As the Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) “gold-rush” intensifies, industry consolidation is inevitable. The latest example of this consolidation process is today’s announcement by NetSuite that it intends to acquire OpenAir.

This announcement not only reaffirms the SaaS industry consolidation trend, but it also is the latest example of a company profiled by THINKstrategies being acquired shortly thereafter. Other examples include,

Vtrenz which was acquired by Silverpop
Everdream was acquired by Dell
AimNet was acquired by Cognizant
Corio was acquired by IBM

(Contact me if you’d like a copy of our Strategic Thinking profiles on these companies.)

I had the privilege of talking with Zach Nelson, CEO of NetSuite, and Morris Panner, the CEO of OpenAir, moments before today’s announcement was made public. They indicated that the acquisition was based on a trend which THINKstrategies has seen coming for a few months now.

Prospective SaaS users are not only seeking … Read More »

I’ve been predicting for a couple of years that the worlds of business process outsourcing (BPO) and Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) would converge. In fact, you can also add managed services to the mix.

The reason for this prediction is that the BPO companies, especially the offshore companies, can no longer sustain their labor-intensive business models. Competition for skilled labor is intensifying, driving up operating costs and creating service continuity issues as workers jump between firms.

In response, the BPO companies must shift their operations from a labor-centric to a software enabled model. SaaS represents a natural solution for this business challenge. The BPOs will use SaaS to automate their existing processes and services, to expand their service portfolios, and to extend the reach of their operations.

The BPOs will use managed services to do the same in the IT infrastructure management arena.

The clearest example … Read More »