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SaaS Technology Trends to Look Out for in 2020

2020 will see the continued climb in SaaS adoption across regions, markets, industries, and business sizes. TechRepublic has already forecasted that 73% of enterprise-level organizations will function almost entirely on SaaS at the start of the new decade. Those that have already made the leap to SaaS-driven business models are reporting improvements in attracting and retaining top talent, improving their employees’ work experiences and optimizing existing workflows.

Now 60 years after the inception of SaaS, what does SaaS business modeling in 2020 bring to the table that is different from its previous iterations? At its core, Software-as-a-Service technology and its providers remain steadfast, allowing users to license services on a contractual basis through the internet. What has changed, however, are its use-cases and potential to integrate more fully with a business’ operations.

Partly, this shift is attributed to the increase in internet latency and speeds, enabling SaaS providers to deliver more intelligent and powerful technology to their user base via broadband, Wi-Fi or cellular connection. But current changes to the SaaS market also indicate transformations in overall business practices—the connection organizations want to build between technology, their work process as well as their relationships with customers.

To give you a better understanding of the future of SaaS technology—as well as how these innovations will continue to evolve the ways we do business—let’s look at some of the biggest trends influencing the digital business landscape today:

Personalization

In the age of automatic follow-ups, long customer wait times and en-masse email campaigns, personalization is the key to growing your customer base. One recent study uncovered that 80% of eCommerce shoppers are more likely to do business with companies that offer a personalized customer experience—even going so far as to pay more for equivalent products or services.

Contrary to popular belief, engagement through personalization begins well before the first purchase. Businesses that can successfully tailor their website’s content, social media strategies and email outreach are the most likely to fully engage with prospective buyers and convert them to sales in the pipeline. More notably, developing a unique approach to customer experience will prevent your teams from spending additional time and resources on those who are outside of your target audiences.

That’s why tailoring customer experience to each specific individual or buyer persona is necessary in your marketing processes. Marketers especially can benefit from artificial intelligence software as a service in your technology stack, which several SaaS providers have integrated into their tools to curate CX strategies that operate on an individualized basis. This is because great personalization relies on accurate, data-driven insights on your customers–everything from the types of online communities they inhabit to whether they prefer emailing or a quick phone call when communicating with a business.

AI-powered SaaS helps businesses create a better data-set through two primary features: first, artificial intelligence is able to quickly collect and organize large volumes of information; second, it is able to make sure that the information it acquires is accurate. Human error during data entry is the primary reason why one-fifth of companies around the world believe that a majority of their customer data is faulty. Of course, these inaccuracies in your customer database can make it nearly impossible to foster personalization at any meaningful capacity. As the number of marketing teams that utilize AI integrations expands in 2020, it will become subsequently more difficult for businesses without this technology to personalize at scale.

Customer Retention

If the first step to growing a consumer base is acquiring customers, the second—and equally important—step is to retain those already doing business with you. Customer retention is not the only key to establishing a healthy rapport and brand, but it also is the most cost-effective long-term strategy for growing your business.

By some estimates, retaining a single existing buyer is one-fifth of the total expenses of acquiring a new customer to your business. Efforts to improve your company’s customer lifetime value also yield benefits far beyond reduced costs. Existing buyers are often easier to upsell to other products or services you offer, and they are more likely to become public advocates for your business.

While there are a number of reasons why customers decide to leave businesses—everything from unhappiness with your product to no longer buying within that market—the most glaring hit to customer retention is wait times. Eighty-six percent of British consumers in a survey by Retail Times vouched that they would avoid shopping at stores where line queues appeared to be too long. The numbers are even more dire when it comes to customer support over the phone. Recent research found that nearly two-thirds of customers wait only two minutes or less when a business puts them on hold, and roughly half of people will never complete their purchase if they encounter bad customer service.

The desire to more quickly and accurately satiate customer inquiries is the main cause of this next SaaS trend, wherein many businesses now rely on contact center software as a service to fortify their relationships with customers and retain them down the line. Investing in contact center technology that is delivered as a service boasts a number of distinct advantages that outdated contact center architectures are unable to supply. Because it’s hosted on the cloud, contact center SaaS enables multichannel routing, meaning that you can manage web chats, social media messaging and calls under the same platform while keeping response times low. This also makes it easier for businesses to oversee their agents and scale their needs accordingly—as your customer base grows, you can increase your subscription to ensure new agents have all the tools they need from their first day on the job.

End-to-End Business Solutions

Another key trend affecting the SaaS market in 2020 is the increasing demand for software solutions that are specific to one single industry or type of work. The result is a SaaS model designed to deliver end-to-end functionality and support for users in that industry, as opposed to solving just one business need.

