Enterprise applications delivered from the cloud have become a hot talking point in the tech industry recently. Fueled by an increasing focus on cost cutting, ease of use, scalability and faster time to market, cloud applications are being discussed in detail at various seminars and industry conferences. Taking a cue from these market indicators, most major enterprise application vendors have already started offering their applications via the cloud. Any enterprise application you name, including database, ERP, CRM, etc., is already being offered, in some form, through a SaaS (Software-as-a-Service) or cloud-based model. A Content Management System (CMS) is no exception as we have begun to see the arrival of plenty of CMS applications delivered from the cloud. However, do these cloud-based CMS applications really bring a new paradigm for managing your content? Or, is it just old wine in a new bottle with all the associated industry pain points still present? (more…)

I agree with Andre Yee’s point of view on SaaS (Is SaaS Dead?).  Andre makes some great points to refute the conclusions made by Neil McAllister in his post, Is the SaaS experiment finally over? In fact, I would go as far to say that the problems that we are seeing now should be expected as part of the transition from delivering Commercial off the Shelf (COTS) applications to delivering SaaS solutions by traditional ISVs.  Andre Yee highlights three points in his post: bad applications, reliability and performance, and shelfware.  As he correctly points out, these problems are not endemic to SaaS, as suggested by Neil McAllister, but a function of poor execution by many SaaS vendors. (more…)

Broadband and ubiquitous Internet access have fed the growth of the World Wide Web (WWW) and led to the  birth and growth of cloud computing and Software as a Service (SaaS), which in turn have started affecting the traditional Independent Software Vendors (ISVs). ISVs were instrumental in defining and giving momentum to the software market during the 1990’s and 2000’s.  Today, however, SaaS is driving the world’s 60 fastest-growing software companies. Existing ISVs are feeling the pressure from pure SaaS start-ups. Calls from the market for SaaS alternatives to their traditional licensed product offerings further add to their woes. What’s an ISV to do? (more…)