Five years of software as a service: the good, the bad and the ugly

Summary form only given. Software as a service (SAS) was introduced with the promise of lowering the costs associated with business software applications. To enable SAS and similar software service deployments to function smoothly, service-oriented architectures (SOAs) were introduced and have been quickly evolving for the past five years. Now, with SOAs well understood and software development environments so efficient, the return to insourcing, especially in the larger enterprises, is cutting into the earlier SAS gains. Providers for the mid-market, on the other hand, are wrestling with the dual problem - how to survive with on-demand requirements in a low margin arena? For many of the early pioneers in SAS and SOA, the past year has been one of tough demands from customers and harsh reactions from financial markets, as they continue to figure out how to survive in challenging, unchartered waters.