SaaS(Hosted) vs. on-Premise Solutions

by Nigel Lewis on 2010-06-29

In today’s global economic environments of uncertainties and business psyche of not knowing which way to take their business to a higher frontier, the plain truth is it can be really scary and daunting to take on a risk.

Many companies and client care centers are now weighing in their options as to moving their operation off site. It is plain economics and can make good business sense. By removing the costs associated with the infrastructure required to carry their business forward, they can have the capitol to continue doing business and still operate a highly advanced system by offloading their technological infrastructure to a hosted provider.

These are decisions that should be considered with the complexities of the environment and the software needed. The question remains, how will this benefit me? Well, for some, this could be the best and only way to do business. For others, they may decide to look at more aggressive future planning where they take their growth projections and future unforeseen requirements into consideration. They may decide that creating an internal IT dept with hardware and software is suitable. This would depend mainly on budgeting, purchasing dynamics or any specific needs they may have.

Others may decide to free up all their resources and provide a turn-key solution where they simply become an “end user” to their own network and just use the software to run their business and do what they are good at. This can be a huge cost saver to many. When considering the budget over a long term, almost always, a hosted solution becomes the attractive way to go. That’s why you see more and more systems today being offered as SAAS only. Predictions are expecting this technology to grow 22% this year alone.

Having the ability to access and do work from anywhere opens up a whole new way of staying in touch and streamlining day to day operations. For a global company that has offices all over the world, or perhaps your team is on the road, complete accessibility to your network/software is only as far as your internet browser. This also allows multi platforms to connect and work cohesively.

Some organizations may choose the SAAS to “dip their feet in the water” to try out a system or new software for a period of time before they decide to go full steam ahead and invest into it… so you can call it a “test drive” if you wish.  If it doesn’t work, they are not out all the money they would have spent to implement an on premise solution.

One of the biggest attractions to SAAS today is security levels and redundancies. Knowing that your data is stored in a controlled, secure and multi back-ups available lets you sleep at night. There are many safeguards today to allow major security levels for banking or medical records or any other sensitive data. Today’s internet infrastructure in the southern hemisphere is coming up to par with the rest of the world, so the adage that bandwidth is prohibitive is no longer valid.

Tarek Sidky
General Manager
Enterprise Solutions Asia Pacific
SIMMS / CRM Unleashed


INVOTEC Technology Solutions PTY Ltd.

www.inventory-control.com.au
www.helpdesk-software.com.au
www.invotec.com.au