From managing internal operations and streamlining the supply chain to customer relationship management (CRM) or an additional marketing channel to attract new customers, enterprise software covers a broad spectrum of business apps.
Today, more than ever before, businesses of all sizes are looking to develop customized enterprise apps. The reason is simple, it helps them improve efficiency, provide better customer service, and more. But before you develop an app, you need to make sure that you have the right tools for the job. Speaking of tools, the usage of Flutter for enterprise app development is rapidly growing.
And we will talk about how Flutter is the Future of enterprise app development in this post. But first, let us grasp why every business needs Enterprise software.
The Need For Enterprise Software
Enterprise app development is no longer just for large companies, but also for small businesses and entrepreneurs. Enterprise software helps businesses run more efficiently and provides better services, multiplying business growth and expanding the reach. For example,
One of the leading financial service companies in the USA has achieved astonishing results after investing in a CRM system, such as saving over 5,600,000 hours of extra work, reducing customer downtime by 50%, and increasing developers’ productivity by 20%.
Another example is Sunsweet Growers, a large dried fruits producer. They needed to improve planning and forecasting to reduce cost and inefficiencies in production and distribution. So, they invested in Supply Chain Cost Management. As a result, they saw 15 to 20% more accuracy in forecasting, up to 25% reduction in production facilities, and also a 30% markdown in finished-goods spoilage.
Besides, according to Statista,
- IT Spending on enterprise software is expected to reach around $672 billion worldwide, a growth of 11 percent from the previous year;
- CRM software that focuses on examining and improving business interactions with both current and future customers is expected to cross over $47 billion in sales in 2022.
- ERP software that focuses on corporate data collection and interpretation is going to account for $95 billion in overall revenue.
Clearly, businesses of all sizes are on the move to enterprise application development to save and earn more.
However, there is no standard enterprise app that can fit all businesses in the world. Given enterprise software features vary to a significant extent based on the industry and type of the business. The complexity level also has a role to play.
For that matter, you need to pay attention to choosing the right enterprise mobile app development kit.
Flutter for enterprise app development
Among all the other technologies, Flutter is a rapidly-growing SDK and UI framework catching a new trend in building enterprise apps. Google’s open-source portable UI toolkit lets you build cross-platform apps for six operating systems (Android, iOS, Linux, macOS, Windows, Google Fuchsia), desktop, and the web from a single codebase. Know more about how Flutter works.
Flutter is built on and uses Google’s object-oriented programming language Dart which accelerates developers’ productivity. Consequently, With Flutter, you can build modern, high-quality, and natively compiled apps. And can also run apps on multiple platforms without having to write code for both platforms.
But what about Enterprise apps? Is Flutter ready for enterprise mobile app development?
Let us find out!
Flutter requirements for enterprise app development
Groupon, Alibaba, BMW, CrowdSource, Dream11, and more big and small brands together bust the myth that cross-platform app development is only for startups and small businesses. In addition, Flutter stands tall when it comes to its compatibility to meet enterprise app requirements.
Proven Efficiency
Flutter is designed to create high-performing and well-organized apps that make it the right fit for an enterprise app where efficiency is critical. It offers the same great app performance and speed as native apps. Not to mention, you get the benefits of its unprecedented ability to scale across platforms and devices. This flexibility allows you to rapidly build and iterate on your app.
Thus, with Flutter, you can keep up with your business’s changing needs and fine-tune your user experience. You can also use Flutter to modernize your existing mobile app. This also enables you to improve key performance metrics and reduce operating costs.
User Interface
Flutter is also a UI framework that helps you create user-friendly and intuitive experiences through numerous customizable widgets. Apps built with Flutter run faster, feel smooth, and use less battery than traditional mobile apps.
Flutter also makes it easy to design interfaces that respond to touch, drag and drop, and other user interactions. Since Flutter consists of everything enterprise apps need —specific UI elements and gesture control — it appears as the best choice for Enterprise app development.
Scalability
Flutter sets the standard for mobile app development. With Flutter, you can build enterprise-grade mobile apps that scale to millions of users and billions of devices. Flutter’s flexible architecture allows you to scale your app without downtime or performance degradation.
You can add new users or devices with zero app downtime, and Flutter will keep your app running smoothly and efficiently. This means Flutter is the answer to your scalability requirements regardless of the size of your app, your user base, or your business.
Enterprise-Grade Mobile Applications with Flutter: for the best or worst outcomes?
It’s time to look into the characteristics of Flutter that gives a definite answer to why use Flutter for enterprise app development.
Layered architecture
When it comes to enterprise app development, the layered architecture comes in handy to work on different parts of the app simultaneously. It also makes it easy to understand and manage every app feature. All in all, the layered architecture leads to better productivity in developers, ensuring seamless functionality of the app.
On that note, Flutter has the same unique layer system that can help you write code and create UIs that are easy to maintain. With Flutter, you can define a set of sub-tree views, and nest them inside of each other to define the UI of your app. This means that you can organize your code in a way that is easy to follow and maintain.
IDEs for Native iOS and Android app environment
Flutter provides support for a number of different programming environments, including the most popular IDEs, such as IntelliJ, Android Studio, and Visual Studio. Thereby, Flutter allows developers to choose whichever environment they prefer for each phase of the app development process.
As a result, developers can build, test, debug, and make the app ready to deploy using features and plugins of the IDE. Hence, you don’t have to set a specific requirement but hire experienced Flutter app developers.
Hardware feature support
A successful enterprise app comprises many features that work along with mobile devices. In that case, you need to consider many devices as employees can be using mobile devices of various operating systems. On the flip side, Flutter comes with a set of system-level APIs to support the latest hardware features, such as a camera, GPS, Microphone, video recording, background processing, and Bluetooth and WiFi connectivity.
Flutter and Security
Security is a top priority in the enterprise app as the app contains sensitive data of the business and its employees. That’s why Flutter puts app security first to ensure that your app and its data are safe. Flutter uses various security techniques, including app permissions, app sandboxing, and encryption using SSL or TLS protocols.
Besides, Flutter uses app integrity, a set of techniques designed to protect your app from harmful modifications. And Flutter also uses app isolation, a technique that ensures that each app runs in a separate, secure environment to prevent apps from interfering with one another.
Other things making Flutter ready for enterprise app development
- Flutter’s widgets for Android’s Material and iOS Cupertino to create a native look with high interactivity;
- Dependency injection to make the code units independent and reusable;
- Flutter provides Local Storage through a plugin;
- Flutter apps can use SQLite Database to structure a large amount of data;
- Everything is widgets in Flutter which is easily testable via unit tests, widget tests, or integration testing tools;
- To make UI interactive in an enterprise app Flutter offers animations, beautiful page transitions, paging or infinite scrolling list view, caching library, image loading, and access to Google and Apple Maps as well;
- The cost to develop and maintain Flutter app is comparatively low.
Conclusion
Above all, not only Android and iOS, but you can also build your enterprise app for Windows as Flutter support for Windows is now stable. That means, native-like functionality across all the platforms. With all the benefits and characteristics considered, Flutter is an ideal choice for building a scalable and robust enterprise app.