If you are comparing Bourne with InstaQuote, you probably want to remove more than data entry from industrial quoting. Your reps may need to interpret specifications, find earlier customer agreements and obtain an engineering answer before they can send an offer.
Both products belong in that evaluation. InstaQuote is InstaLILY’s industrial quoting application. Bourne is a platform for building AI applications, with our Solutions team available to deliver the quoting workflow with you. We recommend Bourne when you want to shape the application around your company and keep building on it after the first deployment. Here is what that difference means in the actual work.
Bourne vs InstaQuote at a glance
Suppose you start by automating quote preparation, then want to add a customer portal. Your team can build both in Bourne Studio, with our Solutions team handling the parts you want help with. InstaLILY’s platform also supports custom software, with its engineers delivering the project. That difference in who can build matters as you extend beyond the initial quoting application.
| Buying decision | Bourne | InstaLILY / InstaQuote |
|---|---|---|
| Starting point | Apps, agents and automations; we can build a manufacturing quoting workspace with you | InstaQuote industrial quoting application and the wider InstaLILY platform |
| Work around the quote | We scope technical clarification, commercial approvals and order handling together | Published quote-to-order scope includes exceptions, approvals, posting and follow-up |
| Who delivers the project? | Your builders in Studio, Bourne Solutions, or a combination | InstaLILY’s engineering team offers implementation and ongoing engineering |
| Who extends the application? | Your team can build in Studio as well as work with Solutions | Platform page describes customer-team composition and extension as a roadmap item |
| Main reason to buy | A custom customer operation with a platform for your next applications | A quoting application backed by a broader enterprise AI platform |
What you get with InstaQuote
InstaQuote describes intake from business documents and messages, item resolution, customer-specific commercial rules and ERP writes. It includes exception handling rather than assuming every quote can proceed automatically.
InstaLILY’s forward-deployed engineering offering adds engineers working on customer deployments. Its team can therefore take on implementation work around a complex industrial quoting process.
Our view: choose InstaQuote when its existing application closely matches the quote-to-order project you want to commission. Choose Bourne when becoming a builder on the platform is part of the purchase. As of September 2026, InstaLILY labels customer-led composition and extension as roadmap work; Bourne Studio is available for creating apps and agents today.
Both companies offer agents and customer context. Studio access matters when your team wants to create the next application itself.
A Bourne quoting workspace
With Bourne, we build the application around the people responsible for the quote. A rep sees the quotation record, line items and open decisions. They can inspect documents and ask the assistant about the record without moving the whole job into a chat window.
The example below shows a 24-tonne steel request with three lines. The agent has prepared the quote and identified a payment-term exception: 60 days requested against a 30-day agreement. The rep reviews a specific commercial decision rather than checking a blank draft from scratch.
We adapt the workspace to the records your team uses. A machinery business may need installed-base records; a chemicals supplier may need specification and certificate checks. We use the same platform to build the interface and workflow your people need.
How we build the RFQ workflow in Bourne
First, we use Bourne’s native integrations to connect the intake and business records the workflow needs. The arrival of an email or form submission can start an automation. The agent then reads the request and retrieves the customer context it needs, including relevant quote history.
Next, we configure the preparation work. The agent identifies products, checks the current sources for commercial terms and prepares the draft. We define which uncertainty should stop a line and which exception should go to a reviewer. Historical context can help identify a product without granting permission to repeat an expired discount.
The application gives the reviewer a place to act. We can include a queue of open quotes, technical questions and approvals, with each task linked to its customer and source documents. An agent can prepare a clarification or customer response while the responsible person retains approval.
Finally, we connect the approved action to the system where it belongs. That can mean creating an ERP quotation, generating the document and sending it through the agreed channel. For NetSuite, for example, the estimate API mapping must reflect the account’s forms, fields and permissions.
This is what you buy from Bourne Solutions: a working business application and the agents behind it, built with your team on Bourne. The application needs your product data and agreed commercial rules to prepare useful quotes.
