Low-Code Platform

Full text

DISCUSSION
Low-Code Platform
Alexander C. Bock •Ulrich Frank
Received: 5 February 2021 / Accepted: 10 September 2021 / Published online: 15 November 2021
ÓThe Author(s) 2021
Keywords Low-code Software development
environment Citizen developer Organizational agility 
Conceptual modeling Software development productivity
1 Introduction
Under the heading of ‘low-code’, a new class of software
development environments has emerged in recent years
which is not only said to afford the prospect of a substantial
increase in software development productivity, but also to
yield new ways of promoting business IT alignment and
user empowerment. These platforms now go by the names
of low-code platform (LCP), low-code application platform
(LCAP), and low-code development platform (LCDP).
Presumably coined by a market research company in
2014 (Forrester) (Richardson and Rymer 2014), several
indicators suggest that a major trend has by now evolved
around the label ‘low-code’. Large software vendors,
including IBM, Microsoft, and Oracle, have begun to
incorporate low-code solutions into their product portfo-
lios. Market research companies have forecast a consider-
able market potential for LCPs (e.g., Rymer and Koplowitz
2019; Vincent et al. 2020). These assessments, together
with the promises of vendors, have attracted the interest of
corporate investors (Shah 2020). For example, Siemens
recently bought a leading LCP vendor, reportedly at a
significant price.
1
Moreover, the discussion and
presentation of LCPs thrives on, and itself perpetuates, the
trends surrounding other current buzzwords such as ‘citizen
developer’, ‘robotic process automation’ (RPA), ‘user
experience’, and ‘microservices’.
Unfortunately, the rise in attention has not been paral-
leled by similar advances in the conceptualization of LCPs.
For initial reference and for later comparison we cite, at
this stage, a definition proposed by a market research firm:
‘‘An LCAP is an application platform that supports
rapid application development, deployment, execu-
tion and management using declarative, high-level
programming abstractions such as model-driven and
metadata-based programming languages, and one-
step deployments. LCAPs provide and support user
interfaces (Uls), business processes and data ser-
vices.’’ (Vincent et al. 2020,p.1)
An analysis of this tentative characterization of LCPs
suggests two conclusions. First, LCPs are intended to help
achieve objectives which have been at the core of business
information systems research for a long time. Among these
are increasing productivity and reducing costs of devel-
oping and maintaining enterprise software systems,
improving organizations’ ability to adapt software systems
to rapidly changing requirements, and empowering users.
Second, however, it is not at all clear what distinguishes
LCPs from existing software development facilities, such
as classical integrated development environments (IDEs)
and tools for model-driven development (MDD). Taken
together, the low-code trend presents itself as a
Accepted after one revision by Christof Weinhardt.
A. C. Bock (&)U. Frank
Research Group for Business Informatics and Enterprise
Modeling, University of Duisburg-Essen, Essen, Germany
e-mail: alexander.bock@uni-due.de
1
https://www.forbes.com/sites/adrianbridgwater/2018/08/06/sie
mens-buys-low-code-mendix-the-digital-factory-race-climbs-higher/.
Accessed 12 Sep 2021.
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Bus Inf Syst Eng 63(6):733–740 (2021)
https://doi.org/10.1007/s12599-021-00726-8
Content courtesy of Springer Nature, terms of use apply. Rights reserved.

contribution to goals at the heart of business information
systems research, but is in dire need of clarification.
With this in mind, the goal of this paper is to give a
balanced account of the current trend of low-code devel-
opment, and to place the topic in the broader context of
business information systems research. Specifically, we
address three questions:
1. What are the characteristic features of low-code
platforms?
2. How do low-code platforms compare with the current
status of research, and what, if any, technological
innovations are realized by these platforms?
3. What opportunities for future research arise from the
present attention to low-code development?
