Part I of this blog post series talked about my encounter with BigMachines, a provider of slick software-as-a-service (SaaS) configure, price, and quote (CPQ)/quote-to-order (Q2O) solutions during my recent attendance of Gartner’s CRM Summit in Scottsdale, Arizona (US). Prior to analyzing recent events at BigMachines, Part I explained the general value proposition of on-demand Q2O and CPQ software solutions. Part II will continue with a discussion of recent developments at BigMachines.

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I recently attended Gartner’s CRM Summit in Scottsdale, Arizona (US). During the conference, I bumped into several old acquaintances who are working for various customer relationship management (CRM) software vendors. One of the vendors that attended the conference was BigMachines, a provider of inventive software-as-a-service (SaaS) configure, price, and quote (CPQ)/quote-to-order (Q2O) solutions.

Generally speaking, Web-based product configurators empower user enterprises to sell more, faster to their customers. These customers can be either other businesses or individual consumers.

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Part 1 of this blog series depicted the three evolutionary phases (or waves) of software as a service (SaaS) and cloud computing adoption. The post ended with some glimpses into the future and the likely implications for SaaS users.

Part 2 then explored the apparent opportunities and accompanying challenges (and painstaking soul-searching exercises) that SaaS aspirants face in their endeavors. Some concrete examples of vendors and their new strategies and solutions were presented, most notably SAP Business ByDesign.

Part 3 of this blog series analyzed recent SaaS initiatives by mainstream mega-vendors. Some concrete examples of vendors and their new strategies and solutions were presented, most notably Oracle’s Platform for SaaS and SAP’s recently unveiled on-demand strategy for large enterprises.

Coming back to the company that has inspired this series, Progress Software, the vendor believes that most mega-vendors, based on their nascent and budding SaaS offerings described in Part 2 and Part 3, have been slow to market with SaaS offerings. Thus, the window of opportunity for Progress’ partners is still open. Read the rest of this entry »

Part 1 of this blog series depicted the three evolutionary phases (or waves) of software as a service (SaaS) and the adoption of cloud computing. The post ended with some glimpses into the future and likely implications for SaaS users.

Part 2 then explored the apparent opportunities and accompanying challenges (and painstaking soul-searching exercises) that SaaS aspirants face in their endeavors. Some concrete examples of vendors and their new strategies and solutions were presented, most notably SAP Business ByDesign.

Part 3 of this blog series analyzes recent SaaS initiatives by mainstream mega-vendors with some concrete examples. Read the rest of this entry »

Part 1 of this blog series depicted the three evolutionary phases (or waves) of software as a service (SaaS) and cloud computing adoption. The article ended with some glimpses into the future and likely implications for SaaS users.

Part 2 explores the apparent opportunities and accompanying challenges (and inevitable soul-searching exercises) that SaaS aspirants face in their endeavors. Some concrete examples of vendors and their new strategies and solutions will be presented. Read the rest of this entry »

At the time when my recent “SaaSy Discussions” series was already being published, I had an update briefing and great discussion with Colleen Niven Smith, vice president of software-as-a-service (SaaS) initiatives at Progress Software. Smith and Progress Software’s findings on SaaS industry dynamics concur with my assertions that growth of SaaS-based offerings is expected to outpace traditional on-site enterprise applications business in the not-so-distant future.

Combined competitive, organizational, and technological factors are expected to fuel SaaS solution growth, and many industry analysts project the SaaS market to be in the range of USD$14 billion to USD$17 billion within the next three years. Indeed, as mentioned in my 2008 blog post on Progress Software’s SaaS forays, 20 percent of Progress Software’s independent software vendor (ISV) partners that leverage the Progress OpenEdge platform for SaaS applications saw their businesses grow by over 40 percent in 2008.

In addition, there has been a much higher market valuation lately of on-demand SaaS providers as compared to their on-premise-software peers. There are also more optimistic expectations about SaaS companies’ performances and long-term growth prospects as compared to traditional “perpetual license” application businesses. Read the rest of this entry »

Part 1 of this blog series introduced common supply chain challenges and resulting spend management opportunities for companies of all sizes. The article then went into the philosophical and functional differences (if any) between the “spend management” and “supplier relationship management (SRM)” monikers. Further discussion was about what exact functional parts of this software category small and medium enterprises (SMEs) might need.

The real question should always be, “Do we manage spending and, if so, what solutions do we use to do it?” To my mind, sourcing, procurement, and spend analysis capabilities cover most of the spend control needs for midsized enterprises. Read the rest of this entry »

The first part (Part II) of this blog series described the opportunities for software as a service (SaaS) or on-demand applications, especially in the current difficult economic milieu. Part II and Part IIa then analyzed the top five SaaS assumptions (misconceptions) recently outlined by Gartner.

Part IIa and Part IIb also analyzed the major technical considerations that any vendor has to go through before it can embark on delivering a SaaS offering. This final part will will conclude with the Internet hosting service considerations as well as with key success factors (KSFs) for SaaS providers. Read the rest of this entry »

The first part (Part II) of this blog series described the opportunities for software as a service (SaaS) or on-demand applications, especially in the current difficult economic milieu. Part IIa then analyzed the top five SaaS assumptions (misconceptions) recently outlined by Gartner.

