Bending Spoons: why it builds its own software rather than buying it

Key points

Key takeaways from a Sourcery interview with Bending Spoons co-founder & CEO Luca Ferrari (September ​2026):

Build-vs-buy doctrine. Bending Spoons' ambition is to be the most capable operator of digital businesses in the world,and part of achieving that is having the best toolkit possible — just as a great cyclist wants a great bike.

Long-term platform bet. The company has invested in its internal operating systemand technologies for over a decade,because it was strategically critical —and because Luca's co-foundersand he are all engineers,so there is a passion angle too.

Buy when best-in-class exists. Bending Spoons does buy from vendors when relevant: it uses Slack,for example,because it doesn't need a more sophisticated version of a messaging tool —Slack is a wonderful product.

Why vendors don't serve it. Providers of business tools generally optimise for the mass market of enterprises,which makes sense: building what Bending Spoons needs would mean chasing a market of one or two customers,which isn't an appealing business to go after.

The sophistication gap. As a result,most tools out there are relatively simple,while Bending Spoons needs more sophistication to maximise its potential — so it has to build them itself.

Platform as the moat. In Luca's telling,the build choice follows from the company's operating modeland acquisition history — spanning Evernote,AOLand Vimeo —wherethe internal platform underpins the buy-and-hold approach rather than being an end in itself.

Read more: Sourcery — Luca Ferrari on why Bending Spoons builds its own software instead of buying it