The paper is structured as follows. We begin with a brief
survey of the reception of the low-code trend in practice
and academia (Sect. 2). Subsequently, we present an
answer to the first question, drawing on a detailed study of
ours of selected LCPs available on the current market
(Sect. 3). The study was decidedly exploratory and, given
the limited number of systems considered, cannot claim to
be representative, but the obtained results nonetheless
throw light on the characteristic features of a variety of
LCPs. Thereafter, we turn to the second question, formu-
lating several general findings and contrasting them with
existing approaches from research on software develop-
ment productivity (Sect. 4). These findings, in turn, provide
the basis for examining the third question, leading us to
suggest a variety of attractive research opportunities for the
field of business information systems (Sect. 5).
2 Aspects of the Trend: Promises and Reception
The trend surrounding low-code development is carried by
an appealing story. It is widely known that the lack of
professional software developers is a major obstacle for
many companies in successfully dealing with the digital
transformation. Moreover, there is the perennial problem
that software development projects often suffer from poor
efficiency, or fail altogether. Portrayals of LCPs by vendors
and market research firm tie in with these problems and
promise relief:
‘‘When you can visually create new business appli-
cations with minimal hand-coding – when your
developers can do more of greater value, faster –
that’s low-code.’’
2
‘‘That’s where the power of citizen development
comes in – with no-code/low-code platforms, anyone
can build applications without software expertise,
significantly faster, and at a fraction of the cost.’’
3
‘‘Enterprise low-code application platforms deliver
high-productivity and multifunction capabilities
across central, departmental and citizen IT func-
tions.’’ (Vincent et al. 2020, p. 1).
The enthusiasm and hopes engendered by claims such as
these are further nurtured by reports of successful appli-
cations of low-code solutions in industry (e.g., Shah 2020),
and by optimistic assessments of the future economic
potential of the low-code sector. For example, Gartner has
predicted that by ‘‘2023, over 50% of medium to large
enterprises will have adopted an LCAP as one of their
strategic application platforms’’ (Vincent et al. 2020, p. 1).
It was only after some years that academic investigators
took notice of this trend (e.g., Henriques et al. 2018;
Zolotas et al. 2018). But now there is growing awareness of
low-code in the research community. For example, the
workshop on low-code development at the Models con-
ference in 2020 attracted the highest number of submis-
sions of all workshops.
4
Regrettably, much work on low-code development to
date has assumed a relatively uncritical attitude, and all too
little effort has been spent on developing a clear and dis-
tinct concept of these systems. For example, one author has
defined LCPs thus: ‘‘The low-code platform is a set of tools
for programmers and non-programmers. It enables quick
generation and delivery of business applications with
minimum effort to write in a coding language and requires
the least possible effort for the installation and configura-
tion of environments, and training and implementation’’
(Waszkowski 2019, p. 376). The favorable, even euphoric,
tone and the conceptual ambiguity of this statement are
characteristic of many descriptions found in the field (cf.,
e.g., Chang and Ko 2017; Ihirwe et al. 2020; Sanchis et al.
2020). That said, a modicum of work towards a more
nuanced view of low-code development is scattered in the
literature. For example, Sahay et al. (2020) have conducted
a study of eight LCPs with the aim of clarifying and
comparing the functionalities of these systems. Moreover,
there are a few critical voices that question the supposed
novelty of low-code environments. The most notable ex-
ample is Cabot (2020); we will return to a verdict of his
later on.
This brief outline of the reception of low-code in prac-
tice and in academia indicates a propensity toward mar-
keting jargon, terminological inexactitude, and inflated
promises. Meanwhile, profit and non-profit organizations
face the question of whether, and under what conditions,
2
https://www.ibm.com/uk-en/automation/low-code. Accessed 12
Sep 2021.
3
https://www.pmi.org/citizen-developer. Accessed 12 Sep 2021.
4
https://lowcode-workshop.github.io/. Accessed Sep 12 2021.
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734 A. C. Bock, U. Frank: Low-Code Platform, Bus Inf Syst Eng 63(6):733–740 (2021)
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investments into low-code development projects are justi-
fied. The need to support these decisions is a further reason
for business information systems research to analyze the
subject and to contribute to a clarification of the term.
