Tag: platforms
Reinventing Online Marketplaces in the Cloud – A Guest Commentary in E-Commerce Times
5th May
One of the cornerstones of a successful software business has been to build as big a partner ecosystem as possible. In the world of the cloud, showcasing the partner ecosystem in an online marketplace also has become an imperative.
Salesforce.com has been in the vanguard of this trend. Since its inception in 2005, the AppExchange has grown to include more than 3,000 partner solutions that augment Salesforce’s growing portfolio of cloud services. AppExchange has strengthened significantly Salesforce’s position in the marketplace by cataloging the company’s rapidly expanding ecosystem of independent software vendor and consulting partners.
However, the tremendous success of the AppExchange has made it a bit overwhelming for customers to find and easily implement the right third-party solutions to best meet their needs.
Click here to read THINKstrategies’ latest commentary in E-Commerce Times about how Salesforce’s new AppExchange Partner Program is seeking … Read More »
SAP Snaps Up Coghead
22nd February
Among my predictions for 2009, was that the on-demand services industry will experience a shakeout and consolidation.
I also suggested in a recent post that platform and cloud computing companies which don’t offer a combination of solid enabling technologies plus attractive channels to customers won’t survive the shakeout.
Sure enough, the rumors about the demise of Coghead have come true, and it is among the early entrants to the platform/cloud computing market who are now making an equally early departure.
Coghead may have had terrific technological capabilities, but it lacked a sufficient revenue model to stay afloat in an increasingly competitive market. As a result, investors were unwilling to continue to fund the company and it had to discontinue operations.
The primary reason Coghead couldn’t generate sufficient revenue to stay alive was that it didn’t offer enough value to attract adequate customers. It was a classic ‘Catch 22’ … Read More »
Platform Plays and Players
17th January
Platforms have been proliferating and it is not surprising that there are already signs we may be on the cusp of a shakeout.
Today’s platform players range from start-ups, like Bungee Labs, to Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) and cloud computing movement standard-bearers, Salesforce.com and Google with Force.com and Google App Engine respectively.
This has created a somewhat confusing array of players and platform alternatives which have been divided into various segments.
This week’s announcement about Salesforce.com’s new “Service Cloud” illustrates the way SaaS vendors are leveraging platforms to redefine their business in order to extend their market reach and strengthen their position in the marketplace.
SpringCM is heading down this same path with its new platform which enables independent developers and resellers to build applications or more easily integrate to SpringCM’s electronic content management (ECM) capabilities.
Platforms enable these vendors to convert their internal technologies into development and delivery mechanisms which can be … Read More »