Before any vendor can embark onto delivering a SaaS offering, it must thoroughly consider a number of harrowing SaaS technology choices and their implications. Thus, Part IIa also analyzed the decision’s impact on the functional footprint (scope) of the future SaaS product, after which the aspiring SaaS vendor must identify gaps within its in-house skill sets and define how to fill them.

This part continues with the other major remaining technical considerations before any vendor can embark on delivery of a SaaS offering. Read the rest of this entry »

The first part of this blog series described the opportunity for software as a service (SaaS) or on-demand enterprise applications, especially in the current difficult economic milieu. But before any vendor can embark on delivering a SaaS offering, it must understand several misconceptions about SaaS.

Part two then analyzed the first two of the top five SaaS assumptions that Gartner recently outlined in its research.  Read the rest of this entry »

Wow, how time flies and how many things have happened in the market these days to distract a market observer! Namely, only over a year after my SaaSy Discusions (Part I) and SaaSy Discussions (Part Ia) blog series, some time has at last become available for more discussions on the intriguing topic of software as a service (SaaS).

The title of this SaaSy discussions series might be somewhat deceiving, since the question might no longer be whether to go for SaaS or the on-demand computing deployment mode, but rather how to go about it for both vendors and users. Indeed, the current tough economic situation certainly has something to do with making this “go on-demand” decision a bit easier for both software providers and users. Read the rest of this entry »

Part 1 of this blog series introduced the SAP-sponsored expert panel discussion that explored reasons to maintain IT investments even during difficult economic times. The Harvard Business Review (HBR) article by Andrew McAfee and Erik Brynjolfsson entitled “Investing in the IT That Makes a Competitive Difference” was the main supplement and starting point of the discussion.

As I mentioned in Part 1, in a nutshell, the panel logically (and not surprisingly) argued that enterprises should use IT tools to innovate and create differentiation, especially during a difficult economy.  Moreover, a long-term SAP analyst relationship contact privately solicited my opinion on the extent to which these esteemed academics understand our industry.

According to the “you asked for it” motto, here is the continuation of my thoughts that was parlayed into a blog post to be shared with our readers too.

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The recent economic slowdown has illustrated how interwoven our global economies really are. The demands to increase enterprise performance has accelerated. Whether it’s to find new opportunities to increase or maintain market share, or to generate new revenue opportunities, each of these areas represent additional challenges in fulfilling customer expectations and demands. Read the rest of this entry »

Part 1 of this blog series described the conundrum that commodity-based manufacturers encounter when it comes to determining the best price, production mix, and volumes. It also introduced SignalDemand, Inc., which applies math and science to the problem of price and margin optimization software for large-scale manufacturers.

SignalDemand stands alone as the only provider of price management and optimization software that takes into account the key supply and production constraints impacting manufacturers. In other words, its application is using pricing as a demand and supply matching mechanism for manufacturers of consumer goods.

Namely, on the supply (upstream) side, commodity-focused hedge funds have long leveraged supply optimization software, while on the demand (downstream) side, wholesale distributors and retailers have for some time leveraged demand management and optimization software. Conversely, manufacturers have for too long been left in the middle shooting in the dark when it comes to concurrent pricing and demand management. Read the rest of this entry »

Sadly, it is not difficult for so many of us to concede that, except for maybe the historic elections in the US and the successful Olympic Games in Beijing, 2008 was a terrible and somber year. It felt long-drawn-out, and many of us will have trouble sinking it easily into oblivion.

Without even talking about our retirement funds and investments being slashed by about 40 percent (as part of a potentially more far-reaching financial crisis) or about 2.6 million jobs lost in the US only, just look at mushrooming late 2008 layoffs news at even the biggest and typically impervious enterprise applications vendors. For example, both Bruce Richardson of AMR Research and Frank Scavo of Enterprise Systems Spectator have reported in their respective December 2008 blog posts about Infor’s deliberate preparations for a downturn.

Along similar lines (although about some vendors there have been rumors rather than a public acknowledgement by the vendor) were the recent cost-cutting and restructuring moves by Sage, Consona, Lawson Software, Oracle, and Epicor Software. The market leader SAP has not yet been plagued by major layoffs per se, although there have been rumors/reports about the recently enacted stringent internal corporate-wide cost-cutting policies, such as restricted traveling, training, events, and so on.

I am indeed aware of the fact that there was no traditional SAP Influencer/Analyst Summit this past fall/winter, after several years of being a major winter event solely for industry analysts and media. Thus, trying to think positively, I am happy to report about coming across at least one vendor with upbeat news and upright posture in these dreary days.

In fact, how often have we heard about a mid-market enterprise resource planning (ERP) provider’s quarterly global results in late 2008 revealing a 37 percent increase in revenue and sales (with 30 percent growth in North America), with the company claiming many significant new orders worth over US$ 1 million? Read the rest of this entry »