3 In Search of a Conceptualization: Results
from an Exploratory Study
In want of informative and consistent descriptions of LCPs,
the only way to obtain a concept or even an idea of LCPs is
an analysis of the actual platforms offered under this label
on the current market. If these platforms have common
features, it may become possible to derive inductively from
them a possible conceptualization of low-code develop-
ment. With this aim in mind, we conducted an explorative
study of ten LCPs, which has been published separately
(for a synopsis with a technical focus, see Bock and Frank
2021; for the full study, see Frank et al. 2021). The purpose
of this section is to summarize the central results of this
study. The reader interested in further details is referred to
the references cited.
There are now between about twenty and several dozen
vendors selling products under the label ‘low-code.’ It was,
of course, beyond our scope to undertake an exhaustive
review of all these solutions, so that a limited number of
LCPs had to be selected for study. Accordingly, no claim
of representativeness can be made. Because the study is
intended to be explorative in nature, however, we argue
that this restriction is justifiable. A number of criteria were
considered in the selection of LCPs. The overriding intent
was to cover a spectrum as broad as possible. We therefore
began with a preliminary market study, grouping existing
LCPs into four rough categories according to their general
character and purpose (cf. below). Afterwards, we chose
the LCPs so that at least one candidate from each category
was considered. Moreover, we made sure to cover vendors
of different size and market influence, as well as LCPs
intended for different target audiences. In case of doubt,
large vendors were given the priority, based on the
assumption that these figure prominently in shaping the
concept of LCPs. More details on the selection process are
found in the original study. Limitations of the analysis and
related work are indicated at the end of this section; and for
the complete details, again, see the references cited above.
3.1 Historical Background and Product Positioning
A striking fact about almost all considered low-code
products is they have existed, in one form or another, be-
fore the label ‘low-code’ was invented. With the exception
of one platform, the solutions now marketed as LCPs have
been the single or primary products of the offering
companies for years, if not decades. An analysis of
archived versions of the vendors’ homepages revealed that
most products have been further developed and reposi-
tioned over the years. For example, some systems have
previously been offered as solutions for ‘rapid application
development’, ‘platform as a service’ (PaaS), and, in one
case, as a ‘model-driven application platform’. Another
platform has a history as a tool for ‘business process
management’ (BPM) in general, and as a tool for ‘mobile’
BPM and ‘human-centric’ BPM in particular. The bottom
line is that present-day low-code solutions are rarely new
products; more often than not, they have a long history on
the market and have simply been rebranded.
Another significant finding is that platforms available in
the low-code sector vary drastically in several dimensions.
Although certain technical features are common to many
LCPs, as will be discussed in the next subsection, the
studied environments differ substantially in functional
scope, primary purpose, range of technologies involved,
breadth of applicability, means of design and specification,
and other respects. For example, the four rough categories
of LCPs we distinguished in the pre-study included
(1) simple data management platforms, (2) classical
workflow management systems (WfMS), (3) extended,
graphical user interface (GUI)- and data-centric IDEs, and
(4) complex multi-use platforms for business application
configuration, integration, and development (for a fuller
description, see Bock and Frank 2021). The upshot is that
platforms offered under the label ‘low-code’ are exceed-
ingly heterogeneous and do not constitute a well-defined
class of technological environments.
3.2 Features of Low-Code Platforms
We now turn to the identified features of the studied LCPs,
which we will present according to their frequency of
occurrence, distinguishing between common,occasional,
and rare features. Where relevant, we will assign these
features to the traditional perspectives of systems devel-
opment – the static, the functional, and the dynamic per-
spective. A summary is given in Fig. 1.
Common features. Most common features of LCPs fall
into the static perspective. Every considered product fea-
tures a component for the definition of data structures.This
component is almost always offered in the form of a con-
ceptual modeling tool, implementing either a classical data
modeling language (i.e., a variant of the Entity-Relation-
ship Model) or a simplified proprietary language. Some-
times, data structures can only be defined in UI-based
dialogs or lists. A related common feature is the capacity to
access external data sources using a variety of application
programming interfaces (APIs). For example, the platforms
all permit using standard APIs like JDBC, as well as
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A. C. Bock, U. Frank: Low-Code Platform, Bus Inf Syst Eng 63(6):733–740 (2021) 735
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various connectors to other types of files and systems. As a
rule, the platforms are designed so that data may be stored
either in an internal database system, or in existing ex-
ternal systems.
