Why Software Companies Quote 3x What I Do

Why a company needs ¥2,000 a day

What does a developer on a ¥10,000 monthly salary actually cost a company?

• Social insurance (employer share): ¥2,500 to ¥3,000
• Housing fund (employer share): ¥500 to ¥1,200
• All in, every ¥10,000 in salary costs the company ¥14,000

Then add:

• Office space, equipment, and admin: ¥1,500 to ¥3,000 per person per month
• Sales: this is the big one. Commissions plus ad spend usually take 10% to 20% of a quote. Part of what you pay covers "how this company found you." A company needs a certain sales volume every month to cover its fixed costs, so acquisition costs stay high
• Corporate taxes, management, and profit

For a developer on ¥10,000 a month, a company has to charge ¥2,000 a day just to break even.

That's not a scam. Office space, sales, licenses, and teams are all real costs, and I saw every one of them in my company years. It's just worth knowing: not all of your money goes to building your product.

Why I charge ¥600 a day

My pricing is simple: ¥600 a day for new clients, ¥500 for returning clients, tax included, with a year of free support.

Where does the money go?

• To me. I'm responsible for the project, so the rate is priced on the person responsible
• Taxes, paid in full.
• The part handed to people working with me when the deadline is tight. The money comes to me first, then goes to them. What I keep is the responsibility and the final check, and the rate doesn't change

What I don't have:

• No sales commissions. Clients come across me on their own
• No big office costs. I can work remotely and flexibly
• No fixed headcount. I only pay for people when I need them

So it's not cheap work. It's a cheap structure. The rate is priced on the person responsible for the project, plus a small share for taxes.

My acquisition cost is low for three reasons:

1. I built a content workflow with AI. Making content is much faster, so I don't need to spend heavily to find clients
2. A company has to hit monthly sales numbers to cover fixed costs, so it has to buy ads. I don't. Returning clients plus a few new ones are enough, with no sales targets hanging over me
3. No sales department, no ad spend, no heavy fixed costs, no fixed headcount

This model has a downside too: I can't take on a lot of projects. What I'm building is small and careful enough to last, not big and broad.

Don't big projects need a company?

That instinct is out of date.

The infrastructure of the software industry was built long ago. E-commerce has mature open-source systems like CRMEB and ECShop. Content management has WordPress. Payments, login, messaging, and permissions all come ready-made. Take apart a project that looks huge, and 80% of it is assembling proven solutions. Only 20% is code written from scratch.

Then add AI. Work that used to take a small team a week, a full-stack developer with AI can now deliver in two or three days. Projects that look big are smaller than they seem. Projects that seem to need a lot of people, a full-stack developer with AI can handle.

There are only three things a company can do that I can't:

1. Licenses: government contracts and large corporate tenders require a registered company and certificates
2. Fronting the money: with payment terms of six months to a year, an individual can't carry that cash flow
3. On-site work: the client wants someone sitting in their office

What about brand? A brand sells trust, but trust doesn't only grow out of a brand. Publishing all my development costs is another way to earn it. An open door does more than a big building.

Worried I'll disappear? By default, I do the project myself. When the deadline is tight, I hand one part to people I trust, I check their work, and I'm still the one answerable to you. If someone working with me drops out, the schedule and support are still mine. You hold the code, and the documentation is written so someone else could take over. A company puts your sense of security in its organization. I put the code and documents in your hands, and the person responsible doesn't change.

If your project doesn't involve licenses, fronting money, or on-site work, what you buy from a company is mostly peace of mind, not technical assurance. That peace of mind costs two to three times as much.

The industry is already splitting

My view: the software industry will split into clear layers. Companies will take the work that needs licenses and up-front money, then break it down for individual developers who specialize in one area to deliver, with each layer taking a fair margin.

It's already happening. I've just taken my place a bit early.

What AI changed

People often ask me: now that AI can write code, are programmers out of a job?

AI removes the premium on writing code, not the premium on being responsible. AI can generate piles of code, sure. But after that? Are the requirements right, is the data safe, is the launch stable, who handles it when something breaks at midnight? AI isn't responsible for any of that. I am.

I use AI for my work every day. It's made me at least 30% more efficient, and I've passed that saving on to clients. AI isn't my competition. It's one of the reasons my rate can be lower.