Product engineering
Web apps, dashboards and internal tools built end to end — schema, API, interface, tests and the release that puts it in front of users.
Software as a service · built & operated
We build SaaS products — then we run them.
4ft is a small engineering studio that designs, ships and operates software as a service: web apps, APIs and the platform underneath. One team from first commit to production traffic — and the same team on call after launch.
Design → build → runOne accountable team, no hand-offs
Shipped in weeksSmall releases, real users, fast feedback
Operated 24/7Monitoring, patching and backups included
What we do
Product engineering, with the operational half done properly.
Most studios hand you a repository and walk away. We take the feature all the way to a running service — the deploy pipeline, the alerts, the backups, the 3am page.
APIs & integrations
REST and webhook surfaces, OAuth and SSO, third-party integrations, idempotency and rate limits that survive real traffic.
Platform & infrastructure
Containers, CI/CD, environments, observability and backups — the unglamorous parts, done to a standard you never have to think about.
AI in production
LLM features that ship: retrieval, agents, structured outputs, evaluation and guardrails — measured against real work, not a demo.
Managed SaaS
We host it, patch it and watch it. Uptime, monitoring, incident response and cost control stay with us as part of the build.
Rescue & modernisation
Legacy takeovers, performance work, and the rewrite you keep postponing — stabilise first, then move it forward without a freeze.
Build & run
Two halves of the same job.
Writing the code is the easy half. A SaaS product is only as good as what happens after the first deploy — so we take both, under one roof and one roadmap.
Build
- Discovery & scope you can quote
- Data model & API design
- Interfaces people actually use
- Tests, CI and staged rollouts
Run
- Deploy pipeline & environments
- Metrics, logs and alerting
- Backups, patching, renewals
- On-call when it matters
How we work
Short loops, visible progress, no surprises.
Every engagement runs the same four beats. You see working software at the end of each one.
01 / SCOPE
Scope
A short discovery: what it must do, what it must not, and the smallest version that earns users. Fixed price, written down.
02 / BUILD
Build
Weekly releases to a real environment. You click the actual product while it is still small enough to change.
03 / LAUNCH
Launch
Hardening, load and failure testing, DNS, TLS, billing and docs — then the switch is flipped with a rollback ready.
04 / OPERATE
Operate
Monitoring, patching, backups and iteration. We keep the service healthy and keep shipping against it.
Engagements
Pick the shape that fits the problem.
Fixed scope when you know the destination, a standing team when you do not, and full operation when you would rather not run it at all.
Project build
FIXED SCOPE · MILESTONE BILLING
A defined product or feature, taken from scope to launch.
- Written scope & estimate
- Weekly working demos
- Handover pack, or we operate it
Embedded team
MONTHLY · FLEXIBLE BACKLOG
We become your engineering function, or extend the one you have.
- Reserved capacity each month
- Roadmap, delivery and platform work
- Cancel with 30 days notice
Managed product
BUILD + OPERATE · MONTHLY
We build it, run it, and are accountable for it being up.
- Hosting, monitoring, on-call
- Continuous feature delivery
- One line item, no vendor juggling
Contact
Have something that needs shipping?
Tell us what you are trying to build, or what is falling over. We will reply with a straight answer on scope, timeline and cost — and whether we are the right studio for it.
hello@4ft.me
Usually answered within one business day.