This difference in delivery modeling is the difference between horizontal and vertical SaaS. Horizontal SaaS products have existed on the market for several years and are used across the business spectrum. Since horizontal SaaS products broadly service one specific business need—such as a customer relationship management tool or content marketing platform—businesses of all sizes and industries use them within their own respective departments.

In 2020, however, vertical SaaS will likely take a greater share of software spaces as more businesses invest in solutions that are tailored to their niche. Vertical delivery models pinpoint very particular challenges, allowing them to go deeper in their target audience and provide solutions that encompass multiple departments within a single organization. As more businesses seek software solutions that are tailored to them, the vertical SaaS is sure to grow even more—already, the market size for vertical SaaS offerings has tripled within the last decade.

A good example of vertical SaaS is ERP as a service for one designated industry. Resource planning systems deliver a number of benefits for businesses—everything from more accurate data and reporting to a more standard work process. However, a horizontal ERP software would not be able to provide the same level of detail in its reporting or workflows as a product designed for one type of organization, as so much of resource planning is intrinsically linked to your particular space in the business world. By investing vertically in resource planning, businesses are better suited to satisfy the needs of both their workforce and their target customers.

Mobile-First Accessibility

Perhaps no one SaaS trend will define 2020 as acutely as the demand for mobile compatibility. SaaS integrations have enabled even small- and medium-sized businesses to adopt more mobile-friendly workspaces, such as remote work outside of the office and work during business travel. It makes sense that the next step in the move toward mobile accommodations is total software compatibility on smartphones, tablets and—in some cases—even wearable devices. The SaaS providers that will dominate their areas of expertise are therefore the ones that develop the best mobile user applications and experiences.

What exactly has caused businesses to so suddenly place such high value on mobile SaaS options? Largely, the popularity of mobile-friendly workspaces reflects workers’ familiarity with these types of devices outside of work. Adopting smartphones into work atmospheres can, therefore, result in reduced learning curves when employees first start using a new tool.

Businesses that have made the switch to mobile work environments have also experienced higher levels of productivity and engagement within their workforce. A study that focused on the relationship between custom applications and efficiency found that over 90% of corporate employees use at least one app at work, and roughly one-third believe that using the right apps can enhance their business’ process.

Adopting a custom mobile application as a service for your business is one way to ensure your teams have access to the software they need to perform their responsibilities—whether they’re on the road traveling or working in the coffee shop next door. As opposed to hiring a team of developers and creating an app on your own, enlisting the aid of app development professionals gives you access to comprehensive analytics, DevOps support and general upkeep and maintenance, allowing you and your teams to focus on what really important—getting work done and satisfying your customers.

What recent upgrades has your business conducted to its SaaS portfolio? What 2020 tech trends do you anticipate will create the most abrupt changes to the business landscape as a whole? Make sure to share your thoughts and comments below.

Strategies with Hybrid cloud in 2020

Posted by: Arul karuppannan Posted on: November 8, 2019 Cloud Computing , Hybrid Cloud

Hybrid cloud scenario in 2019

According to 451 research, approximately 69% of companies will be using hybrid cloud architecture for IT resources by the end of 2019. The industry is looking at with an opportunistic approach for technology business, the scope of improvement, and various other aspects that can be influenced by specific hybrid cloud architecture.

What is cloud computing?

Cloud computing is the concept of rendering computational, storage, and infrastructural services for high-level computing and deployment needs in a real-time business environment. It generally takes micro-retail payment model for customer companies to pay as they use services on a cloud computing platform.

What is hybrid cloud computing?

Hybrid cloud computing is a specific concept where all the IT resources are run, deployed, and managed on a combination of on-premise and third-party cloud computing services. It is a newly rising concept which surfaces into the technology industry. It is mainly because of the requirement of computationally intensive operations due to AI, machine learning, and high capacity storage backed up by reliable computing services.

Hybrid cloud strategies for mobile app management

Core in-house deployment, rest outsourced on third party cloud
Mobile app analytics in-house, database outsourced on third party cloud
Encryption in-house, security routines external cloud
Core MVP in-house, massive functionalities on external cloud
Local testing servers in-house, main production platform externality
UI/UX development deployed in-house, heavy multimedia graphics on external storage
Complete code repository on GitHub, nothing in-house

Easily-to-implement strategies with hybrid clouds

Company data management

Company data includes all the real-time information and digitally created data along with the internal business processes of a company. It also provides day-to-day working, communication, and intellectual resources that dynamically come into the picture at various points in time during a business calendar. You can strategically build a hybrid cloud protocol for internal technology resource management.