Another feature provided by every studied low-code
platform is a GUI designer. Without exception, the studied
platforms incorporate a component to develop graphical
user interfaces and to integrate them with other imple-
mentation artifacts. All reviewed GUI designers bring
palettes of pre-defined widgets, although their scope varies
widely. Defining the coupling of GUIs and data structures
is fairly convenient in most environments, as it is not
necessary to implement the model-view-controller (MVC)
pattern manually. Furthermore, most systems provide dis-
tinct support in adapting the GUIs to different target
environments (e.g., desktop browsers, tablets, and
smartphones).
Low-Code Plaorm
Stac Perspecve
Compo nents for data structure
spec ifica on
Mechanisms to access external data
source s via A PIs
Mech anisms to acc ess external
services/funcons via A PIs
External data sources
(RDBMS, XML documents,
CSV fil es, individual
syst ems su ch as ER P or
CRM s ystems , ...)
External services
(Web services, RESTful
services, in divi dual
interfaces of large
technology plaorms, ...)
Explanaon
GUI designer Mechanis ms for coupl ing GUI forms
and data in stance s (MVC)
Domain-sp ecific data reference
model s
Frequen cy (comm on, occasi onal,
rare, not idenfied)
Feature External system or
service
Mechanisms for basic funconal
specificaons (busin ess rules, …)
Standard funcons for gen eric
purpos es (mathema cal, …)
Domain-specific reference func-
ons or reference implementa ons
Funconal Perspecve
Dynamic
Perspecve
Interacon
Perspecve
Generic systems for state/UI page
transions
Conc eptual process modeling
component
Workflow management systemand
engine
Domain-specific reference process
model s
Internal database manag ement
syst em
instances
retrieved/
stored via
may be adapted in
access
Conc eptual data modeling
component
usually invol ves
usually invol ves
may b e used in
operate on
instances
defined via
access
usually invol ves
integrated with
somemes
involve
govern the use of GUIs c rea ted via
Other Aspects
Roles and user rights syst em Deployment and export
mechanisms
oen beco mes
part of soluon
deployed via
Building block-like applicaon units
for varied purposes (BI, AI, RPA, ...)
Adv ance d/tr adi onal co ding
components
Web/ App licao n Serv er
(on-premise or off-
premise, as part of the
low-cod e plaorm)
End-user devices
(local machines/
computers, smart-
phones, tablets, ...)
Mechanis ms for preparing GUI
rendering on different devices
usually invol ves
used/rendere d on
Deployed ap plica ons
will be access via
deployed to
either
GUIs become part of solu ons deployed via
funcons are invo ked in GUIs defined via
become part of so luon deploy ed via
Fig. 1 Features of low-code platforms
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736 A. C. Bock, U. Frank: Low-Code Platform, Bus Inf Syst Eng 63(6):733–740 (2021)
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Furthermore, all systems afford basic functional speci-
fications. The most common approach here are simple
expression languages for decision rules and dialog-based
ways of specifying program flow conditions. Similarly,
each solution provides a library of generic standard oper-
ations, such as mathematical functions. Also, all solutions
enable, in varying ways, to invoke and integrate external
functions via APIs. For example, almost every system
allows to use standard approaches such as web services and
RESTful (representational state transfer) services; and
many systems make it possible to use a long list of APIs of
individual providers, such as Google APIs and other social
media APIs.
Moving on to a different area, almost all considered
solutions offer advanced support in the deployment of the
applications, although this takes quite different forms. For
example, some systems require to install the environment
of the low-code platform on a web server, so that indi-
vidual applications can be deployed there. Other systems,
in contrast, allow to deploy the developed solutions as self-
contained applications on various devices and machines.
Finally, another common feature is that almost all con-
sidered solutions came with a component to define roles
and user rights. The roles and user system is usually
contained in the governing architecture of the platform,
which will be deployed together with the custom
application.
