Like a lot of people in the collaboration and communication space, I'm extremely interested in the Software as a Service (SaaS). Here are my notes from a recent Gartner webinar on SaaS and cloud computing. It was originally broadcast on May 27, 2009, from 1:00 – 2:00 p.m. EST. The presenter was Daryl C. Plummer, Managing VP & Gartner Fellow.
Cloud Computing
- Cloud computing definition: "A style of computing where scalable and elastic IT-related capabilities are provided 'as a service' to external customers using Internet Technologies"
- When you say "cloud", always include another word, like "computing", "storage", "services." "Cloud" by itself really doesn't mean anything.
- The customer doesn't have to understand how a service works. They are "abstracted from provider concerns through service interfaces."
- For the most part IT thinks they need to know how a service works, mostly because we've trained them to do that. Instead, focus on outcomes, measurements, and contracts that mitigate risk.
- Focus on the outcomes you need, not on whether or not the service included the "cloud" label or not.
- Cloud computing is a provider-consumer relationship, instead of a vendor-user relationship.
Cloud Computing models
- Acquisition model: Service – "All that matters is results. I don't care how it's done."
- Business model: Pay for use – "I don't want to own assets; I want to pay for elastic use, like a utility."
- Access Model: Internet – "I want accessibility from anywhere from any device."
- Technical Model: Scalable, elastic, sharable – "It's about economies of scale with effective and dynamic sharing."
Risks of Cloud Computing
- Availability, capacity, and performance
- Security, privacy, disaster recovery policies and procedures
- Service metrics, reporting and analysis
- E-discovery and investigations
- Data ownership, recovery, and migration
- Integration with on-premise systems
- Commitment requirements (terms, minimum use)
- Setup, training, and integration fees
- Difficult to customize
- Switching costs
- Governance of sourcing process
- Data/process location and isolation
- Regulatory requirements
- Transparency to provider operations
- Hidden supply chain impact
Common cloud computing use cases
- Prototyping/Proofs-of-Concept
- Web application serving
- Email / Collaboration
- Application appliances
- Application testing resources
Software-as-a-Service (SaaS)
- A "form" of cloud computing in almost all cases.
- SaaS is misnamed - It should be called "Application"-as-a-service, as opposed to "Software"-as-a service.
- Delivers an application based on a single set of common code in a one-to-many model.
Uses a pay-for-use or subscription licensing model. - Beyond simply "bleeding edge" and "good enough", it is now viable and ready for consideration.
- Almost all software vendors will have an SaaS offering
Upsides to SaaS
- Use operating budget instead of capital budget
- Only pay for what you use
- Platform homogeneity
- Lower Total Cost of Ownership(TCO) in mid-term; Long-term TCO is yet to be determined
- Faster implementation
- Increased innovation
Downsides to SaaS
- Governance issues
- Release management dictated by provider
- Limited 3rd party tools
- Vendor management
- Security
- Long-term TCO
- Integration between on premise and SaaS
Four things you can do today
- Savings: Compare your cost of capital expenses versus cloud services
- Portfolio: Find three workloads which you can experiment (Move workloads, not applications)
- Migrate: Move existing apps into cloud (Served from the cloud, versus cloud services)
- Use: Consider cloud email and collaboration (Get immediate feedback)
Gartner Bottom-Line Recommendation
Now is the time to consider cloud computing model for delivering services to employees, as well as customers and business partners.
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