You may systematically dump all the accounting documents, past project resources, and company business records on a third-party cloud computing storage platform. While you keep your existing day-to-day resources at the hand-stretch of your own, provide cloud computing system. It is like creating a cache structure with a combination of on-premise cloud computing infrastructure and putting the rest of the resources on permanent storage, i.e., the third-party cloud computing storage platform. You can handpick all the data which you need to retrieve, edit, and update very frequently to be stored on the on-premise cloud. The rest goes on to third-party cloud computing system.

AI/ML requirements

One of the most significant bottlenecks in using artificial intelligence or deploying machine learning algorithms is the requirement of high and computational ability and processing units at the client-side of your cloud infrastructure. If you put up all your data and AI/ML resources on a third-party cloud platform, they are of no use because the ultimate computation happens on-the-edge. High computational ability is required on the systems that are used by developers, data scientists, and product analyst for various computationally intensive tasks.

You can strategically solve the problem by building an in-house, on-premise cloud infrastructure that lets you empower the in-house IT resources with high computational ability. Ample storage with secure retrieving capabilities achieving low turnaround time on third party cloud. While you put all your current database and AI/ML software on the on-premise system, the rest of it can rest back on the third-party platform.

Big data platforms

Big data analytics is extensively used in the technology business for business intelligence and customer behavior analytics for higher personalization. It is one of the general use of services in the present day. Big data analytics environments like Tableau, PowerBI, Hadoop require the extremely high computational ability on end computing machines. The connected database may be stored at the third-party cloud.

Deployment/orchestration routines

Companies can also strategically orchestrate the deployment containers on a specific cloud come beating platform. It is possible to strategically transfer a few computationally intensive microservices (from the entire bag of application software) to third-party cloud computing resources and storage. You can decide to keep the core applications on the on-premise deployment environment.

Users may take a deep dive into a particular use case-specific user journey. If that microservice is used, APIs can hit the calls on third-party clouds to fetch the data and info relayed on the mobile and web app. In case, a user makes use of the application in a way that doesn’t require high-end functionalities like processing or AR/VR content retrieval come into play. There is no load on the third-party cloud, otherwise.

Another way of strategizing your hybrid cloud infrastructure is to orchestrate several containers of the deployment of your services with conditions on application load capacity. For instance, if the complete mobile app is concurrently hosting over one lac users at a time. The surplus of users from here on will be diverted to the same instance of external deployment on the third-party cloud. When the number dynamically lowered down, the default services underuse remain the on-premise resources.

You can strategize the deployment of resources in a hybrid cloud environment based on:

Average of dynamic load on various services
Desired turnaround time
Permissible response time
Amount of data transfer
Computation required

Microservice dedicated needs

Depending upon the technology in use and relay of information during the user journey can also help you decide whether you should strategize the deployment on-premise resources or third-party cloud computing platforms. For instance, if you have an alienated third-party functionality or product integrated with your platform. You may choose to deploy across third-party cloud computing resources in an isolated environment just bridging it with mobile applications whenever required. Else, the in-house services can be operated by permanent DevOps official team, which will help to reduce cost and troubleshoot at the 11th hour.

Let us take an example of an e-commerce website that focuses on selling fashion products. It has a general combination of a cart and product which people can seamlessly browse through. All the internal database and deployment infrastructure can be deployed in-house. While the AR/VR kit or the augmented reality functionality (that lets users what virtually try these products) can be easily deployed on a third-party cloud computing platform.

It is beneficial because it helps you gain third-party assistance as it is deployed on an external server. Troubleshooting and managing of search functionalities become more comfortable because you know where the fault exactly resides. The load exerted per user due to computationally intensive AR/VR functionalities is high, and you eliminate the hassle of building in-house.

Benefits of strategic hybrid cloud deployment

Higher fault-tolerance

Strategy implementation of hybrid cloud lets you deploy microservices assets of in-house and third-party cloud service. It will improve the overall performance of a mobile app because whenever functionality malfunctions or there are defects in the code, the rest of the mobile app functions as it should. The scope of fault due to a particular break-down is expected to all interconnected functionalities either on the native cloud platform or the external third-party service.

If there is a fault in the in-house resources, the externally deployed resources remain unaffected and vice versa.

Easier troubleshooting

It is essential to have shopped from shooting capabilities to save your products from running the overall user experience for anyone on-board. You can quickly troubleshoot if there are a clear bifurcation and localization of all the faults which may have occurred. Subsequently, the focus remains on the internal resources and related dependencies, or you can focus on what has been stored and deployed on the external service. It reduces overall troubleshooting time and helps you improve the general condition as well.

