Happy Sunday Techtopians.
After a month away from the newsletter, I’m back with a banger of an issue! But before we dive in, let me share the rabbit hole I’ve been going down lately—Chrome Extensions.

I signed up for this newsletter: Chrome Extension Ideas, and it’s been sending me some awesome extension ideas that I could build (or at least attempt to 😆). So, I decided to jump into one!

The Chrome Extension I’m working on calculates the value of an item in working hours based on your salary. Pretty cool, right?

The best part? I’m documenting my progress on YouTube! 🙂 So drop by, check out what I’m building, and say hello!

Now, onto what you came for—Issue #14! 🎉

From a curious six-year-old tinkering with a Commodore 64 to the founder of a groundbreaking software framework company, Allard Buijze's journey embodies the perfect blend of technical innovation and entrepreneurial spirit. As the mastermind behind AxonIQ and the Axon Framework, Buijze has transformed his early frustration with overcomplicated software solutions into a mission to revolutionize how enterprise applications are built.

Founded in 2017, AxonIQ emerged from a simple yet powerful observation: software solutions were often unnecessarily complex for the problems they aimed to solve. What began as a personal research project to address this challenge evolved into the Axon Framework, a tool that has since captured the attention of enterprise users worldwide. Today, AxonIQ stands at the forefront of event-driven architecture, helping companies build more flexible and adaptable software systems in an era where rapid technological change is the only constant.

Buijze's story isn't just about creating another software framework—it's about fundamentally rethinking how modern applications are built and maintained. Through AxonIQ's innovative approach to Command Query Responsibility Segregation (CQRS) and Event Sourcing, he's helping organizations break free from the rigid constraints of traditional relational data models, enabling them to adapt swiftly to evolving business needs without getting bogged down by technical debt.

Now, let’s jump into the interview with Allard!

Breaking Complexity: How AxonIQ is Revolutionizing Software Development

Can you tell me a little bit about yourself and your business?

My programmer's life started when my parents got a Commodore 64 when I was 6. They bought these little books to explain to kids how the computer works. It included programs. That intrigued me.

Fast forward about a decade, I went to university. The programming language had changed, but I was still building things. I started a company with a few friends. However, I wanted to be in an environment where experts surrounded me. I joined a large consultancy firm as a software developer. There, I built a network, including some Spring team people. Via those connections, I joined JTeam, the company from where the European branch of SpringSource was founded, as an architect.

I loved working on projects for our customers. But one thing frustrated me: often, the solution was much more complex than the problem seemed to require. I started researching how to change that.

As a side effect of this research, I released the first versions of the Axon Framework in early 2010. Not long thereafter, I also started using it in my customer projects.

Seven years later, in 2017, when downloads started growing significantly, and more enterprise users shared their achievements and challenges with us, we decided to find AxonIQ.

To date, AxonIQ maintains the Axon Framework, and AxonServer, which is the Event Store and Messaging component that ensures components within a distributed system can communicate seamlessly while keeping a complete and reliable trail of everything they do.

How do you define success within your core team?

Success is many little things. Our goal is to significantly improve how software is built, not just by addressing one little problem but more fundamentally on the architectural level. We celebrate every customer or user who adopts this approach and succeeds with it.

But we also have to be honest about the bottom line. Some money needs to be made to pay the bills. Any achievement is in vain unless we manage to make it commercially sustainable.

If you were to start again from scratch, what would you do differently?

In the 7.5 years since we founded the company, we have learned a lot around the dynamics of open source and commercial licenses. Making everything available for free makes for an easy sale, but it's also not sustainable. Simply selling support is also not viable. Paid add-ons are nice, but unless they are critical to a company's success, they will find a way around paying for it.

What advice would you give to someone just starting out with a similar business?

Don't underestimate what product-market-fit really means. People using a product doesn't mean there's a fit. People paying for it is the key. Don't make assumptions. Instead, talk to people and find out what they would be willing to pay. Your product might be easier to sell if the price is higher. One thing we had massively underestimated in the beginning was the effort required to switch from our free components to the commercial ones. If that isn't seamless, people won't make the jump.

What was the most challenging aspect of building a business within the framework niche?

It's very difficult to make money directly from a framework, especially since so many tools are already out there, available for free. Also, developers like to explore anonymously, at their own pace, without commercial commitment. That means the commercial offering is in products around the framework. It's challenging to bring these tools to the developer's attention and incite them to (make their boss) pay for them.

What problem are you solving that most people don't see or understand?

Applications built with the principles that Axon promotes (CQRS and Event Sourcing) are so much more flexible than the more traditional applications that rely solely on a relational data model. In times when the software needs to adapt increasingly fast to changing demands, we don't have time for complex refactorings of our data models. The ability to go back in time and replay history to reconstruct any new data model that a new problem requires is critical to a company's success.

Also, Event-Driven applications cannot rely on events alone. They make for awkward coupling for many communication styles. In Axon, we rely on Commands, Queries, and Events. Each serves an explicit purpose and has specific routing characteristics. A side effect of this explicit messaging approach is that it no longer matters whether the communicating components are all part of the same monolith or each separately deployed as microservices. Seamlessly migrating between the two allows developers to balance maintainability and extensibility with performance and scalability. Ultimately, the time we spend on implementing business logic drives value. All the technicalities surrounding it are distractions.

Share a moment when you almost gave up, and what kept you going?

I don't quit easily, but there have been tough times. When we burned through our initial investment, finding a good series A investor was hard. But I had friends who went through similar processes. They told me not to focus on the "no"s. After all, you only need a single "Yes!" to make it work.

How has building this product changed you as a person or a professional?

Building an open-source project that is used in enterprise environments is immensely rewarding. I've traveled to many places and shared ideas with many great influencers in our industry. It's a great way to build a network you can rely on if the need arises. Having your code publicly available is also a great way to learn. People are always willing to provide feedback (sometimes even constructive ;) ) or share ideas.

Where can people find you?

I took a break from most social media, as it felt more of a burden than a benefit. I am still actively posting on LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/abuijze/), and that's probably the best place to connect with me.

Find out more at AxonIQ.