CA dipped its toe in the same pool Microsoft and Salesforce.com have been wading in—software distribution.
The former Computer Associates, and former software maker-only, is letting several other software vendors swim to market in its stream, the OnSite PC Protection program, a platform for delivery, previously, of CA security products to small VARs and PC Repair Shop customers.
That stream now carries productivity titles like Word Perfect X3 and SMB and home office tools like H&R Block’s 2006 TaxCut Premium 2006 Federal + State Software and utilities including Corel WinZip Pro, Iolo Technologies’ System Mechanic and Siber Systems’ Roboform Pro.
CA is swimming in the pool that is the new software distribution model.
Salesforce.com’s AppStore, a Web site through which Salesforce.com is acting as a distributor of third-party software applications, and Jamcracker’s Jamcracker Service Delivery Network (JSDN) that makes software-as-a-service applications available to managed service providers work similarly, and Microsoft is already signing up ISVs to ride its Office Live to market.
Bill McNee, founder and CEO of Saugatuck Technology, in Westport, Conn., refers to the previous delivery of these models represented as “SaaS 1.0.” Going forward, the SAAS market will be dominated by “SaaS 2.0,” in which applications will be seen as a core functionality, some nothing more than a distribution medium, to be implemented by providers with deep business process knowledge and vertical expertise, he said.
Partners will be on the high dive in SaaS 2.0 as customization trumps implementation and delivery in the shift toward business service provisioning, said McNee. A deployment of a human resources application now goes beyond a vanilla software configuration to a richer set of business services, such as helping perform background checks and a virtual HR team to call on.