What is SaaS?

Ladies and gentleman: the story you are about to read is true. Only the names have been changed to protect the innocent.

Pencil Pusher: All right, JP, you keep mentioning SaaS in your email and PowerPoint slides. What is that?

JP: SaaS is an acronym for “Software-as-a-Service”.

Non-comprehending stares from everyone in the room.

JP: Ok … SaaS is a business solution that has been gaining popularity over the last few years. It usually refers to a web-based application that runs in your browser. Contrast that with client server applications, that run inside our corporate network, through on-premise equipment that we've purchased.

BIG CHEESE: Why is that better?

JP: There are a lot of benefits. One of the biggest benefits is that there is nothing to install.

PENNY PINCHER: So? How long does it take to install an application? You pop in a disk and it loads.

Peter Parker’s “spider sense” would be tingling right now. I move the discussion to the white board, with lots of colored markers –- they like it when I use lots of colors.

JP: Ok, this is your Portal Server. These are file servers, they house the content repositories. This is the email integration application that sits between the portal server and our email exchange server; it allows customer emails to be uploaded directly to the appropriate CRM applications, based on the email content. This is the storage server, which holds all the data. Here’s the database application which ties these systems together. What am I forgetting? Oh yeah, this is a Security server – which makes sure that this content is accessed only by authorized personnel. This is the VPN application, Firewall, and all the stuff that allows our remote sales and service teams to access this--.

Someone’s iPhone starts blarring …

JP: Good point, thanks for bringing that up. This is the mobil delivery server. It is the interface between your iPhones and Blackberry devices, and all this other stuff.

Really getting into it now, I started drawing stick figure people …

JP: These are the IT staff. The research, select, install and maintain all this hardware, along with the software that goes with it. They work night and day to make it sure it is compatible with all the other stuff on this board. When a component goes bad, they replace it. When a system upgrade is required, they test to make sure there are no interoperability issues. Take all of this equipment drawn here, and double it -– in two different data centers on two different power grids. We need that redundancy to ensure 24x7 uptime, for our support and remote field service teams. For all this equipment, we maintain spare parts and inventory. We also maintain annual service contracts with the system vendors. Hundreds of hours are spent maintaining this equipment, by specialists in various areas of our IT department. Hundreds of thousands of dollars are spent on the infrastructure and support.

My whiteboard was a work of art. I wish I’d taken a picture of it. Instead, I looked at each of them in turn, slowly. Then, with a few sweeps of the magic eraser, my drawing vanished. I drew a cloud.

JP: This is SaaS. This is Salesforce.com. They own the hardware. They own the software. They manage all that equipment, in fully redundant data centers. They take care of all upgrades, resolve all integration issues ... everything.

I’m getting good at drawing stick figures now. I connect a few stick figure people off the cloud, talking on cell phones, typing at terminals … made a horrible rendition of the globe, but I think it was recognizable. I plopped a few of stick figure people in Mexico, Colombia, Argentina, Germany, Japan.

We “rent” from Salesforce.com, with a “monthly per user” pricing model. Through our rental agreement, we can access OUR hardware on THEIR systems – from anywhere in the world. Anywhere there is internet connection.

PENCIL PUSHER: Trade-offs?

JP: Once upon a time, SaaS had a reputation for being highly rigid. You couldn’t customize it as easily as, say, an ASP model or in-house solution. But as you’ve seen with Salesforce.com, we can customize it heavily. We integrate Salesforce with our internal ERP systems, as well as our email and file sharing servers. With tools we have available from Salesforce, there’s truly nothing we can’t do.

SaaS. No hardware. No Software. Any questions?

BIG CHEESE: No questions.