Issues in enterprise application software
1. I think the next decade or so will see much more change in enterprise applications than the last one. Why? Because the unresolved issues are piling up, and something has to give. I intend this post to be a starting point for a lot of interesting discussions ahead.
2. The more technical issues I’m thinking of include:
- How will app vendors handle analytics?
- How will app vendors handle machine-generated data?
- How will app vendors handle dynamic schemas?
- How far will app vendors get with social features?
- What kind of underlying technology stacks will app vendors drag along?
We also always have the usual set of enterprise app business issues, including:
- Will the current leaders — SAP, Oracle and whoever else you want to include — continue to dominate the large-enterprise application market?
- Will the leaders in the large-enterprise market succeed in selling to smaller markets?
- Which new categories of application will be important?
- Which kinds of vendors and distribution channels will succeed in serving small enterprises?
And perhaps the biggest issue of all, intertwined with most of the others, is:
- How will the move to SaaS (Software as a Service) play out?
3. I’m not ready to answer those questions yet, but at least I’ve been laying some groundwork.
Along with this post, I’m putting up a three post series on the history of enterprise apps. Takeaways include but are not limited to:
- Application software is a very diverse area. Different generalities apply to different parts of it.
- A considerable fraction of application software has always been sold with the technology stack being under vendor control. Examples include most app software sold to small and medium enterprises, and much of the application software that Oracle sells.
- Apps that are essentially distributed have often relied on different stacks than single-site apps. (Duh.)
4. Reasons I see for the enterprise apps area having been a bit dull in recent years include:
- Much of the action these days is in analytics. Analytic apps are problematic.
- Much of the action is in dynamic schemas. Dynamic schemas are, for packaged apps, problematic.
- Much of the action is at internet companies. They’re creating their own software, because it’s the heart of their business.
- Application software vendors are distressingly slow-moving.
- It’s obvious that the future of application software will, for the most part, lie in SaaS (Software as a Service). But SaaS platform technologies are still being worked out.
5. But I did do some work in the area even so. 🙂 Besides posts linked above, other things I wrote relevant to the present discussion include:
- In July I considered how an app vendor could offer both SaaS and packaged apps. I think that’s a hugely important subject, on which I hope to update my opinions frequently.
- In August I reviewed how central database design has been to application software over the decades.
- Back in 2012 I surveyed actual and potential trends in enterprise application software. I of course need to update that discussion too. Ditto my 2013 musings on SaaS.
- Workday is the best example in my posts of the point that leading SaaS vendors have complex, imaginative architectures.
- Second place would go to my 2011 post on salesforce.com/force.com.
- The application software section on Software Memories of course generally contains a number of relevant posts.
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13 Responses to “Issues in enterprise application software”
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Curt,
The enterprise computing model needs to be understood in the broader framework of communication networks and where processing occurs (or has occurred previously). Because of monopoly, processing (data) and switching (comms) shifted to the edge in the 1950s-80s. These forces shaped enterprise communication and processing. But with the advent of competition and mobile, these forces have reversed and transformed. B2B/B2C/C2C lines are all blurring both with respect to communication, data gathering, and knowledge management. I think you raise some of these as distinct issues, but a more complete picture of the interplay and forecast of where the networks will go are necessary in order to make a future prediction on EAS.
Michael
Lately it seems like it is getting much easier to put together a reasonably functional SaaS application in shorter bursts of time thru a MVP model where you can quickly get customer feedback on the functionality of the app and respond with results.
Consider today, the wide choice and availability of reliable open source software (from the likes of Google and others) as well as an amazing expansion of the number of API’s in the market as well as algorithms.
Do you sense we will see a resurgence in new applications that will be more and more niche in nature but tackling pain that a large base of customer desire to address?
Nice to see this subject being discussed.
Of “how an app vendor could offer both SaaS and packaged apps”.
Underway already desktop platforms are being slowly back-fitted with *mobile OS. A likely next step is instantiate a series of deep-linked mobile apps as swipe thru on mobile and as a panorama on desktop.
* Apple has been pushing iOS iPhone features back to OSX Mac for 24 months. Google is also pushing Android into ChromeOS technologies (see WSJ). Microsoft surely takes another bite at getting this worked out again after Windows 8 misfire.
http://www.wsj.com/articles/alphabets-google-to-fold-chrome-operating-system-into-android-1446151134
Bob,
I certainly see niche analytic SaaS apps as a major growth area. Reasons include:
Also, if an app depends on data integration, then it’s limited to the niche corresponding to what it integrates with.
Clive,
You seem to be talking about where the clients are, while I’m focusing on the tension between having the servers in one’s preferred cloud/co-lo and having the servers wherever the customer likes to have their servers be.
A fundamental problem with adaptable applications is that they can only work as productivity tools for people with domain knowledge.
That’s the pitch: You don’t have to understand the generic technology to do the implementation, just have domain knowledge and click you way through some configuration screens.
Then to save money, big companies outsource the implementation to offshore generic IT service providers. When you look at the CVs of the cheap offshore employees, they all know the generic tech stack, but few have domain knowledge. So to them, the easiest solution to the problem is a total rewrite.
So big vendors spend vasts sums delivering the wrong toolset to the wrong implementers. The problem is related to the whole IT vs business user conflict that plagues BI.
Barney,
It depends on the degree of adaptability/adaptation, among other factors.
Curt,
I’m coming at enterprise application software from the bottom up tier 3 perspective building very large scale SaaS for say 100,000 to 1,000,000 multi-tenancy SMB customers with growth to on-premises for SMEs. Both with same code base. Current web frameworks popular in consumer apps I see giving way over the next 24 months to apps built mobile first. For the reasons you well outlined I see huge pent up demand for new enterprise application software platforms (mobile instantiated on desktop) with Spark and Stucco algorithms remaking MRP. [Or I wipe away “3 tears”].
Clive,
Why the centrality of mobile? Is that the main use case?
Curt,
In the SMB/SME space building UI for configurable scale requires building on the dominant canonical platform, it was Windows, it’s now Android / iPhone.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.exact&hl=en
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.xero.touch&hl=en
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/exact-crm/id789694857?mt=8
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/xero/id441880705?mt=8
Clive,
I see your point(s). Salesforce automation obvious should be mobile.
The other argument is that tedious “paperwork” should be mobile as well. Fair enough.
Curt,
Very much looking forward to reading your follow on posts to this layout of the ground work. An “Outkast Prototype” feels due (Website linky).
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