that this is not a « one stop shop »: every single company has it’s own definition of what should be included or excluded from the MRR. I am pretty sure you never end up on an universal definition
  5. Rafsark parent
    That’s one of the options, yes. Chartmogul does an amazing job at ingesting and retrieving revenue data from stripe
  6. Rafsark parent
    You’ve got plenty of paid options with Stripe, but here’s the catch: trying to match what you see in the Stripe dashboard with exact cent accuracy using queries is a total headache. in addition, it would be simpler to add an option to pull that data via an API call.
  7. Rafsark parent
    Yes! And ARR = annual recurring revenue. In addition to other saas metrics like usage revenue that is pure consumption based and sometimes calculated differently
  9. Rafsark parent
    But Amazon uses a custom homegrown usage based billing, not relying on Stripe Billing. This is why Lago exists, to offer a flexible usage-based billing architecture for companies offering usage based or hybrid billing without having to build everything on their own.
  10. Rafsark parent
    If you spotted it, it means than images have a greater impact than words.
  11. Rafsark parent
    We're diving into creating an alternative to one of Stripe's key services which is billing. Especially focusing on areas where Stripe struggles, like mixed or usage-based billing models. We do offer a great UI/UX ;)
  12. Rafsark parent
    We're diving first into creating an alternative to one of Stripe's key services which is billing. We especially building billing on areas where Stripe struggles, like mixed or usage-based billing models.
  13. Rafsark parent
    What's a fair price for a budget-friendly hosted version? Lower upfront cost, or maybe a revenue share? We've aimed at enterprise deals for the paid edition, keeping the open-source version widely accessible. Keen to hear your thoughts on adjusting our pricing.
  14. Rafsark parent
    What's a fair price for a budget-friendly hosted version? Lower upfront cost, or maybe a revenue share? We've aimed at enterprise deals for the paid edition, keeping the open-source version widely accessible. Keen to hear your thoughts on adjusting our pricing.
  16. Rafsark parent
    (Lago co-founder here.) I guess it depends on how complex your pricing and monetization process are (is it the same pricing for everyone or custom ; is it a simple subscription: or a is there revenue share, transactional pricing, usage-based, tiers ; is it self-serve or sales-led with a quoting system, do you have grandfathered plans, do you need to use other payment processors than Stripe - "Stripe Billing" is only usable with "Stripe Payments").

    In some cases, it's "brain dead simple", in a lot of cases it ends up "being much more complex than it seemed".

    Related threads: - "Why Stripe doesn't use Stripe Billing": https://www.hackerneue.com/item?id=33191307 - "Stripe's real pricing: a primer" : https://www.hackerneue.com/item?id=33920019

  17. Rafsark parent
    I could add: - metering - relations with accounting/finance softwares - timezones (if your customers are spread around the globe) - proration - payments and dunnings
  18. Rafsark parent
    When you don't understand the complexity of billing (revenue ops, top management or marketing), you often end up adding more and more complexity, and engineering teams have no choice. They have to build new billing features
  19. Rafsark parent
    The use case is tiny at the beginning but the complexity increases over time to be honest. The scope is never as narrow as you think at the beginning of the project. Libraries are great, they can help you implement faster, but if the company grows, you will need an entire team to build and maintain it
  20. Rafsark parent
    Was it a basic subscription model or have you faced challenges with taxes, usage-based components, entitlements, grand fathering?
  21. Rafsark parent
    Even if you find that guy, you'll have to find 20 more in the next 3 years if the company grows
  22. Rafsark parent
    Not necessarily open source, but there are a lot of third party tools for accounting (netsuite, quickbooks, xero). And I would say they scale 100x better than an in house tool
  23. Rafsark parent
    You can add taxes and negotiated contracts to the list tbh
  24. Rafsark parent
    Navigating this challenge involves the ever-changing boundaries of billing. Initially, you build a monthly billing system, only to find that your team requires a yearly one, which seems relatively straightforward. However, complications arise when you introduce usage-based billing, incorporating weighted values akin to storage, layered on top of a quarterly plan. This complexity is further exacerbated when custom billing structures are needed for negotiated contracts, adding another layer of intricacy to the mix.
  25. Rafsark parent
    What's your vision? Can AI handle revenue prediction and billing engineering tasks? Both? How?
  26. Rafsark parent
    How do you know in advance it will grow into a unicorn? I tend to agree with you, but that's a shame to have a team of 30 engineers working only on billing, even if you are a unicorn.. I would prefer to have them working on my product

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