Clerk has expanded its offerings beyond simple authentication with the introduction of enhanced authorization features, addressing the top request from users of its B2B SaaS Suite. The new features include the ability for developers to define custom roles and fine-grained permissions in Clerk's dashboard, moving beyond the previous limitations of just "admin" and "member" roles. To facilitate authorization checks, Clerk has launched new SDK helpers: has(), protect(), and <Protect>, which allow developers to easily manage user permissions and roles. These tools are designed to streamline the process of verifying whether users have specific permissions or roles, with protect() and <Protect> offering more declarative and secure methods to ensure unauthorized actions are blocked. These features are currently available for Next.js, with plans to extend support to other frameworks and add entitlements for feature gating based on subscription plans by 2024. Clerk aims to continue enhancing its authorization capabilities, making it a core component of their service offering.