Cost-effectiveness

Easier troubleshooting and more effective DevOps with direct efforts help in reducing the overall requirement of human resources for continuous management off mobile apps and web resources. It is generally considered that 20% of the total development cost has to be spent annually on IT resources for streamline management and performance-oriented DevOps. Strategically using a hybrid cloud infrastructure also brings this figure of 20% down to a certain extent.

Simpler DevOps approach

Development application management is generally more comfortable with continuous deployment. But it can become a hassle with non-optimised dependencies and various reasons for fault occurrence. Systematically managing the applications with hybrid cloud strategy enable companies to take a more straightforward DevOps approach.

Clearer future development roadmap

A clear-cut insight into the existing digital platform infrastructure makes it easy to cover the roadmap for future development. It facilitates innovation in terms of customer-centric functionalities that will eventually help you market a mobile app in a better way. Strategically using hybrid cloud infrastructure has deep-rooted benefits that ran down the spine of all digital platforms; right from development till the engagement and marketing face.

Conclusion

Strategic use of hybrid cloud infrastructure has its own technical, technological, and perpetually growing maintenance liabilities. It is important to note that merely signing up for a hybrid technology doesn’t ensure success for any digital resource/platform. It must be an end-to-end effort which comprehensively benefits the users and creates a better user experience overall. Leading mobile app development companies and development fraternity is quickly adopting hybrid cloud architecture for better performance, more feasibility in terms of development, cost, and higher client satisfaction with every project.

A Guide to Digital Transformation and Cloud Migration

Posted by: Maran kavin Posted on: October 18, 2019 Cloud Migration , Digital Transformation

As long as businesses exist, the question of how they can be more productive will exist as well. In fact, if you aren’t already considering how you can optimize your workforce for greater productivity today, then you may find your organization lagging behind the competition.

This is particularly of concern in an era of business where technology develops at such a rapid pace. Developments are flipping entire industries on their heads and causing companies to grapple to find the best ways to invest, implement and adjust to these new innovations. But how should you get your organization started down the road to greater digital compliance? Between juggling your daily operations and researching these new solutions, it’s no surprise that businesses often have no other choice than to stick with their outdated tech (which can contribute to a number of missed opportunities).

The solution for many is to comply with Digital Transformation and Cloud Migration best practices to ensure that the tools you decide to use are properly integrated into your company workflows, culture and communication methods.

But First: What Are Digital Transformation and Cloud Migration?

Unlike an actual piece of technology you can purchase—such as a new Live Tracking System or mobile application— Digital Transformation and Cloud Migration are both better defined as an ideology or service that you can introduce to your current tech strategy.

Let’s start with Digital Transformation, or DX. This business process can be simply defined as the use of technology to not only replicate an existing service or workflow, but to replace it with a more time- and energy- efficient system. It’s important to note that successful DX is more than deploying new technology into your business and considers the following as well:

How clearly and preemptively leadership communicated the change
The level at which daily workflows and procedures were modified to include new technologies
How widespread new tools are implemented across the company
The amount in which people directly affected by this change were involved in the transformation

As a single facet of a larger Digital Transformation initiative, Cloud Migration adopts new, internet-powered solutions to the ways that businesses store their information, access tools and communicate with internal and external personnel. Cloud Migration is defined as “moving data, applications or other business elements to a cloud computing environment.” While there are many different methods to perform cloud migration, all of them include moving information and services on localized—often on-site—centers to public cloud infrastructures, allowing simpler accessibility, security and IT management.

So where, exactly, is the intersection between Digital Transformation and Cloud Migration? Since many, if not all, modern digital tools offer cloud components, businesses can execute their DX plan by focusing on migrating current practices to the cloud or by ensuring that tools found to replace them are powered by the cloud.

Perform a Manual Workflow Audit

The first step to enacting Digital Transformation and Cloud Migration in your business is to audit your existing, most outdated work processes. After all, how can you hope to build upon your current digital situation without a comprehensive understanding of where you stand?

Audits are an effective method to glean insights on your manual workflows—be it data entry, customer emailing or inventory management—to pinpoint the specific aspects of the workflow that can best be improved through digitization. Workflow audits can also help you find any areas within your business that rely on faulty information, and with 60% of B2B professionals evaluating the health of their data as unreliable, this is an essential aspect of the audit for every business to consider.

