Building a great plugin is one of many challenging aspects to a commercial launch. Getting it licensed, delivered, updated, and monetized sustainably is where development teams have historically had to build almost as much infrastructure as the plugin itself. UJAM today announces that Gorilla Engine, the professional plugin development platform behind the company's own commercial catalog and products from teams at Avid, Reason, Loopcloud, Crow Hill, and others is now available through structured public licensing for independent developers, studios, and enterprise teams worldwide. Alongside this opening, UJAM releases Gorilla Engine 26.03, which introduces third-party Product Hub support: a fully integrated licensing and delivery system, designed to eliminate that infrastructure burden entirely.
Product Hub: A Complete Licensing and Delivery Stack, Included
\u200bThe moment a plugin leaves development, it needs a delivery and licensing system. Most teams build one from scratch, or patch together third-party services not designed to work together. Product Hub replaces that patchwork with a purpose-built solution integrated directly into the Gorilla Engine workflow, and with release 26.03 it is now open to all third-party manufacturers.
With Product Hub, developers can manage products, builds, and releases from a single interface, ship installers directly to customers at no additional traffic cost, and offer optional branded downloaders with resume support for large file sizes. Webshop connections allow license data to flow into Product Hub automatically when a purchase event fires, and the Product Hub JavaScript client library gives developers a straightforward path to adding username and password activation directly inside their products. Teams that need deeper reporting or custom workflows have access to Product Hub's full API for building their own dashboards and integrations.
Product Hub supports time-limited licenses, making monthly and annual subscription models more practical and with minimal effort. Product Hub charges no per-transaction fees and no traffic costs, which means the economics improve as a catalog grows rather than compounding against the developer.
A Professional Platform, End to End
\u200bProduct Hub is one layer of a platform that handles the full lifecycle of plugin creation. Gorilla Engine gives developers access to more than 60 professional-grade effect algorithms, filters and oscillators, all inside a modular environment where sound designers, developers, and UI designers can work in parallel. Sound core design, prototyping, and final compilation each have dedicated tooling, with a flexible UI layer and scripting language that keeps audio logic, interface layout, and control behavior cleanly separated.
When a plugin is ready to ship, Gorilla Engine manages the complete packaging pipeline. Developers can preview inside popular DAWs and export signed and notarized installers for VST, AU, AAX, and standalone formats from a single environment. Plugins built on Gorilla Engine run natively across macOS (universal binary) and Windows (x86). Built-in encryption discourages low-effort piracy without adding friction for legitimate users, optional iLok integration satisfies customers who expect it, and Native Kontrol Standard (NKS) and MIDI Polyphonic Expression (MPE) support ships out of the box.
Gorilla Engine is also available as a C++ library that can be included within existing plug-in tech stacks. It is available for macOS and Windows as part of the SDK and can also be compiled to Linux ARM or even bare metal, upon request.
Audio performance holds up under real-world conditions where the engine carries no meaningful CPU footprint and is highly optimized in collaboration with well-known hardware developers.
The Practical Path for Teams Migrating from Kontakt
\u200bFor development teams currently working in Kontakt, Gorilla Engine offers a direct migration path rather than a platform shift. Gorilla Script, the platform's scripting language, is intentionally similar to Kontakt Script (KSP), meaning many existing scripts carry over with minimal modification. Core group and mapping parameters export directly, interface design and control logic move to a JavaScript-based UI layer, and modulation, filter, and effect chains can be rebuilt quickly inside Gorilla Editor. Teams with years of accumulated KSP investment do not need to start from scratch.
A plugin built with Gorilla Engine ships as its own product, with its own installer, its own brand, and its own presence on a customer's system. For developers building a catalog identity or targeting customers outside the Kontakt ecosystem, that difference is fundamental.
The economics are equally direct. Getting started as a developer often requires a licensing investment of thousands of dollars before a single product ships. Gorilla Engine's free license tier gives developers full access to the platform at no upfront cost, including the ability to build, test, and prototype without a financial commitment until they are ready to distribute commercially.
The competitive context makes this worth considering seriously. While alternatives to Kontakt exist, most treat their engine as a side project rather than a product with an active roadmap. Gorilla Engine is UJAM's own platform, which means it receives continuous investment as a first-party product, maintained by a team whose commercial success depends directly on its quality and reliability.
Release 26.03: What Else Is New
\u200bProduct Hub is the centerpiece of the 26.03 release, but the update goes further. Single sign-on now covers gorilla-engine.com, Gorilla Compiler, Product Hub, and the helpdesk, giving developers a single login across the entire development workflow. Automated Apple Notarization is now built into Gorilla Compiler, removing a step that previously required manual intervention for every macOS distribution. The release also contains more than 50 additional features, improvements, and bug fixes developed in response to feedback from the developer community.
"We built Gorilla Engine because we needed it for our own releases, and it has been the platform behind everything UJAM has shipped commercially," said Wolfram Knelangen, COO at UJAM. "Product Hub is the piece that closes the loop. With it, a developer on Gorilla Engine gets the same licensing and delivery infrastructure we use ourselves, without having to build any of it. We think that changes what is possible for independent developers and for the enterprise teams who have spent years building and maintaining their own delivery infrastructure."
Looking Ahead: GE React
\u200bLater in 2026, UJAM will introduce GE React, a new UI layer for Gorilla Engine that brings a React-inspired component model to plugin interface development. GE React is not standard web React. It is a purpose-built flavour of React, engineered specifically for the performance constraints and real-time requirements of audio software. Developers familiar with component-based UI patterns will find the model recognizable, while the implementation is designed from the ground up for plugin development rather than adapted from browser-based tooling. UJAM expects GE React to make interface development faster and more maintainable across teams of all sizes, and the project reflects the platform's continuing commitment to modern, developer-friendly tooling.
Availability
\u200bGorilla Engine is available now for macOS and Windows under a tiered licensing model. A free license provides full access to the Gorilla Engine development environment for learning, experimentation, and private plugin creation. Commercial and enterprise licenses are available for teams planning to distribute or monetize their work. Further information and license options are available at gorilla-engine.com.
About UJAM
\u200bUJAM \u200bwas co-founded by Hans Zimmer and Pharrell Williams, both musicians whose careers have been significantly supported by technology. The vision behind UJAM is to make technology even more accessible and encourage even more people to make music.
This vision is being realized by a team of virtual instrument pioneers who had previously developed legendary virtual instruments from Steinberg and Digidesign — from Steinberg Hypersonic to Virtual Guitarist, from Digidesign Xpand to Transfuser — and who finally want to realize their vision of shortening the path from the idea to the perfect track. More fun, better results, less complexity.
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