Backend is a Conversation,
Not Code.
API is the new standard of communication with databases.
Every table. Every database. Every AI agent — governed, production-safe, and accessible without a line of code written or owned.
Works with your database
Any of these databases, anywhere — RDS · Railway · Supabase · Neon · PlanetScale · ClickHouse Cloud · Altinity · or your own server
The Difference
The old way
FR → Code → Review → Build → QA → Scale → Release
SQL + language + frameworks — developers only
Separate codebase to maintain
Two weeks per feature
Migration = engineering quarter
Governance bolted on afterward
AI agents: security risk
100% of work follows this route
The Minimal way
FR → Minimal MCP → Live API → QA → Release
English — everyone
No codebase. Nothing to own.
Minutes per feature
Migration = one config line
Governance built in by default
AI agents: governed and auditable
Only 10–20% of work follows this route
The old way
FR → Code → Review → Build → QA → Scale → Release
SQL + language + frameworks — developers only
Separate codebase to maintain
Two weeks per feature
Migration = engineering quarter
Governance bolted on afterward
AI agents: security risk
100% of work follows this route
The Minimal way
FR → Minimal MCP → Live API → QA → Release
English — everyone
No codebase. Nothing to own.
Minutes per feature
Migration = one config line
Governance built in by default
AI agents: governed and auditable
Only 10–20% of work follows this route
The Problem
Four delays. None of them necessary.
Every sprint pays the cost.
EXPOSURE DELAY
Build it safely — wait for backend.
A new table is ready. The business logic is understood. Exposing it safely still takes repeated engineering cycles every time. The capability exists. The API does not. Yet.
ANSWER DELAY
Answers exist — access does not.
Operational answers live in production data. But teams still route through BI tools and engineering queues. Intent in plain language, output weeks later as a dashboard that's already stale.
BACKLOG DELAY
Every request — a new engineering task.
Customer-specific reports pile up. Each request is legitimate. Each becomes a sprint ticket. Engineering builds custom work that cannot be reused, at the expense of product work that should be the priority.
DISCOVERY DELAY
Signals hidden — questions go unasked.
Valuable patterns stay buried because teams can only answer questions they already know to ask. The insight that would have changed a product decision sits untouched in a database with no one watching it.
These four delays are not isolated inefficiencies. They are symptoms of the same root cause: the gap between business intent and governed, production-safe output has to be crossed by hand, every single time.
The Structure
Seventy percent of every API layer is the same problem.
Auto API resolves the 70% at runtime. Zero code.
The 20% — Auto API with parameters, or Custom API in minutes.
The 10% is still yours. It no longer carries the other 90%.
These ratios apply to database-centric workflows — the primary API surface in most products. Backend work outside this scope — auth, third-party integrations, and logic not tied to your database — is not covered by Minimal and remains yours to build.
The Suite
One runtime. The complete path from schema to shipped feature.
Auto API
Schema to governed endpoints. Instantly.
Every table discovered. Four endpoints live. Zero code written. Zero code owned. Always in sync — schema changes, nothing breaks.
0 lines of code
Solves: Exposure Delay
Custom API
SQL, Starlark, Expr. Inline. No deployment.
Business logic that runs inside the runtime — not in a sidecar, not a Lambda, not an HTTP handler you deploy and maintain. Sandboxed. Auditable. Versioned. Done in minutes.
No external service
Insights
Ask in English. Get a live dashboard.
AI composes a full visual application from one plain-language question — geo-maps, KPI cards, trend lines, filters. Live-connected to production data. Not last Tuesday's export.
No BI tool needed
Solves: Answer Delay
Forge
Your customers. Their data. Self-serve.
Customers define what they need in plain English and get a governed, live application. No sprint. No wait. No generic version that half-fits everyone. The best apps become your product features.
No sprint required
Solves: Backlog Delay
Deep Thought
Patterns surface — without knowing to ask.
Autonomous signal discovery. Anomalies, correlations, and patterns that no human thought to query for — presented as ready-to-use insights at the right time.
Solves: Discovery Delay
The Proof
We are our own first customer.
Before any external customer boarded Minimal, we ran it ourselves — in production, at scale. Schema changes, upgrade paths, runtime surprises, API rollouts, version updates, downtime — we found them first, and fixed them before anyone else had to.
The Dialer App
A production application running on Minimal.
"Database software earns trust the same way every time: uptime, backward-compatible contracts, and operations nobody notices. API contracts that survive schema changes. Compute that stays predictable through migrations. Updates that reach production without a deployment window. We held Minimal to all three — in production."
The Thesis
Agent are Ferraris.
Minimal is the highway to accomplish the impossible
SQL gates access to the people who learned it. Every developer who cannot write SQL is a ticket. Every business user who needs a report is a sprint. Every AI agent that queries a production database with unrestricted SQL is a security incident waiting to happen.
AI agents are Ferraris. They are built for speed, intelligence, and capability. What limits them is not ambition — it is infrastructure. SQL is a dirt road: unstructured, injection-prone, built for humans fifty years ago. Governed API endpoints are the highway: structured, access-controlled, auditable, MCP-native. Minimal builds that highway in minutes. The agents drive. Nobody notices the road. That is the point.
API opens access to anyone you authorise — governed, scoped, and audited by default. Your developers. Your product managers. Your customers. Your AI agents. All from one runtime.
With Minimal, English is the only prerequisite.
Read the full thesis →The signal is already in the market
of API teams still face collaboration blockers in production workflows.
Postman · State of the API 2025
of developers are designing APIs specifically for AI agents.
Postman · State of the API 2025
of teams worry about unauthorised AI agent calls hitting production systems.
Postman · Security Report 2025
Embedded analytics directly drive revenue and user engagement.
ThoughtSpot · Embedded Analytics
Minimal addresses all four simultaneously — API infrastructure, embedded BI, and AI tooling governance — from a single runtime.
The Invitation
Minimal is selecting its first 100 partners.
We are offering 100 unlimited licenses — free for 12 months — to teams who want to be in the room where this standard is set.
- Everything unlimited for 12 months.
- Monthly feedback session — 30 minutes.
- One case study at month three.
- Direct access to the founders.
Not a free trial. Not a discount.
A seat at the table.