Is it about to happen for SaaS?

Software as a Service (SaaS) is not a new idea; its origins in Bureaux and ASP have been around for many years. But is this new incarnation of this well established principle about to take off?
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Certainly at the recent Softworld exhibitions the public were asking to see online business systems. The few SaaS exhibitors were certainly receiving a lot of attention and I was questioned extensively about them in my Master-classes. But are customers just inquisitive or are they actually selecting SaaS applications?

In a depressed market all types of software applications are affected, but the in-house application providers do not yet believe they are losing out to online providers. However established online market leaders, like Salesforce.com and NetSuite, seem to have shrugged off their competitors.

Many of the traditional applications suppliers are trying to re-invent themselves with online applications. But as the innovators explain, it's not as simple as creating a web-based front-end to a legacy application. I know from bitter experience with my web-based software directory, the complex problems that web-based delivery uncovers - especially with incompatible web-browsers.

Customers are slowly getting round to the idea of having their data hosted on a third-party server. They are still not convinced the SaaS pricing model is cheaper - after all, they rarely cost their daily maintenance and infrequent upgrades which are taken for granted with online applications.

The big problem however is the protection of the data. HMRC requires companies to keep their data available for audit for 6 years, plus the current year. If it's held electronically, they want it available in an electronic format. So what happens if you fall out with your online-software provider after 3 years - how will you keep your data accessible? How will you transfer your data to your next service provider?

With shared online services and the move to open source, the future will be quite different to what exists at present. You only have to start to use Google's Apps to realise the opportunities that are now available - in many cases free of charge.

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BY Dennis Keeling, Independent Business Software Analyst
Source：AccountancyAge

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