The correct frame of mind when auditing is to find the single workflow that has the greatest opportunity for improvement. Starting your Digital Transformation with just a single workflow helps you understand the process before rolling it out across the entire company.

Here are a few key aspects of your audit to consider when finding the right workflow to digitally optimize:

Does this workflow use multiple tools with overlapping functionalities?
Does this workflow result in multiple human errors or mistakes?
Does this workflow require menial, repetitive tasks to be completed?
Does this workflow rely on physical documentation or data that could otherwise be included in a digitized storage system?

Research New Tools

Once you’ve chosen which workflow you want to digitally transform and migrate to the cloud, you can begin to choose new digital tools to replace outdated structures. As with any major change to your business practices, the first step to choosing a new solution is research.

Although the tools you select should be specific to the workflow you want to digitally transform, there are some universal boxes that every digital tool should check off for your business. This includes features like:

Ease of scalability so you can use the same tools as you grow
Integration capabilities with software and services you currently use
Services hosted through the cloud for greater accessibility and connectivity

Still not sure where to begin? Below, we’ve shared a few resources where you can learn more about cloud-migrated tools for Digital Transformation:

To learn about designating roles you can read through Techopedia’s insights on Project Management Software. This piece of technology gives businesses a digital platform to clearly define each project, update the status of each task at the individual or team level and track time spent on the project for more accurate invoicing. Many businesses already use a PM system, so migrating to a cloud-friendly alternative could be a simple way to begin the DX process.
To learn about improving connectivity explore W2S Solution’s article on 5G and the ways that IoT technology will impact mobile development for businesses. As the next and most advanced iteration of cellular networking, 5G will make powerful improvements to download speeds and mobile security and better sync all of your devices currently connected to the internet.
To learn about digitizing communication check out 8×8’s resource page on Voice over IP, which explores the similarities between cloud-powered telephones like VoIP and more traditional forms of communication. Because its services can grow or shrink to meet your current demands, VoIP is a great option for those considering to digitally transform their communication methods.
To learn about simplifying repetitive tasks visit HubSpot’s blog post on how workflow automation works. Automation for businesses exists to take the most repetitive, mind-numbing tasks that your employees face every day and have a machine perform them instead. This HubSpot article is a great resource for those unfamiliar with automation software, as it begins by examining how the different principles of business, such as human resources or financing, can benefit from automation.

Brace with Change Management

When your business is charting unknown waters, what strategies are guiding the ship in order to ensure you make it back to familiar land? Especially if your employees are not accustomed to using high-grade technology in their day-to-day work, you should instill the guiding principles of change management within your company culture to ensure that these adjustments go as smoothly as possible.

At the organizational level, there are several benefits to change management, but for Digital Transformation and Cloud Migration specifically, this change ideology helps ensure long-term success with your new digitized practices. This is because change managers help deter employees who are averse to new business practices, which enables faster implementation of technology and return on your initial investment. Change management is also an important element of DX strategy because, when practiced regularly, it will guarantee that you have the necessary communication channels in place to disseminate all essential information on these new digital tools.

Change management is equal parts proactive and reactive: that is, preparing for change before it occurs as well as acclimating to its aftereffects. Managing every aspect within your control is prudent to minimize the change and lessen its impact.

In the reactive stage of change management, you can prepare for tech implementation by rolling it out at a time and in an environment that works best for you. Schedule your tech changes during slower seasons of the year to give your team the time they need to explore these new tools and the many capabilities they offer. Similarly, you can pilot your digitized workflow at a small scale by selecting a few of your most tech-savvy employees to try out this new software and sharing their discoveries across the company.
In the proactive stage of change management, the most essential element to consider is effective and transparent communication. In the first few weeks of implementation, end-users and team leaders will need to coordinate with each other to ensure that the new technology is indeed a good fit for the company. Vetting concerns and criticisms through an established system of change feedback will help your organization receive the candid and critical insights that are needed to guarantee that you’re operating at 100% productivity and tech proficiency.

Has your business recently undergone a Digital Transformation or migration to the cloud? Share your experiences and insights in the comments section below.

SaaS vs. PaaS vs. IaaS: What’s The Difference and How To Choose?

Posted by: Maran kavin Posted on: September 30, 2019 IaaS , PaaS , PaaS Vs IaaS , saas , Saas Vs Iaas , SaaS Vs PaaS

From small businesses to leading enterprises, the cloud has been a popular topic amongst leading software development companies. The efficiency and versatility it renders have resulted in its global adaptation. But before you rush to include cloud in your business, it is essential to understand different types of cloud services and their functions and benefits. Otherwise, you would end up with cloud services that aren’t doing anything to help you with your business objectives. Furthermore, not knowing the right kind of service for your business, you are most likely to waste money as well as time. In this article, we will be highlighting different cloud services and how they differ from one another.

