Ten ISV Traps to Avoid on the Path to SaaS Success Phil Wainewright CEO, Procullux Ventures.

Ten ISV Traps to Avoid on the Path to SaaS Success

Phil WainewrightCEO, Procullux Ventures

A timeline of SaaS failure

1998

1999

2000

2001

2002

2003

2004

2005

2006

2007

2008

2009

Red G

orilla

Pande

sic

Futur

elink

USinter

netw

orkin

g (C

11)

Qwest C

yber

Solutio

ns

Klir Tec

hnolo

gies

Micr

osof

t Live

SAP Bus

iness

ByD

esign

Siebel

CRM O

nDem

and

How do I get to SaaS?• Defining your strategy

– Seeking advice, business objectives, product definition

• Laying the foundations– Infrastructure choices, service delivery

management, business models• Go-to-market

– Market assessment, partner selection, sales and marketing techniques

• Journey’s end

1. Well-meant advice

2. Ignoring the Web

• The Web brings new ways to interact with others– Online selling and service– Collaborative development– Vendor ecosystems

• Explore and understand network effects– Shared services– Mashups – Aggregate data– The long tail

• Three monkeys take on SaaS– Adobe: See no SaaS– SAP: Hear no SaaS– Microsoft: Speak no SaaS

• Cloud deflation– Force.com: $12-18 per user per month– Bungee Labs: $3.60 per user per month

3. Cannibalisation/commoditisation

4. The wrong platform

• How much multi-tenancy?– Shared infrastructure– Shared application server– Shared database

Security Log

SaaS Applicatio

n

Identity Manageme

nt

Usage Tracking

CRM

Call Center Support System

Management Log

SaaS Applicatio

n

SaaS Applicatio

n

SaaS Applicatio

n

Performance

Availability

Security

SLA Monitoring

Provisioning

Management Agent

Access Control

MeteringOrder

Management

Service Delivery Platform Runtime

Billing

Management Alerts

Credit: Gianpaolo Carraro & Fred Chong, Microsoft Architecture strategy team

4. The wrong platform

• How much multi-tenancy?– Shared infrastructure– Shared application server– Shared database

• Virtualization vs consolidation

• Time-to-market vs building for scale

5. Undervaluing trust

5. Undervaluing trust

6. Thinking like a software vendor

• It’s a service, not a toolkit

• Deliver&

• Price

… like a service provider

7. Market projection

8. Leaving it to partners• Channel partners

– Traditional– Non-traditional

• Platform partners– Hosting and utility platforms– Development/deployment platforms

• Provider partners– Application vendors– Business service providers

9. Build it and they will come

• The Web is a tool, not a panaceaAutomated sales processesOnline trials and pilotsContinuous prospect interactionBetter marketing feedback

… but enterprise buying is still person-to-person

10. Expecting a destination

Q&A

Close + clinic