Don’t reinvent the wheel
The marketplace engine solves your problem. These are already built:
- Settlement
- Vendor payouts
- Split carts
- BuyBox
- Commission ledger
- Returns & disputes
- Vendor onboarding & KYC
- A command center
Mercur removes the tradeoff between speed and ownership
Building it yourself gives you ownership but costs you years. Buying a SaaS gives you speed but costs you the engine. With Mercur you have all three.
| Build it yourself | Buy a SaaS | Mercur | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Fast | No | Yes | Yes |
| Own it | Yes | No | Yes |
| No upkeep | No | Yes | Yes |
Building it yourself vs Mercur
The differences that decide this are structural, not feature-by-feature.
| Category | Build it yourself | Mercur |
|---|---|---|
| Time to market | Years | Weeks to a running engine |
| The engine | You build settlement, payouts, BuyBox, compliance | Built, in full source |
| Maintenance | Yours, forever | Enterprise: we maintain it, you read every line |
| Ownership | Full – and the full cost | Full – MIT core, self-host, extend |
| Customization | Anything – if you build it first | Extend or change the core, in your own layer |
| EU tax & compliance | You research and rebuild it with every change | Caught by the data model, updated with the platform |
| Your engineers | On undifferentiated plumbing | On what differentiates you |
Sometimes building it is the right call
We don’t think Mercur is for everyone.
Build it yourself
The marketplace mechanics are your product: you have unusual, core-differentiating requirements no engine can meet, and a team ready to own them for years.
Choose Mercur
- The marketplace engine is table-stakes you need running
- You’d rather own a proven engine than rebuild one
- You want to spend your team on what sets you apart
Put your team on what sets you apart
Read the comparison, run the engine yourself, then talk to us about taking it as full source – and spending your build time on the last 20% instead.