Enterprise Identity Features That Unlock Upmarket Deals

In the growth journey of B2B startups, the transition to serving enterprise customers often hinges on robust identity and authentication solutions, particularly with Single Sign-On (SSO) capabilities. Enterprise clients demand features like SSO, multi-tenancy, data residency compliance, and audit trails, which are crucial for security and administrative control. Startups often overlook these until they face stalled deals or security concerns, realizing that their existing infrastructure cannot support larger, more complex clients. The article highlights the challenges of building these systems in-house, using examples like Stack Overflow's lengthy SSO implementation and the benefits of using managed solutions like Descope, which streamline onboarding and reduce support overhead. The need for readiness in enterprise authentication is emphasized, urging startups to proactively invest in identity infrastructure to avoid growth chokepoints and ensure they can meet enterprise requirements without sacrificing development resources.