Typically, there are three cloud service models that software development companies integrate –

Software as a Service (SaaS)
Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)
Platform as a Service (PaaS)

Each of these services come with unique benefits and it’s essential to comprehend the difference between SaaS vs. PaaS vs. IaaS.

Software as a Service (SaaS)

Software as a Service is also denoted as Cloud Application Services. It is the most commonly used cloud service by software development companies in the current market. SaaS harnesses the internet in order to provide numerous applications, that are generally administrated by a third-party vendor. Generally, SaaS applications operate through the companies web browser, thereby eliminating the requirement of any downloads and installations from the client’s side. The use of SaaS will reduce the ownership cost by eliminating the need to hire, and maintain an IT team to install, administrate and update software’s. It will also reduce the costs involved in licensing the software.

Features of SaaS:

Following are the key features associated with SaaS services –

Multitenant Architecture

SaaS features a multitenant architecture model wherein all users as well as application share, one common infrastructure and codebase. Since all vendor clients are working on a single infrastructure and code base, they can bring in innovations more efficiently and save development time, that was previously invested in maintaining multiple versions of the old code.

Easy Access

SaaS offers improved data access from the various networked device while making it highly efficient to monitor data usage, manage privileges, and make sure all the vendors view the same information.

Consumer Web

Amazon.com, My Yahoo, Microsoft, Google G Suite, etc. are the typical examples of SaaS. With this cloud service, companies can avail the ease of point-and-click customization; thus reducing the time it typically tasked to update conventional business software.

Efficient Customization

SaaS renders the ability to easily customize various applications and to align with their evolving business process, without making any modification to the standard infrastructure. The standard architecture of SaaS makes customization easy for each company without incurring high risk or cost.

Benefits of Using SaaS

SaaS extends employees as well as companies with a wider range of benefits including –

Scalable Usage

SaaS extends software development companies with high scalability. This allows users with the option to access services as per their demands.

Payment flexibility

Instead of buying software to install and additional hardware in order to support it, SaaS allows customers to subscribe to its bountiful offering simply. Typically, the customers pay for the services monthly based on consumption. Such flexibility in the cost allows businesses to plan their budget more efficiently. Moreover, users can simply terminate their subscriptions, any time they wish to eliminate the recurring costs.

High Accessibility

As SaaS applications are normally provided to users over the internet, they can be made easily to access a wide range of internet-enabled devices and locations.

Automatic Update

Instead of buying new software, SaaS automatically perform updates, as well as patch management. This significantly reduces the workload of a company’s IT staff.

Usability of SaaS:

SaaS becomes an ideal cloud service in various business scenarios. It is beneficial for new organizations that require to develop an e-commerce platform, quickly, but lacks the software or expertise to solve server issues. It is also apt for projects that are focused on simple and cost-effective collaboration. Software development companies often use SaaS when applications are not needed on a regular basis.

Examples of SaaS include –

BigCommerce
MailChimp
Google Apps
DocuSign,
Salesforce
Slack
Dropbox
ZenDesk
Hubspot

Related Article – Major cloud security challenges for enterprises in 2019

Platform as a Service (PaaS)

Platform as a Service is also referred to as Cloud Platform Services and offer cloud aspects to specific software, while primarily being used for applications. This service provides developers with a framework to work in and harness, to develop personalized applications. The servers, networking, and storage are commonly administered by the software service provider or company while developers can manage the applications. The delivery approach of SaaS and PaaS is quite similar. The only difference is SaaS deliver software via the internet and PaaS offers a dedicated platform for the development of software.

Contrary to SaaS and PaaS, IaaS companies are responsible for the management of various aspects such as runtime, applications, OSes, data, middleware, etc. Moreover, software development companies can now request for more resources as and when they need them rather than paying for hardware.

Features of PaaS

Below highlighted are the key features associated with PaaS –

Runtime Framework

It is one of the prominent features of PaaS. The runtime framework integrates the end-user code as per the policies determined by the cloud provider and application owner. There are different forms to the runtime framework, including traditional application runtime, runtime with pluggable support, runtime with visual programming concepts, etc.

Abstraction

Platform-based cloud services are reckoned for the high level of abstraction that they often render users. PaaS emphasizes on the applications.

