What is MicroSaas, and do they have a bright future?

Plus the news roundup this week including business news from Canada and Asia.

Hey there, you fabulous folks out there!

Welcome to another edition ?? of Brightwaves, out planet’s latest business + tech orientated newsletter with a side dash of culture, entrepreneurship, and society.?

In this week’s edition, we’re looking at the potential that microSaaS products have, one small product at a time. What are the trends, and can they succeed in securing a larger share of the pie?

Also, usual news including Malaysia’s new EV and Canada’s fall economic statement that provides more funding for tech. For the political crisis that preceded that fall announcement,?why not check out my other newsletter?

As usual, we’ve recommendations for tools and services and articles/opinion pieces.?

I’ll take a break from writing during the holiday weeks (Christmas and New Year) - but I’ll see you back in 2025.

Read also: this newsletter is also published on Substack if you prefer reading it there.

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As a co-founder of my own tech firm and a video editing solopreneur outfit,?we advertise our own services here.?Nevertheless, I’ll strive to keep all things fair and you can check out other similar services that can help your business advance.

ICYMI - News Roundup ???

Markets, Governance & General News

• Canada’s federal government provides more tech funding such as tax credits and programs to encourage AI research?in its fall economic statement. (Source)
• Malaysia launches a national AI office?for crafting policy and regulation (Source)
• China’s video gaming sector revenue hits a new high in 2024?as blockbuster releases drive up sales. (Source)
• Vancouver’s city council agrees to a motion to make the city “Bitcoin friendly”?and to allow the city to convert reserves into Bitcoin. (Source)

Tech & Product

• Apple nears development of new Bluetooth and Wifi chips with TSMC?as it attempts to create energy-efficient in-house components.?(Source)
• OpenAI brings video to ChatGPT Advanced Voice Mode and an organising system called Projects.?(Source?1,?Source?2)
• Singapore ride-hailing platform TADA expands its operations to Hong Kong?amid HK government’s plan to regulate ridesharing services.?(Source?1,?Source 2)
• Malaysia officially enters the EV game?as national carmaker Proton launches the Proton e.MAS 7 EV. (Source)
• Salesforce announces plan to hire 2,000 new employees?to help the company sell its new AI tools to customers. (Source)

Startups & Funding

• China’s chip design tool maker Empyrean Technologies cedes control to state-owned firm?after US blacklisting. (Source)
• Montréal-based?Flare?raises US$30 million in Series B financing?to scale its cybersecurity threat monitoring software. (Source)
• Grammarly acquires productivity startup Coda?and makes its co-founder the new CEO of Grammarly. (Source)
• The European Union prepares a €10bn space programme to rival Musk’s Starlink?- but the UK is not part of the project. (Source)

Making Waves: MicroSaaS products (with AI) ??

You’ve probably heard of SaaS, or software as a service. But there’s been a significant wave towards?microSaaS solutions?these days.

A microSaaS, as the name suggests, is micro-software that involves a singular product that solves one niche for a specific market niche. The team behind such products is usually small, or possibly it can even be created by a single individual.

What helps the development of such novel solutions is the world we live in, where computing has been democratised to a point where the resources to design and build software can involve minimal resources.

As an entrepreneur, you could easily use a no code platform, simple design tools, AI models, and digital marketing tools to launch something quickly for next to nothing.

On the consumer side of things (think small businesses, freelancers) it’s a boost - you’re not restricted to going only to big companies if you have specific software needs.

So what’s making waves?

Here’s one: AI-Powered PDF summarisers/assistants.?

They’re mostly single-function tools, and are the sort of tools that we need because regular folks don’t have time to go through long documents on a daily basis.

I needed to summarise some documents as I get up to speed with AI Safety.

So I googled, and one of the first few things that popped up was?Adobe’s new AI Assistant. I tried it and, yes, it did its job fine. It even had a chatbot function!

However, being the megacorp that it is, thinks that it deserves more money and this new feature was not covered in my Adobe Creative Cloud subscription.

I ended up trying a few microSaaS products?(for a list see the resource section below). These are mostly partly free so I could still squeeze some output from my PDFs on a daily basis.

The result? I did get my summaries. Some had a similar chat function to Adobe’s, while most did the summarisation jobs well with footnotes to the text.?

I even tried one that had a summariser function that I could use on YouTube!

Most of these aren’t using AI models that they’ve to build from scratch - their underlying architecture is based on the current LLM models out there.1

This is just one example, of course. There’s an ocean of products out there, including solutions in analytics and business intelligence, and also?consumer products that help craft creative content.

What’s the future of microSaaS?

The SaaS market is?projected in some estimates to hit US$317.5 billion by the end of this year and a whopping US$1.228 trillion by 2032,?with healthcare, education and finance?expected to carry much of this growth..?

Also, expect more companies to shift towards SaaS based products for cost-savings, scalability, and for (vertical) solutions specific to their particular industry.

And while we can’t really say how much the microSaaS segment is worth -?some estimates suggest US$100 billion or 20% of the total SaaS industry?- there’s room for expansion especially with the big turn that we see towards generative AI.

Expect microSaaS solutions to continue to:

• leverage on AI for deeper features and to create improved user experiences
• compete with bigger SaaS providers on specific workflows or industry needs
• consolidate/merge with bigger SaaS companies once they achieve success.

There’s definitely room for smaller players to exist with bigger SaaS companies and to compete on their offerings. The example I gave with Adobe’s AI Assistant and the various AI summarisation tools is one example.?

This is where consumers or businesses can benefit when they will try - and maybe pay for the services that they use. And thus, reduce your costs in the process.

If you’re an entrepreneur or have a small product idea to take to market, the usual steps follow of course to build a digital product:

• Identify a market and focus on a niche
• Build a product that can integrate with other existing software out there
• Turn on the paywall (subscription) for revenue
• Continuously integrate and provide support
• Market, market, market and sell

AND…if you’re not one to get your hands dirty with code or to build something from scratch, why not work with us? Drop us a line at Lumina Future. All free.

Noteworthy Articles/Opinions ??

• Did you know that Emirates Airlines’s callsign, EK, originally stands for Emirates-Karachi? Check out that fun fact and how the airline grew?in this post.
• Can, and should Canada diversify beyond the United States as the threats of tariffs loom in the horizon??Read more here.
• How can small businesses leverage AI without spending too much???Read Entreperneur.com’s take here?and convert those insights into your strategy.

Useful Tools/Resources??

If you’re new to Digital Marketing for your business,?check out this free Social Media mini course?for learnings you can apply for any of the networks mentioned above.

Need some e-commerce user experience design inspiration??Check out Baymard Institute’s design examples?here.

Need AI to summarise your PDFs for you??I checked out several microSaas products such as?AskYourPDF,?PopAi,?SmallPDF.com,?Monica,?Otio.ai, and?Sharly.

Unclassified (Services you can use)??

Software Development:?Lumina Future builds digital stuff,?with a focus on AI, microSaaS products, and websites. Check out our services?and?get in touch with us.

I also do video editing for a reasonable fee?-?check out my site and my pricing!

Co-living consultation:?New to digital nomadism and want to head to Japan for a couple of months??Check out Nomad University?and book a call with the founder.

Support us and stay informed! ??

Did you find this newsletter helpful? If so, feel free to share this! We’d love to build a community and we hope you can come on board!

If you have any suggestions or things I can feature or awesome folk to interview, and if you’d like to be featured - do reach out!

I hope it has been a good read for you! I’d love to hear what you think about this newsletter, and we’ll keep iterating to make this more useful for you.

Enjoy the holiday season, and?see you back in 2025!