Occasional features. Many less common features fall
into the dynamic perspective. One occasional feature is the
availability of a workflow modeling component and a
workflow engine. Several of the larger and more complex
LCPs incorporate a WfMS at their architectural core; other
systems now branded as LCPs, as previously indicated,
really are classical WfMS. The platforms either use a
conceptual modeling language like Business Process
Model and Notation (BPMN), or a proprietary representa-
tional structure. In other systems, the perspective is more
generic and technical. These platforms mainly provide
components to define the interaction with, and transition
between, user-defined UI forms. Some platforms rely on
proprietary process modeling component for this purpose,
others on basic menus and event-catching scripts.
Another occasional feature is the availability of
advanced or traditional coding components. Some systems,
involve one or several explicit components where proce-
dural specifications can be made using traditional pro-
gramming languages and related technologies. Most
frequently, the systems use Java and JavaScript. Indeed, at
some more or less hidden level of the architecture, almost
all low-code platforms grant recourse to traditional pro-
gramming code. Finally, the studied platforms of major
vendors offer a variety of configurable, building block-like
application units. For example, these units provide, in
limited scope, pre-implemented functionalities for the
areas of business intelligence (BI), artificial intelligence
(AI), and RPA.
Rare features. Notably, domain-specific reference
implementation artifacts were identified only on rare
occasions. Only one large-scale platform provides a con-
siderable library of domain-specific reference data models,
addressing common business and communication concepts,
such as ‘customer’, ‘address’, and ‘email’. Some other
systems offer small sets of simple reference structures, and
most reviewed LCPs do not bring with them any data
reference models at all. When it comes to domain-specific
reference functions and reusable artifacts of a dynamic
nature, still fewer artifacts are found. One large-scale
platform makes it possible to reuse a number of ready-
made functions from various business applications of the
same vendor. Most other studied systems offer catalogs of
reusable functions or examples of predefined processes, but
these are mostly generic in nature, or very limited in scope
and depth.
3.3 Limitations and Related Work
A number of limitations apply to our study. The most
important one has already been emphasized at the outset:
because of the limited sample size, no claim to represen-
tativeness can be defended. Another general limitation is
that besides the various features highlighted above, every
solution has, of course, a range of individual features,
which cannot be enumerated here. Several more specific
limitations concern the fact that there are a number of
criteria whose analysis was unfeasible for us. This includes,
for example, the behavior of the LCPs in the deployment
and scalability of large projects, as well as cost-efficiency
analyses. To our knowledge, the only other study of
available LCPs is that of Sahay et al. (2020). The aims and
results of that study are similar to ours, but Sahay et al.
(2020) concentrate on comparing particular LCPs, whereas
our interest is to reveal and critically discuss the main
features of LCPs in the context of business information
systems research. For a more detailed discussion of the
results and limitations of our analysis, see Bock and Frank
(2021) and Frank et al. (2021).
4 Discussion and Assessment
Our exploratory analysis of existing low-code platforms
has revealed a number of features found in these systems,
and it has occasioned several general observations. We will
now discuss the main findings of our analysis, offering a
critical assessment of the trend.
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Low-code platforms integrate various classical devel-
opment components in one environment. The most impor-
tant way in which the examined LCPs differ from classical
software development infrastructures is that they incorpo-
rate all or most tools and components required for a limited
class of software development projects in a single envi-
ronment. When using a classical software development
infrastructure, one has to deal with a sizeable array of
separate tools, such as IDEs, modeling tools, database
management systems (DBMS), object-relational (O-R)
mapping frameworks, GUI editors, deployment and com-
pilation assistants, and so on. In LCPs, these tools are
integrated into one system, so that there is less need to
switch between different systems and, more importantly,
less need to keep consistent and integrate the implemen-
tation artifacts produced by the distinct technologies.
Reuse is addressed at a generic architectural level, not
at a domain-specific level. The investigated low-code
platforms rarely offer reusable artifacts at a domain-
specific level. Rather, what is reused by these platforms are
fairly generic, and often implicit, architectural frameworks
for certain classes of application systems. This involves
reference implementations for such areas as GUI design,
O-R mappings, MVC operations, access to external data
sources and other services, and so on. Within these
frameworks, then, individual solutions can be configured
and developed.
