# How Factory scaled its cloud backend to one billion monthly requests on Vercel

DevFeed: [How Factory scaled its cloud backend to one billion monthly requests on Vercel](<https://devfeed.tech/articles/how-factory-scaled-its-cloud-backend-to-one-billion-monthly-requests-on-vercel-737.md>)

Original publisher: [Read original article](<https://vercel.com/blog/how-factory-scaled-its-cloud-backend-to-one-billion-monthly-requests-on-vercel>)

Author: Ben Sabic

Published: 2026-08-03T04:00:00Z

Content type: article

Language: en

Sources: [Vercel News](<https://devfeed.tech/sources/vercel-news.md>)

Topics: [Next.js](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/next-js.md>), [Vercel](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/vercel.md>), [Back end](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/backend.md>), [Software as a service](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/saas.md>), [API](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/api.md>), [Authentication](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/authentication.md>), [Routing (disambiguation)](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/routing.md>), [Serverless](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/serverless.md>)

Tags: [api](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/api.md>), [authentication](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/authentication.md>), [backend](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/backend.md>), [cloud](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/cloud.md>), [latency](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/latency.md>), [next-js](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/next-js.md>), [routing](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/routing.md>), [serverless](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/serverless.md>), [software-development](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/software-development.md>), [tooling](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/tooling.md>), [vercel](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/vercel.md>), [web-app](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/web-app.md>)

## AI overview

The article describes how Factory runs its cloud backend on a single Next.js application deployed on Vercel. API routes, middleware, webhook handlers, and log-drain pipelines support a multi-surface SaaS platform handling one billion daily requests, with reported p95 response times of 350 milliseconds or below. Factory scaled memory limits and function duration as needed, while Vercel's fluid compute kept functions warm and avoided cold-start latency.

## Source excerpt

Factory on Vercel One billion backend API requests served daily 350ms p95 response time Scaled backend, internal tooling, and security without a dedicated infrastructure team Factory's mission is to bring autonomy to every phase of the software development lifecycle, from signals to production. Not to replace engineering judgment, but to automate the repetitive work around it, giving engineers more time to focus on the decisions that matter most. To deliver this enterprise-grade platform, Factory adopted their ideal operation model internally: remaining lean and agile by deploying Droids to manage routine workloads, so their engineers could focus strictly on building the product. As Factory scaled from a simple web app into a multi-surface platform, serving everyone from individual developers to enterprises with tens of thousands of engineers, their backend scaled alongside them. Today, a single Next.js backend on Vercel powers every surface, handling one billion daily requests across API routes, middleware, and webhook handlers, without becoming a separate engineering project. Next.js as a full-stack backend for cloud SaaS: API routes, middleware, and backend logic at scale Most teams think of Next.js as a frontend framework. Factory runs its entire cloud backend on it: API routes handle the customer-facing API, which launched in its own section of their Next.js app Middleware manages authentication and routing logic across every surface Webhook handlers and log drain pipelines run alongside the web platform, feeding analytics downstream As Factory grew rapidly, the same backend absorbed every new workload. None of it required standing up separate infrastructure or making a new vendor decision. The only areas that required tuning were memory limits and function duration. Both scaled up without incident. Fluid compute keeps functions warm across requests, removing the cold start penalty that makes traditional serverless a liability for latency-sensitive workloads. T