Launch HN: Okapi (YC W24) – A new, flexible CRM with good UX

Hacker News Discussion ↗

A new YC-backed startup, Okapi, is pitching a flexible, Salesforce-style CRM with custom objects and a cleaner UX aimed initially at smaller teams migrating off existing tools. Commenters welcome fresh competition in an entrenched market but largely see the product as early and barebones, noting missing staples like robust reporting, workflows, integrations, and opinionated sales/marketing features. Much of the debate centers on whether better UX and flexibility alone can overcome Salesforce’s network effects and HubSpot-style out‑of‑the‑box functionality, and whether Okapi should narrow its focus to specific use cases or industries to gain real traction.

Product positioning & differentiation

  • Okapi is pitched as a flexible, modern UX alternative to Salesforce-style CRMs, with fully custom objects/fields and minimal mandatory structure.
  • Founders emphasize simplicity over “busy” feature sets: no forced automations, enrichments, or complex onboarding; they set up customer instances manually.
  • They see early fit with small businesses switching CRMs and wanting Salesforce-like flexibility without its complexity or cost.

Market skepticism & competition

  • Multiple commenters argue the product looks like a generic CRUD/admin UI and is highly undifferentiated in a crowded, “red ocean” CRM market.
  • Comparisons are made to Salesforce, HubSpot, Monday, Pipedrive, Attio, Zoho, vertical/industry CRMs, and open-source options.
  • Some question why investors funded yet another generic CRM and whether the team has clearly identified its target niche or problem.

Features, gaps & roadmap

  • Missing or immature today: reports/dashboards, custom views, robust workflows/automations, deep integrations, task/journey management, marketing automation (campaigns, landing pages), and public API.
  • Roadmap items include reporting (possibly via third-party libraries), better list/views, built-in automations, open API, dashboards, task/journey management, and omnichannel/communication features.
  • Some users want marketing automation and campaign tooling more than pure CRM.

UX, performance & onboarding

  • Interface is praised as clean and modern; Tailwind UI is used.
  • Feedback notes clunky object/field management, small UX issues (buttons, links, search scope, hotkeys), and the importance of very low latency and small bundle sizes.
  • Okapi currently avoids self-serve; onboarding is done by the team, with possible future templates.

Architecture, integrations & extensibility

  • Backend uses Postgres as the authoritative store plus additional stores optimized for search and reads; all record revisions are tracked by default.
  • Plans for a robust API and possibly transactional scripting akin to Apex, but with a mainstream language (e.g., TypeScript), not a proprietary one.
  • Commenters stress access control (FLS/RLS), change data capture streams, bi-directional sync, and good developer experience as critical.

Email & communication

  • Current email sync is intentionally simple, relying on Gmail/Outlook and not BCC-based flows.
  • Some users strongly prefer BCC-only approaches for compliance and want per-deal email association and historical person–company relationships.
  • Suggestions include Outlook/Excel add-ins and deeper omnichannel messaging/call integrations.

Security, reliability & bugs

  • Several users hit login/account-lock issues and UX dead-ends; founders acknowledge a rough demo setup.
  • One commenter worries that talk of “fancy” replication without clear credentials undermines trust.