What is SaaS (Software as a Service)?

When it comes to software as a service (SaaS for short), you are using software through an internet con­nec­tion, rather than software that is installed locally. Hardware and software belong to a service provider and they rent the external use of their products. SaaS is an aspect of cloud computing by de­f­i­n­i­tion, one of the largest areas of business de­vel­op­ment.

Other cloud computing services include in­fra­struc­ture as a service (IaaS) and platform as a service (PaaS). E-mail providers have been operating according to SaaS prin­ci­ples for years now, offering e-mail tools through a website, like IONOS. Other well-known SaaS vendors include Slack, Sales­force, and WordPress. Major software de­vel­op­ers like Microsoft (Microsoft 365) and Adobe (Creative) now also offer SaaS versions of their services.

The most popular SaaS programs include project man­age­ment apps, content man­age­ment systems (CMS), financial ac­count­ing, file man­age­ment, e-commerce, customer re­la­tion­ship man­age­ment (CRM), archive man­age­ment, and personal planning. While companies have often had to install multiple programs in the past and purchase and manage licenses for them, the much more customer-friendly SaaS model is becoming in­creas­ing­ly popular as a re­place­ment.

SaaS is expanding as an at­trac­tive cloud solution in many different areas, offering many benefits to both users and busi­ness­es over installed software:

• Quick com­mis­sion­ing and provision of services to customers: instead of sending software packages and issuing licenses, the user simply has to go online to start op­er­a­tions.
  
  
• The provider deals with main­te­nance, which is a relief to employees: above all, IT teams do not have to worry about software in­stal­la­tions, licenses, updates, or main­te­nance, but can focus their resources on tasks that are equally important for the company.
  
  
• Easy in­te­gra­tion for new employees: no need to license or install software for new employees. Creating a new reg­is­tra­tion in the web tool is enough to integrate them, which is helpful as they can start their work im­me­di­ate­ly.
  
  
• Use of services both sta­tion­ary and mobile from different devices: software is no longer nec­es­sar­i­ly bound to a work­sta­tion. With the login data, users can also access the tools from mobile or other systems. This also makes the home office concept con­sid­er­ably easier.
  
  
• Cloud ar­chi­tec­ture provides all users with the same security standards: local hardware and software problems are less likely to lead to data loss due to the de­cen­tral­ized storage of all data on a cloud server. Smaller companies enjoy the same security standards as larger companies.
  
  
• New functions and updates are im­ple­ment­ed and in­te­grat­ed much faster: since the software runs on the vendor’s side, they also have complete control over it. This ensures that you always use the latest version of the services.
  
  
• User-oriented: companies do not pay flat-rate amounts, but instead pay per user. Software licenses were often too expensive in the past in terms of size, es­pe­cial­ly for smaller companies. With payment options per user, corporate spending can be managed ef­fi­cient­ly.

The dis­ad­van­tages and possible dangers of SaaS are mostly small. The SaaS model is spreading rapidly, and com­pet­i­tive pressures are con­tin­u­ous­ly improving data security and per­for­mance. However, it is still worth noting the concerns that are as­so­ci­at­ed with SaaS:

• Sharing your data with the provider: Even if the operator claims to offer the highest levels of secrecy and data security protected by contract – your con­fi­den­tial company data is not de facto in your pos­ses­sion, but is stored on the operator’s side. Data leaks, hacker attacks, and other incidents that jeop­ar­dize your con­fi­den­tial­i­ty are generally beyond your control. Cloud service security remains un­con­tro­ver­sial. In Europe, the new basic data pro­tec­tion reg­u­la­tions could provide for regulated con­di­tions, when applied to the re­spec­tive provider.
  
  
• Danger of service ter­mi­na­tion: If the SaaS provider goes bankrupt or is forced to dis­con­tin­ue their service for other reasons, it is im­pos­si­ble to continue using the services, and, the­o­ret­i­cal­ly, all data and documents could get lost. However, SaaS rarely switches off spon­ta­neous­ly, and the providers in question usually give users time to back up their records and documents on other data carriers or servers. In some cases, one service changes over to another, whereby data can often be trans­ferred.
  
