What are Packaged Business Capabilities?

Quick Summary: Packaged Business Capabilities (PBCs) are a foundational concept in modern commerce architecture, helping teams create flexible, modular solutions that align closely with business outcomes. In this post, we break down what PBCs are, how they relate to microservices, and why they matter to both technical and business stakeholders evaluating flexible, future-ready commerce platforms.

What are Packaged Business Capabilities (PBCs)?

Packaged Business Capabilities (PBCs) are self-contained software components that represent a specific business function — such as catalog management, pricing, or order orchestration — and are designed to be used as modular building blocks within a flexible commerce architecture.

Each PBC typically includes a collection of APIs, services, data schemas, and event channels that work together to deliver a complete, business-facing capability. They are intentionally designed to be autonomous, reusable, and easily understood by both technical and business teams—making them ideal for organizations seeking to create flexible, modular commerce solutions.

Today, PBCs are widely adopted by modern commerce teams looking to create flexible, best-fit solutions that can evolve with customer needs and market demands.

How Are PBCs and Microservices Different?

Microservices and PBCs are often discussed together in a composable commerce architecture, but they serve different roles.

Microservices are an architectural style — small, autonomous services that developers use to design and deploy software with speed and flexibility. Think of microservices as the internal wiring of your commerce platform.

PBCs, on the other hand, are business-facing modules that align to functional outcomes. They are often made up of multiple microservices bundled together into a meaningful unit for business users.

For example, a “Customer & Account Management” PBC may include microservices for:

• Customer management
• Role-based access control
• Address book management
• Account hierarchy configurations

While developers focus on how microservices are designed and deployed, business teams care about what they enable, such as managing B2B buyer workflows or configuring loyalty programs.

Why PBCs Matter for Business Teams

PBCs bring real value to business users by:

• Reducing complexity across the commerce stack
• Enabling faster onboarding and training
• Simplifying licensing, documentation, and go-to-market planning
• Offering business-aligned functionality without exposing technical underpinnings

Unlike abstract technical services, PBCs reflect the language of the business. A merchandiser doesn’t care if three microservices power their promotions engine — they care that they can launch and manage promotions quickly. Tools like Elastic Path’s Product Experience Manager are built to give merchandisers and marketers direct control over those experiences, without needing to rely on developers for every update.

That’s why PBCs have become a critical lens for evaluating modular commerce platforms: they provide a bridge between business needs and technical architecture.

Why PBCs Matter for Vendors and Architects

On the vendor side, PBCs allow for more modular packaging of capabilities that are easier to sell, deploy, and evolve. Over time, the set of microservices within a PBC may change, but the capability offered to the business remains clear and consistent.

For solution architects and developers, working with PBCs enables a clearer alignment between system architecture and business requirements. Instead of focusing solely on granular services, they can build solutions that map directly to the outcomes business teams care about.

How Big Should a PBC Be?

There’s no universal size. But a PBC should be:

• Recognizable to a business user as a standalone capability (e.g., "Catalog" or "Pricing")
• Large enough to provide meaningful value
• Small enough to be independently replaced or enhanced

If a PBC is too small, it becomes meaningless to the business.

If it’s too large, it risks unnecessary complexity or unused features.

The right-sized PBC aligns with how your teams think, plan, and execute commerce strategies.

Can a Monolith Be a PBC?

Yes,if the monolith offers a focused, complete capability that is always consumed as a whole. For example, a standalone payment gateway with APIs can qualify as a PBC. What matters is the business-facing clarity and modularity, not the internal architecture.

Why This Matters for eCommerce Software Evaluations

Understanding the difference between microservices and PBCs is especially important during a commerce platform evaluation.

• Business users will focus on the PBCs: Does this solution solve my catalog, checkout, pricing, or customer management needs?
• Technical teams will focus on the microservices: How are services decoupled? How easily can we integrate, extend, and deploy them?

When evaluating modern commerce vendors, make sure both groups are aligned on outcomes, and that the vendor clearly communicates how capabilities are delivered, consumed, and evolved.

Explore PBCs in Action with Elastic Path

Elastic Path is built using a microservices-based architecture and delivers business-aligned capabilities as modular PBCs. This makes it easier for technical and business teams to launch tailored commerce experiences quickly — without sacrificing flexibility.

Learn how our architecture and our approach to PBCs supports faster time-to-value, better alignment across teams, and long-term composability.

Key Takeaways

• Packaged Business Capabilities (PBCs) are modular, business-aligned components that deliver complete commerce functions like catalog, pricing, checkout, or customer management.
• PBCs bundle APIs, microservices, data, and events into a single, reusable capability that is easy for both business and technical teams to understand and consume.
• Microservices are an implementation approach; PBCs are outcome-focused building blocks designed around business needs, not technical structure.
• PBCs reduce complexity and improve alignment by abstracting technical details while preserving architectural flexibility.
• Composable commerce platforms organize functionality around PBCs, enabling faster assembly of best-fit solutions and easier evolution over time.
• Effective PBCs are right-sized: meaningful to the business, yet independently deployable and replaceable.
• Commerce platform evaluations are clearer when viewed through a PBC lens, helping teams align business outcomes, system design, and long-term composability.