Events and News Detail
Ordinary to Extraordinary
Initiating change. Creating a better future.
|
|
| SaaS Healing Business Pain Points, Say ISVs [ CXO Today ] |
|
By Priyanka Akhouri
Mumbai, Jun 27, 2008
Today as more and more applications are hosted, connectivity and delivery of products plays a critical role for Independent Software Vendors (ISVs). Without an efficient infrastructure and seamless connectivity it's difficult for an ISV to achieve business goals.
ISVs are companies that make and sell hardware to their customers. However, the role of ISVs in today's competitive market scenario has transformed a lot. With the high level of attrition in the industry it becomes difficult for them to keep up with the industry standards. Besides their customary role, there is a constant need for ISVs to keep up with technological challenges and build long lasting skills.
Businesses today are not only open to a range of proprietary options that have existed all these years, but are also on the look out for open source alternatives. The challenge for ISVs today is to scale the products and business across markets, maintaining the high standards associated with the company. An ISV has to target 2 segments of the market namely - enterprises and SMBs.
In the large enterprise space, the deals are bigger, more personalized, and more customized. It requires more personnel to deliver the solutions that are more complicated and cost more. Rahul Chawla, CEO of Bangalore- based In4velocity says, "Enterprise customer's expectations are higher and the flexibility, adjustability to functionality delivered by a product is very low. Therefore, this market typically suffers from high costs, both in implementation and long term maintenance."
However, in the SMB space it's just the opposite where the customer's budget is not much, but requires the basic fundamentals of software for streamlining the business.
Adoption of SaaS:
According to a recent study by Springboard Research, the Indian SaaS market will grow at a CAGR of 77 % from 2006 - 2010 to reach US $165 million by 2010.
For efficient application delivery process, businesses are undergoing a transformation from traditional tools to cloud computing and Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) model. According to Ramesh Shastri, MD of SpikeSource (India), companies need tools to meet the demands of the business and customers. "Time-to-develop solutions are also decreasing today, and customers are also expecting higher functionality at lower TCO. Without an efficient infrastructure and seamless connectivity, none of these targets can be effective."
To meet up these challenges, businesses are increasingly moving onto adopting the SaaS model. With the software boom across the world driving generalization of functionality and cutting costs, enterprises and ISVs are realizing deliveries of solutions via SaaS to be more fruitful. Atul Kumar, VP (SaaS operations) of Serena Software adds, "With SaaS, IT does not need to maintain systems such as marketing, sales, HR, etc. It frees up valuable resources for mission critical applications and projects."
Shastri opines that SaaS is one good option as it offers an easier way to get started. It also makes trials easier and much less expensive. "Customers want to focus on their core business and not on IT. They are willing to invest in a solution that is delivered through a SaaS model. With the SaaS model, companies do not need to deal in-house to support and upgrade the infrastructure that is needed to support these solutions," he added.
There are both technical and business reasons driving the demand for SaaS. According to Satish Syal, executive vice president of NIIT Technologies, using outsourced SaaS services allows companies to procure best-in-class computing environment that is more efficient and less expensive than creating one on their own. This allows organizations to focus on the real technology and business issues that drive the success of their companies.
Sanjay Marathe, CTO of Zensar Technologies feels that the adoption of SaaS is still in the infancy stage as far as commercialization is concerned. The adaptation is probably in single digits in terms of percentage, but the trends show that this could grow to 20-25 % in next 2-3 years.
The adoption rate is therefore driving a change on how future application software will be and should be developed, installed, delivered, and managed by ISVs in future. "Greater the adoption of SaaS model, the higher is the demand for a robust data center capability, telecom infrastructure, and enhanced scalable technology platforms," adds Shastri.
The growing acceptance of SaaS allows ISVs to focus on building end user solutions. "It helps to reduce costs, maintenance, and the workforce involved is also reduced in the chain. Every major ISV, in any space, is thinking SaaS," says Chawla.
Chawla provides some insights on some ISVs that have achieved success through SaaS. Tally for example is by far the most well accepted SMB accounting solution in the business in India. Oracle scales solutions and tools for the retail and SMB space with the help of SaaS providing meeting the market potentials. Companies such as Google and Salesforce.com also deliver applications via SaaS.
Certifications Provide Business Assurance:
Businesses today wish to source the best solutions from multiple vendors. Hence, security, reliability, interoperability, and scalability are important factors that help to manage mission critical work.
"ISO certification and surveillance audits maintain continued focus and benefits the organization in terms predictability of service levels and better information security," adds Marathe. In the SaaS world, the right kind of certification is very important. Examples include PCC-DSS, SAS70, ISO 20000, etc. Kumar views that certifications make calls for a trustworthy SaaS vendor and while making any deal certifications holds a lot of importance for ISVs.
Shastri views that ISO Certification is relevant for service companies and ISVs are better of with technology platform certifications. To maintain these standards, technology certifications ensure trustworthiness to ISVs.
|
|
