Back in February I provided some context about the growth of the Software as a Service (SaaS) model in my post entitled, "The Enterprise Software World is Getting Sassy-SAAS". This gist of my post was to show that the overall market demand for SaaS is high and that SaaS is displacing traditional software in aggregate.

But that sort of depiction really masks some things. For example, my original macro characterization does not highlight mistrust laying just below the surface. To what degree are people switching to SaaS as we know it because there are no better options? Hard to answer that question without targeted research, but Christopher Koch, CIO Magazine's Executive Editor has some interesting thoughts when commenting on another IDC study (posted trimmed a little with "..." indicated):

But
the question is, how to escape this co-dependency of mistrust? Software
as a service, at least as it is currently being offered, is not the
answer, according to the survey. It was interesting to read between the
lines of the results. For every major category of enterprise software,
IT executives in small and large companies ... said they wanted
software delivered as a service. Twice as many wanted to buy by the
drink rather than owning it outright. Until you get to the one category
where software as a service is really being tested: CRM ... when
the IT executives were asked whether they wanted CRM as a service or
wanted to own it, the numbers reversed. Twice as many wanted to own ... And
probably the biggest resistance point of all: you can't integrate the
internal, usually customized CRM stuff with the service.

And Koch's closing thoughts:

... Integration
is holding it all up. An independent integration layer in the
architecture could make it easier for CIOs to want what they say they
want.

Breaking it down, baby.

Steve Shu