Productivity gains mainly ensue from reducing the
efforts of routine tasks. LCPs produce productivity gains
primarily by reducing the efforts of routine tasks in soft-
ware development projects of low to moderate complexity.
This applies in several ways. One is that through the pro-
vision of a pre-defined, integrated environment, there is
less effort in synchronizing the artifacts produced by pre-
viously separate development components. Productivity is
also promoted by the aforementioned reference imple-
mentations for such generic tasks as GUI design, O-R
mapping, MVC implementation, and deployment in dif-
ferent environments.
No new technology. Summing up the previous points,
we arrive at the finding that most components of LCPs are,
in and of themselves, neither radically new nor innovative
in any way. To the contrary, what is actually provided in
these environments are well-known tools and components
for software development which have been used, in varying
forms, for decades. Also, many low-code products have, in
fact, existed for many years, and are now merely rebran-
ded. In this respect, we therefore agree with Cabot who
concluded: ‘‘I do not believe there is any fundamental
technical contribution in low-code trend’’ (Cabot 2020,
p. 536).
Conceptual modeling is not at the core of marketing, but
at the core of the platforms. Another key finding concerns
not the technology itself, but the way in which it is sold. As
our analysis has indicated, conceptual modeling compo-
nents are among the most important components of low-
code platforms and one of the principal ways in which they
are able to decrease the need for traditional coding. This is
the exact approach of the field of MDD, where the vision
has been that conceptual models are used to ‘‘reduce the
gap between problem and software implementation
domains through the use of technologies that support sys-
tematic transformation of problem-level abstractions to
software implementations’’ (France and Rumpe 2007,
p. 37). The modeling languages provided by the LCPs,
however, are rather simplistic, lagging behind the state of
the art in research on conceptual modeling.
Incomplete account of related research. The design of
available LCPs has, evidently, derived inspiration from
several lines of research on IS design and implementation,
but, surprisingly, ignored others. A field from which most
LCP vendors have drawn quite extensively is, as under-
lined above, that of model-driven development. There are
also more or less pronounced similarities to other research-
based approaches, although the exact technical concepts
and procedures are not usually adopted. This is true, for
example, of design constructs from research on ‘visual
programming’ (e.g., Costagliola et al. 2004; Ingalls et al.
1988), technical concepts to support ‘weaving’ reusable
services into customized ones (e.g., Besova et al. 2012;
Bergel and Fabry 2009), and the more recent vision of ‘on-
the-fly computing’ (Karl et al. 2020). Remarkably, other
well-known lines of investigation have been ignored alto-
gether. Most importantly, as already stressed, this concerns
work on reference models (e.g., Becker and Delfmann
2007; Fettke and Loos 2007) as well as work on domain-
specific modeling languages (e.g., Kelly and Tolvanen
2008; Frank 2013). Both reference models and DSMLs can
promote the productivity of systems design significantly, as
they incorporate domain knowledge.
Risk of lock-in effects. In most cases, the representations
generated in one LCP cannot be used in another. This
presents a serious threat to the protection of investment and
may lead to dead ends when a vendor stops supporting a
platform (as is the case with AppMaker, which Google has
recently abandoned).
5 Opportunities for Future Research
A number of opportunities for research are tied to the
emergence of low-code development platforms. One rea-
son is that methods and theories for the construction and
adaptation of organizational information systems are at the
very core of business information systems research.
Another reason is that all areas of our social reality
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continue to be permeated by software. Thus, much in the
spirit of low-code development, approaches are needed to
empower people – not just the traditional ‘‘user’’ – to
understand and modify the software shaping their work
environment and, more and more, their entire lives. The
following list of research opportunities is intended to
illustrate the scope of inspiring research topics related to
the low-code trend.
Support for the evaluation and economic use of low-
code platforms. As has become clear, LCPs are no silver
bullets, but, under the appropriate circumstances, the use of
these platforms can help organizations improve produc-
tivity and agility in software design and development. It is,
however, far from trivial to judge the economics of LCPs.
