In this new Work-from-Home, WFH, Environment business owners are being forced to
make their software available for their employees to use from anywhere. In order to make this a reality and not lose productivity or efficiency employers are looking at replacing their in-house servers and legacy software with something that works better remotely and from anywhere. The below will explain an alternative to in-house legacy software called Software As A Service, SaaS. SaaS is an alternative to the standard software installation in the business environment, the traditional model, where a user has to build the server, install the application and configure it. In SaaS, the user does not pay for the software itself. Instead, it works like a rental. They have the authorization to use it for a period of time and pay for the software that they are using. The overall benefits of going to such a model is as follows:
1. Reduced time to benefit
Different from the traditional model, in SaaS the software (application) is already installed and configured you simply just learn to use the software and add fields and report layouts as needed. This reduces the time spent in installation and configuration, and can reduce the issues that can get in the way of the software deployment.
2. Lower costs of ownership
Maintenance costs are reduced since the SaaS provider owns the environment and it is split among all customers that use that solution.
3. Scalability and integration
Usually, SaaS solutions reside in cloud environments that are scalable and have integration with other SaaS offerings. Comparing with the traditional model, users do not have to buy another piece of software or additional hardware to accommodate an integration of different software models. A company would only need to enable a feature or purchase an application programming interface, API, in order for the programs to communicate.
4. New releases (upgrades)
SaaS providers upgrade the solution and it becomes available for their customers. Costs and effort associated with upgrades and new releases are lower than the traditional model that usually forces the user to buy an upgrade package and install it, or pay for specialized services to get the environment upgraded. This is the case when you purchase on premises or hosted solutions.
5. Easy to use and perform proof of concepts
SaaS offerings are easy to use since they already come with best practices and sample test data as part of the solution. Users can do proof of concepts and test the software functionality or a new release feature in advance. Software Matrix.
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