Weapons of SaaS Destruction; Neutralize the Neutron Bomb: VARS/partners
Posted by Brian Anderson, VP Partner Outcomes, Channelsales Worldwide
There is a Fourth Weapon: The Neutron Bomb Created by VARS and Partners
Richard Levy from Sandhill effectively addresses the 3 myths that detonate as a massive weapon against SaaS adoption: Security, Inflexibility and Cost. These three myths create an impenetrable blast force encouraging companies to defer (i.e., flatly reject) adoption of SaaS for their operations. http://www.sandhill.com/opinion/editorial.php?id=271
There is a fourth offensive weapon we can call, a ‘Neutron Bomb’ and is launched strategically by the traditional IT VARS. These partners fear (unnecessarily) the demise of the hefty discount (the same partners are loath to admit that the hefty discounts aren’t so much these days, particularly for hardware) and value added services from the on-premise world. While it’s always awkward talking about Money Matters among friends, there is a lucrative silver lining for VARS in the SaaS world.
Levy discusses the perception held by on-premise supporters that view SaaS as IT Job Killers. IT Job Killers and their supporters are only doing (to a degree) what their IT-based VARS are suggesting them to do behind the scenes: define when and where to detonate the myth of the Neutron Bomb: SaaS means no VARS as trusted advisors and therefore, e SaaS is a VAR Killer. The VARs’ Neutron bomb perpetuates the 3 myths that Levy suggests and in turn, makes it that much more difficult to separate myth from fact, when engaging in enemy fire in the SaaS vs On-premise debate. Without an effective offensive tactical ordnance, SaaS suffers in defeat and On-premise is named the Battlefield Victor (SaaS supporters know this is just a single campaign and not the war).
The Neutron Bomb is a fourth myth created and perpetuated by partners out of fear. There IS a robust model SAAS model for traditional IT VARs. Let’s just look at one aspect of SaaS: its maturation level. SaaS is maturing AND it means that SaaS must be integrated to legacy and to other SaaS systems. In fact, in June 2007 (2 years ago!), Bill McNee, Saugatuck Technology, confirmed that SaaS was already deep in the second of three phases of adoption, noting that (SaaS is).. increasingly integrated with on-premise application in the IT business portfolio”. http://www.sandhill.com/opinion/editorial.php?id=141
Not only are there requirements to integrate SaaS to legacy systems, today companies require integrations between SaaS to SaaS (see the Amazon/Cast Iron announcement of just 2 weeks ago, oops time flies so quickly in the ‘flat’ is the ‘new growth’ of 2009, it was actually announced nearly a month ago, September 1st! http://blogs.zdnet.com/BTL/?p=23530
Voila…traditional IT-based VARS, you have a great model to build and transition your business. The model is not so much transition to SaaS as it is creating a new hybrid model: on-premise/on demand Levy calls for a truce between those who support SaaS and the internal naysayers (on-premise hold outs). Not only can companies diplomatically create a truce, they can deploy a reconstruction policy BEFORE the destruction begins by helping partners understand SaaS is not a weapons-hugging battlefield.