Research is needed to identify problem classes which can
be effectively addressed by the typical functions of LCPs –
and those which cannot. It is also essential to investigate
whether and how LCPs can serve as a supplement to, rather
than a replacement of, traditional software development
infrastructures. Furthermore, the support of organizational
decision makers calls for research on the training required
for employees with no or little programming skills to use
LCPs effectively, as well as on the costs and risks of this
sort of institutionalized lay development. Following on
from this, another line of research could be directed toward
the design and evaluation of methods for the economic
analysis of LCPs, as well as (modeling) methods for
guiding lay developers in the use of LCPs and classical
software development facilities.
New approaches to study the possibilities and limita-
tions of domain-specific reference models: As our analysis
has shown, domain-specific reference models and equiva-
lent implementation artifacts are rarely provided in low-
code platforms. This raises the question of why this is so,
as reference models could easily be integrated into these
environments. Reference models may not only reduce
development costs and enable a higher quality of infor-
mation systems, they may also promote (cross-organiza-
tional) integration. But it is also true that domain-specific
reference models, despite some enthusiasm a few decades
ago, did not become the game changers they were supposed
to be. The emergence of LCPs is a welcome occasion for
business information systems research to (re-)address itself
to the obstacles preventing the use of reference models and
the design of strategies to overcome them.
Cognitive fit of representations: Although LCPs address
both professional software developers and ‘citizen devel-
opers’, it remains unclear what kind of user models they
employ. Such models are needed to make representations
of software fit cognitive capabilities and personal working
styles. The investigation of this topic opens a wide range of
research questions whose investigation may involve fields
such as cognitive psychology, and modeling and pro-
gramming language design.
Effects on organizational behavior: Approaches to fos-
ter end-user computing effectively blur the traditional
boundaries between developers and users. This is likely to
affect organizational decision processes, patterns of col-
laboration, and roles surrounding IS design and use. While
these matters have been the subject of early studies on end-
user computing (Amoroso, 1988), the digitization of work
environments as well as the average levels of computer
literacy have changed considerably since then. This leads
to research questions concerning the future conception of
IT management in general, and the organization of soft-
ware projects in particular.
6 Conclusion
Our analysis of low-code platforms did not produce evi-
dence that the individual components of low-code solutions
are radical innovations. In many ways, they lag behind the
frontiers of research on software design, implementation,
and maintenance. What distinguishes these platforms is
that they integrate, in one environment, multiple well-
known and traditional system design components so as to
reduce the efforts of routine tasks in implementing business
applications within the confines of certain, more or less
restrictive frameworks. As such, LCPs can promote soft-
ware development productivity if all the requirements of a
given project can be satisfied within the predefined,
immutable framework of a certain LCP and all other per-
tinent technical and economic conditions are fulfilled, too.
Developing methods for the careful assessment of these
conditions is an important subject for future research.
Moreover, the momentum generated by the low-code
trend gives rise to various other inspiring research oppor-
tunities lying not only at the core of our discipline, but also
at the cross-sections with other disciplines. A most
notable opportunity lies in the fact that the attention
directed at low-code platforms may contribute to the
revival of conceptual modeling. As we have shown, con-
ceptual modeling is one of, if not the single most important
ingredient of present-day low-code platforms – even
though vendors rarely declare themselves as offering
modeling environments. Business information systems
research is well positioned to seize this opportunity, since it
is the only discipline that takes the design and analysis of
domain-specific conceptual models as one of its funda-
mental tasks.
The term ‘low-code’, however, is problematic. It is
currently used in an inconsistent manner, being deployed to
sell vastly heterogeneous development environments.
While we do not think it is advisable to prescribe
123
A. C. Bock, U. Frank: Low-Code Platform, Bus Inf Syst Eng 63(6):733–740 (2021) 739
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practitioners what terminology to use, we believe that it is
our responsibility to critically reflect on whether terms are
suitable for incorporation into a proper technical termi-
nology. We do not think the term ‘low-code’ at present
satisfies the criteria required of a scientific concept. After
all, language is our most important tool, and we should
beware of compromising it.
Funding Open Access funding enabled and organized by Projekt
DEAL.
Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons
Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing,
adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as
long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the
source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate
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article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless
indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not
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use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted
use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright
holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.
org/licenses/by/4.0/.
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