Compliance isn't a phase. It's a parallel track.

The default playbook for compliance is to ship the product first and bolt on SOC 2 or HIPAA afterward. It’s also, in our experience, the most expensive way to do it.

Post-launch compliance is expensive because it’s a rewrite. Audit logs need to be added to systems that weren’t designed for them. Access controls need to be retrofitted into APIs that weren’t scoped that way. Vendor agreements need to be re-papered.

Running compliance alongside the build costs roughly a third of that because the constraints inform the architecture as it’s being designed. Audit logging is in the request middleware on day one. Access is scoped per-role from the first migration. Vendor selection includes a BAA check.

The other reason to run it in parallel: your evidence package is essentially complete on the day the product is code-complete, which compresses your time-to-audit by months.