Automation

PaaS models automate the entire process of application deployment to the infrastructure, application configurations, configuration of support technology, and system change management absolutely based on the policies determined by the user. It is further capable of slashing the cost across various aspects of the application cycle, including development, deployment, and management. It offers users a way to deploy the application into the endless pool of computing resources, thereby mitigating the challenges associated with deployment and configuration of infrastructure.

Versatile Services

PaaS models provide users with versatile services as well as APIs that assists in streamlining the task of developing and delivering, scalable and accessible cloud applications. These services extend software development companies with an array of capabilities making the whole process more efficient and effective to handle and deliver

Benefits of PaaS

Irrespective of the size of an organization, PaaS offers tremendous advantages. Some of them include –

Make Innovation Faster

Harnessing PaaS to deploy and operate application, significantly improves the developer’s agility. The web continues to bring in new and improved innovations, and developers must come with newer ideas to improve their application with the changing scenarios. Creating a platform-level software to launch an application is however complex and arduous. By streamlining, automating, etc. can thus help you deploy your application quicker and allow rapid iteration and extensions with the passing time.

Money-Saving

Focusing solely on development resources and spending less on the expertise that is not any how required, can help companies reduce the cost incurred. From reducing the precious time and money spend on building and maintain core stack, PaaS considerably reduces the cost you incur while developing applications. Additionally, then there are various hidden costs such as downtime costs. But with PaaS, companies would not have to worry about the same.

Automated Updated

Deploying an application on a self-built stack comes with a challenge of tracking, maintaining, updating, and re-integration of various components time and again. When you use PaaS for your cloud services, then you don’t have to worry any more about keeping up the constant update. It automatically ensures that your application is running on the latest update, so that you stay ahead in the market.

Optimum Uptime

PaaS can help you attain your objectives and hence offers innovative opportunities for disaster recovery or business continuity. PaaS providers have the expertise along with the latest tools and technologies that can help you avoid the unexpected outages due to downtime.

Usability of PaaS

Integrating PaaS cloud services is highly beneficial and at the time, may become essential. For instance, when numerous developers are working on the same project, PaaS allows software development companies to streamline their workflows. Moreover, if the team needs to add other vendors, then this cloud service is capable of offering high flexibility and speed to the entire process. This cloud service significantly reduces the costs and simplify certain challenges associated with development and deployment of an app.

Examples of PaaS include –

AWS Elastic Beanstalk
Apache Stratos
Heroku
Magento Commerce Cloud
Windows Azure (mostly used as PaaS)
com
OpenShift

Related Article – Reasons Why Everybody is Using Cloud Mobile Apps

Infrastructure as a Service(IaaS):

Infrastructure as a Service also denoted as Cloud Infrastructure Services that are developed using automated and scalable compute resources. It is considered as a prominent building block of the cloud services. It encompasses scalable and automated computing resourcing accompanied by network capabilities and cloud storage. Users can also outsource and develop a digital data center within the cloud and gain access to all the technologies and resources, that is offered by a standard data centre without having to invest in maintaining and managing.

Its offering allows companies to enjoy metered, on-demand, and self-provisioned cloud services. This cloud service is entirely for managing computers, storage, networking, etc. IaaS enables organizations to obtain resources when and as they need, rather than acquiring complete hardware.

Features of the IaaS

Following are the important features of IaaS –

Dynamic Scaling

Dynamic Scaling is one of the primary features that IaaS offer. If companies end up needing more resources than they had anticipated, they can easily get additional resources through their provider. IaaS provider generation thus optimizes the cloud environment so that the operating system, hardware, automation, etc. can back up to the ever increasing workloads.

Extended Service

Software development companies uses IaaS services for different purposes. There are customers who rent capacity-based cloud, at an on-demand model and without a contract. Moreover, there are situations where customers get into a contract, or to obtain a particular amount of computing or storage. A standard service-level agreement entails what the provider has agreed to offer, in terms of storage available and on-demand.

The Rental Model

When companies purchase IaaS, the IT infrastructure aspects such as storage, server, etc. that are rented, usually based on the quantity of the acquired resources and how the company plans to use the same.

Metering

By controlling the resources, that you demand from the providers and pay for, to match your requirements allows companies to save a lot of money. IaaS providers need a predictable and consistent method of measuring usage. They use the metering process to charge the companies based on the computing the user have consumed.

Benefits of Using IaaS

The manifold benefits of IaaS include –

It is Cost Saving

The most popular benefit of IaaS is the cost of saving it offers the user. With IaaS, companies do not have to worry about maintaining uptime, hardware, and maintaining and updating hardware equipment. It offers a pay-as-you-go model that allows companies to save a lot of money as the resource usage is metered, and they only have to pay for the consumption at a particular time period.

