One of the myths about software-as-a-service (SaaS) is that it is primarily geared toward small and mid-size businesses (SMBs). While SMBs may feel the most immediate benefits from SaaS, large-scale organizations have become big beneficiaries of SaaS as well.

Just as Internet leveled the playing field for many SMBs competing with major corporations by giving them instant access to global markets via eCommerce, SaaS has done the same by giving SMBs equal access to many of the enterprise applications which big companies have relied upon for years to manage their businesses.

However, SMBs aren’t alone in recognizing the business benefits of SaaS.

Fortune 500 companies and other brand-name corporations are showing up on the customer lists of many of the SaaS providers that are now listed on THINKstrategies’ online SaaS Showplace directory.

These companies have found that many of today’s SaaS solutions are not only easier to deploy and administer, but they are flexible and scalable enough to satisfy their internal and external business requirements. As a result, many major corporations are using Salesforce.com to satisfy their customer relationship management (CRM) and salesforce automation (SFA) needs; Taleo to handle their recruitment and talent management needs; and others to support a variety of back-office and customer-facing functions.

The broad-based adoption of SaaS across demographic categories was also confirmed by a recent industry survey conducted by THINKstrategies, in conjunction with Cutter Consortium. The survey found little variation in customer perceptions and buying intentions when it comes to SaaS by size of company.

[Let me know at jkaplan@thinkstrategies.com if you’d like to obtain a summary of the survey results when it is published.

The rapid acceptance of SaaS as a viable alternative to traditional ‘shrink-wrapped’ software is driving leading independent software vendors (ISVs), such as SAP and Microsoft, to accelerate their rollout of SaaS options for their legacy applications.