  
• Requires a quick, con­sis­tent internet con­nec­tion: SaaS works online, so a good internet con­nec­tion is essential. Many operators offer online modes that allow you to work without the internet and syn­chro­nize the data as soon as you go online again. However, you need a constant con­nec­tion to the internet for optimal use of SaaS. Problems in your network can lead to annoying load times in the web tools, which can cause economic damage.
  
  
• Software cannot be used during downtime: Similarly, not all SaaS can be used if the provider needs to tem­porar­i­ly take their services off the network for main­te­nance work or service downtime, for example.
  
  
• Required com­pat­i­bil­i­ty with operating systems and browsers: Web tools may work dif­fer­ent­ly depending on which browser you use. There may also be com­pat­i­bil­i­ty problems with the operating system, es­pe­cial­ly if you are using macOS. Most SaaS vendors are currently op­ti­miz­ing their tools for Windows, since after all, problems with the browser selection are extremely rare.
  
  
• Com­mis­sion­ing un­fin­ished software: Since SaaS is not tra­di­tion­al­ly produced and sold, SaaS vendors may be tempted to provide their software at an early stage of de­vel­op­ment. This can happen before extensive beta tests have been carried out or important features have been im­ple­ment­ed. Generally speaking, quality control is much more careless for SaaS products.

The most well-known SaaS providers are def­i­nite­ly e-mail providers, and chances are that you’re already using one of their services. However, the scope of SaaS is way broader than just e-mail, es­pe­cial­ly in the business sector. Here, we will discuss three SaaS web tools that have already caused a storm in the working world.

Slack is well known as an SaaS tool, but it also provides tra­di­tion­al software for Windows, Android, and iOS. An advantage this software has over the web tool is that you can have several work­spaces open at the same time. Slack also offers more control over no­ti­fi­ca­tions. If you just use one workspace, the choice between SaaS or tra­di­tion­al software is just a question of personal pref­er­ence, Slack’s general func­tion­al­i­ty remains unchanged. Whether you install Slack, or use it through your browser, everyone can par­tic­i­pate. This makes Slack a good fig­ure­head example of the SaaS model.

Sales­force has es­tab­lished itself as one of the most suc­cess­ful cloud computing providers. It is par­tic­u­lar­ly prominent in the customer re­la­tion­ship man­age­ment (CRM) area, im­press­ing with a wide range of SaaS offers like work.com (formerly Rypple), and data.com (formerly Jigsaw). Sales­force is like a network of tools that are acquired over several years. It has become a serious com­peti­tor to SAP and the ex­pec­ta­tion is that even more SaaS providers could be swallowed by companies like Sales­force along the line.

The sub­di­vi­sion into lists allows you to customize Trello according to your needs. For example, the lists can display various steps like “To be written”, “Written”, “Read”, and “Uploaded”. You can also create lists like cat­e­gories (e.g. “Sport”, “Health”, “Politics”). You can then comment, add at­tach­ments, create a checklist, and set a deadline in the in­di­vid­ual maps. Trello is quick and easy to operate, making it a great SaaS web tool. Like Slack, the freemium model has proven to be very suc­cess­ful: in March 2017, Atlassian bought the SaaS for $425 million. Trello also has mobile apps for Android and iOS, and has released a desktop app for Windows and macOS. Following Slack, Trello is also offering programs initially released as SaaS as locally in­stal­lable software ap­pli­ca­tions.

SaaS is clearly a model with a strong future. Sales are expected to more than triple between 2015 and 2020, but SaaS vendors still have some chal­lenges ahead of them. On the one hand, there is still wide­spread mistrust of cloud computing in terms of data security. However, solutions like deploying a cloud access security manager (CASM), which shifts data security and policies to the user side, are just as enticing as the promises made by many vendors to improve trans­paren­cy and control over server-side data.

In addition, if SaaS providers want to continue to achieve growing user numbers, per­for­mance must remain constant. To make sure that users are not deterred by long loading times or break­downs, and instead start resorting to con­ven­tion­al software, SaaS providers must from now on con­stant­ly prove that their model is tech­ni­cal­ly stable and future-proof. The ad­van­tages described above must clearly outweigh the dis­ad­van­tages – then, SaaS could establish itself as the most popular software model in the long run.