High Degree of Flexibility and Scalability

IaaS offers the potentials to scale the resources in response to the company’s requirements. Typically, the providers possess the latest and most powerful servers, storages, networking technologies, etc. in order to accommodate to the usual customer’s needs. Such on-demand scalability offers additional flexibility to provide quick responses to the needs and opportunities.

High Availability

While companies already have a disaster recovery plan drafted in place, the technology to back up the plan is often unwieldy and expensive. IaaS provides a combined disaster recovery plan, thereby helping in optimizing manageability and reducing the costs.

Facilitate Business Growth

The time, effort, and money invested in making various technology-based decisions and hiring IT staff to manage the infrastructure, can be spent according to the growth of the company. By handing over the management of infrastructure to IaaS, companies can start to focus on building innovative applications and solutions.

Usability of IaaS

Small companies and start-ups may purchase IaaS in order to avoid wasting money and time, while on a buying and developing of software and hardware. Larger enterprises may prefer this service to hold the right to control their infrastructure and applications, and purchase only what they use or need. Moreover, rapidly growing companies prefer scalability rendered by IaaS, and this is because they can change or modify specific hardware and software as their business evolves. IaaS extends cloud computing infrastructure such as networking operating systems, servers, storages via virtualizations technology. The servers are offered to the company through an API or dashboard, offering IaaS client enabling complete controls.

Examples of IaaS include –

AWS EC2
Rackspace
Google Compute Engine (GCE)
Digital Ocean
Magento 1 Enterprise Edition*

SaaS vs PaaS vs IaaS

All three cloud services come with unique functionalities and features, and it is important for companies to comprehend the essential differences. Whether you need cloud software for storage, enhanced performance, or infrastructure, there is surely a specialized cloud service for you. And by understanding how these services differ from each other, you would be able to make better decisions based on your requirements.

SaaS based Enterprise web application – good or bad?

Posted by: Madhu Kesavan Posted on: July 27, 2016 saas , saas in cloud computing , saas service , saas software development , saas solutions

“We are constantly bombarded with employees not going to correct domains to login and they do not know their domain. This is not going away so we need a solution. They do not know their domain so they Google our company name and always get our public URL instead of their subdomain. They try to login and it tells them their email does not exist.”

When I heard this from my customer, I was thinking why a SaaS Solution was not helping an enterprise or how it can be educated well to them? My customer’s traditional app was deployed in a Single Server and various account holders (Customer’s clients) used the same domain name. Every account is differentiated with email address and when they logged in, they had to choose their accounts associated with email address. It was designed long back and was the root cause for various issues such as dashboard loading, tough to switch between accounts, Reports takes time and data can not be easily measured as all account details were stored in one location / database.

At W2S Solutions, we know the benefits of SaaS based solution and are strong in building this. We have built this to our customers with Open Source Technologies such as Django, Python, and MongoDB or with Microsoft .Net platform. Here are the benefits of a SaaS based app:

Software as a Service based solution is a single instance – multi tenant system. You can deploy your code in cloud servers and clients can get their preferred sub domains. Let’s say your business name is card2contact.com, clients can create their own subdomain with their preference. It could be anything such as abc.card2contact.com. This is more convenient in URL promotion with their branding. If client has employees, staffs and consultants, they shall use the sub domain URL to login and access their information. It’s easy to remember and does not need to promote or educate as it has a direct business name in it.

Cost measurement: Every subdomain / business has its own database, bandwidth and memory usage. It’s easy to measure cost consumption and storage consumption. It helps to calculate cost spent per client and revenue made.

Performance will be great as everything is unique and dedicated for every client. As a cloud computing service, It captures lots of business information for each business, It could be very interesting for business executives to analyze their numbers to find their growth rate.

There are other pros available for a SaaS based solution; but would like to talk about things to be added when migrating a traditional app to a SaaS based solution.

New sub domain business URL has to be educated to all accounts and users. This could happen with welcome emails, login and forgot password emails.

Every business URL should have a unique SEO tag indexed with their business name. It solves the major issue of going to parent domain when they do Google.

Find my business domain name and reset password option must be available in parent domain URL. This allows business users to fetch their sub domain URL if they lost it. Hence user will provide email address and system detects all sub domains, usernames associated with that email address.

But sometimes Enterprises feel that whatever they have now works okay and might be worried to change. Its good for them right now but nothing is absolute in IT. We hope and help our customers based on Best Practices that we have learned through years and our solution helps to run cloud businesses successfully. Please reach us if you have any thoughts on this.