Technical review before the quote
A quoting process can stall even when the commercial information is complete. Consider a request where the drawing specifies S355JR and a later document specifies S355J2. The rep needs engineering to resolve which requirement governs the supply.
In this Bourne example, the agent compares the documents, separates matching details from the material conflict and prepares the question for engineering. The reviewer can see why the quote needs a decision. We build this review around the documents and sign-off process in scope for your deployment.
Engineering should not have to hunt through a sales email chain, and the rep should not have to translate the same decision back into three separate systems.
Material conflicts can also affect the documents you must supply. In steel fabrication, AISC distinguishes material identification from traceability to a mill test report. Resolving the required grade does not by itself establish that the proposed stock carries the evidence the customer requested.
Once engineering confirms the specification, the quoting workflow should check the available stock and its supporting records. If procurement must source another lot to meet the traceability requirement, that can change the cost and delivery date. We can connect those checks in Bourne so the technical answer leads to a revised commercial offer, rather than ending as a note in an email thread.
What happens after the first quoting project?
Your customer may accept the price but send a purchase order with an earlier delivery date. We can add an order-review workflow that compares the PO with the accepted quote and routes the changed commitment to planning. Your team keeps the customer and quotation context rather than rebuilding it for the next department.
Bourne Studio also lets you create customer-facing apps and agents. A manufacturer could start with an internal quote-review application, then build a portal through which customers submit clarification documents or check a request’s progress. These are applications to scope and build, not features we assume every deployment includes.
InstaLILY also offers a platform for work beyond quoting. We favour Bourne when you want your own builders using the same product as the implementation team, particularly if new AI services are part of your commercial plans.
Implementation and pricing
For a Bourne deployment, we define the application, business workflow and approval rules before agreeing implementation work. The integrations are native to Bourne. We configure the accounts, records, actions and permissions the workflow may use. AI usage contributes to the running cost. Your internal owner needs to provide representative requests and make decisions about the workflow; we do not need you to specify every technical component before the first conversation.
For InstaLILY, get a proposal that identifies the InstaQuote scope and engineering engagement. Its FDE offering makes engineering part of the buying discussion. Ask which engineering work is included at launch and how later changes are priced.
The practical cost drivers are the number of systems, the actions the agent must complete and the amount of variation in the process. A single ERP and shared inbox differ from several regional systems with separate approval chains. Those differences matter more than a generic “per quote” figure in a software price comparison.
We would choose Bourne for the manufacturer that sees quoting as the first application in a larger commercial operation. You can work with us on that first deployment and keep building on the platform afterwards.
Frequently asked questions
How does Bourne connect to ERP and CRM systems?
Bourne includes native ERP, CRM and business-system integrations. Connect the account and configure the permitted records, actions and approvals. The workflow is tailored to your operation.
Is Bourne a replacement for InstaQuote?
Bourne can provide the quoting application and AI workflows you would otherwise buy for the same job. We build the scope around your operation. It is not a drop-in migration of an InstaQuote configuration, so existing rules, connections and work in progress need an explicit migration plan.
Does InstaLILY also support custom workflows?
Yes. Its public platform and FDE pages describe custom software and engineering delivery. We recommend Bourne for its combination of Studio builder access and Solutions deployment, not because InstaLILY only offers a fixed quote screen.
Will our team need developers to use the finished quoting application?
No. The people reviewing quotes use the application we build for their roles. Creating or changing the workflow is a separate activity. A business owner still needs to define commercial policy and approve the way the system should work.
Can we start with quoting and add order handling later?
Yes. That is a strong reason to choose Bourne. We can start with a bounded quoting workflow and extend the same customer context into order changes and delivery work. The manufacturing solution examples show the adjacent workflows we can build with your team.
Further reading
AISC: material identification and traceability
The distinction between identifying steel and tracing it to a mill test report.
Buğra Gündüz
Buğra Gündüz is the co-founder and CEO of Bourne and co-founder of HockeyStack. He built HockeyStack into an eight-figure AI business. At Bourne, he works with entrepreneurs and established companies to create AI products and services.