2009 June | Zoli's Blog

Multi-tenancy, the Holy Grail of SaaS. Do Customers Care?

Enterprise Software, SaaS June 30th, 2009

Two recent posts by Enterprise Social Software vendors Jive and Atlassian set up a huge debate amongst my fellow Enterprise Irregulars. Here’s the money-quote from Jive:

It’s not so long ago that it felt embarrassing to say the words "SaaS" and " single-tenant" in the same sentence. For years, it’s been an industry mantra that it’s simply impossible to have a scalable SaaS business without multi-tenancy.

Both Jive and Atlassian went single-tenant. That’s a red flag with many SaaS purists. But there’s more then just tenancy. What if customer data stays behind the firewall, while the application is still provided over the web? Is that still considered SaaS? Do customers really care about such issues, or do they look for innovation in features and services?

And a bonus: the #1 SaaS icon supposedly delivers on-premise, if the deal is big enough…

Break Free of Vista for a $50 Ransom. Catch Win7 Upgrade While You Can.

Business, Software June 26th, 2009

Fellow Windows Vista victims, there’s light at the end of the tunnel: we may soon set ourselves free and only have to pay a $50 ransom. I just did.

The $50 ransom is not a bad deal. Forget the myriad of Win7 SKU’s and whopping prices all the way to $319.99. I’m calling BS: the real standalone Win7 price is $50 or $100. Period.

Tags: microsoft, operating system, os, vista, vista final, vistasucks, win7, Windows, windows 7, windows upgrade, windows xp, winxp, xref

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Promoting SaaS on eBay?

Humor, Personal Productivity, SaaS June 23rd, 2009

This listing on eBay is hilarious, almost makes me wonder if it’s a true listing or carefully planted advertising for Google Apps (and SaaS in general). But the seller appears to be real, has been on eBay for ten years… Here we go, get Microsoft Office w. Outlook for $75, because:

It’s brand new and never been opened. My boss bought it right before I moved the whole company over to Google Apps.
We never looked back, but here’s your opportunity to live it up, 90’s style, with this great, retro piece of Microsoft 2007 software.

Zoho Office for Sharepoint: Use SaaS, Keep Data Behind the Firewall

Collaboration, Enterprise Software, SaaS June 23rd, 2009

One of the major roadblocks to SaaS providers’ entry to the enterprise is IT and Business concerns about corporate security, thinking of the firewall as the last line of defense.

Microsoft SharePoint has a very strong position in the Enterprise as the incumbents behind-the-firewall collaboration server, and for years smart Collaboration and Social Software vendors with better functionality, like Atlassian, Socialtext, Jive Software, Newsgator have been "playing well", adopting their services to SharePoint.

Now Zoho joins, announcing Zoho Office for Microsoft SharePoint, which combines the benefits of a collaborative SaaS Suite with the (perceived or real?) security if keeping data behind the firewall.

Skype Spam

Software June 22nd, 2009

The last place I expect to receive spam is on Skype, and so far it has remained clean, I assume due to my privacy settings:

So how on earth could this have popped up on my screen:

[12:05:42 PM] Zora Giannoni: hi! i’m briannahh from http://www.slutsdating.com are we still on for saturday?

No, Zora, or Briannah or whoever you are: we’re not on. Anyone with similar experience? Are we seeing major trouble with Skype?

Tags: privacy, security, skype, spam

6 Comments

Netbooks Resurfaces from Hibernation as WorkingPoint: SaaS for SMB with Nicer UI but Much Less Functionality

SaaS, Software, Startups June 17th, 2009

I’ve previously covered Netbooks, provider of an Integrated SaaS Business Suite for Very Small Businesses.

The company had an affordable On-Demand integrated business management solution for the VSB – very small businesses, the “S” in SMB / SME: typically companies with less then 25 employees, sometimes only 3-5, and, most importantly, without professional IT support, in which case Software as a Service is a life-saver.

NetBooks tried to cover a complete business cycle, from opportunity through sales, manufacturing, inventory / warehouse management, shipping, billing, accounting – some with more success then others. The process logic, the flow between various functional areas was excellent, but it was rendered almost unusable by a horrible UI. And it didn’t scale… so the company disappeared for a long year, completely re-building their code base.

Read on …

Tags: accounting, Accounting Software, bearingpoint, branding, business bydesign, business names, crm, Enterprise Software, erp, inventory management, manufacturing software, netbooks, netsuite, On-Demand, order fulfillment, procurement, quickbooks, SaaS, salesforce.com, small business software, smb, sme, vsb, workingpoint, xref

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Opera Unite Turns Your Computer into a Web Server. But Will You Want It?

Software, Technology June 16th, 2009

The little browser that could … was how the Opera browser was often referred to around 1996-98. The best browser packed with innovative features that Internet Explorer and Firefox were forced to copy: tabbed browsing, popup-blockers, saved sessions, zooming, mouse gestures to name a few. But it never really took off, continuing to hover around 2% market-share forever.

Today Opera proves again they are innovators: they claim to “reinvent the web” with the launch of Opera Unite.

Did the Gizmo-blogs Just Fall for an Old CrunchPad Prototype?

Technology June 14th, 2009

Forget all the news coming from Iran, there’s real excitement on TechMeme: the unboxing of the CrunchPad prototype, posted on Youtube by Loic Le Meur:

I hate to say this.. but I think what we’re seeing here is Prototype C, the previous version, not the final, Launch prototype. Compare the photos and decide for yourself.

Given how I am waiting for the CrunchPad myself, I’d be happy to be proven wrong this time…

(Cross-posted from CloudAve)

Tags: crunchpad, situational device, situational hardware, tablet, techcrunch, xref

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Startup CEO Who “Won’t Take VC Abuse” Is Now a VC Himself and Blogs About Both Sides of the Table.

Blogging, Startups June 12th, 2009

Valleywag named Mark Suster, then CEO of Koral “one entrepreneur who won’t just take VC abuse“ for his blog post “slamming one VC partnership for tardiness, inadequate preparation, and bad Blackberry manners.” That was late 2006…

Not long after the “incident” his startup, Koral received funding, which, in hindsight was probably unnecessary: a few months later, barely out with a beta product Koral got acquired by Salesforce.com.

A few months later the “anti-VC” (not really) CEO has become a VC Partner himself.