New Research Finds 60% of Companies Using Applications in the Cloud

InformationWeek Analytics, a service for peer-based IT research and analysis, announced the release of its latest research report; SaaS 2011 which explores the state of software as a service, a technology being adopted at unprecedented rates.

SaaS adoption is up 13 points over last year, to 60%, despite lingering concerns about features and functionality. More than one-quarter of survey respondents say the applications they have delivered as services are mission critical, down from 34%. Meanwhile, startups and niche SaaS providers are going up against established vendors like Microsoft, Google and Salesforce.com, giving smaller businesses opportunities to take advantage of the burgeoning technology.

Findings:

-- SaaS use among companies surveyed jumped to 60% from 47% last year.

-- Speed to implement, capex savings and opex savings are the biggest drivers behind the move to a SaaS model.

-- Top reasons 40% of companies don't use SaaS: lack of business requirement, concerns over security and concerns over data ownership.

-- SaaS satisfaction levels dipped 11 points, to 74%; still, only 14% say their app services don't meet expectations.

-- Twenty-six percent of respondents rate their SaaS-delivered apps "mission-critical," down from 34% a year ago; they rate 61% "important," vs. 51% last year.

-- CRM (44%), Web presence (38%) and email (35%) are the most common SaaS apps, followed closely by HR/recruiting (33%) and sales (32%).

-- Microsoft (34%, up 8 points), Salesforce.com (30%, down 11 points) and Google (26%, down 2 points) still garner the bulk of the market, but ADP (18%, up 15 points), IBM (16%, up 14 points) and EMC (15%, up 7 points) have gained ground, and smaller companies abound. Oracle dropped 11 points, to 15%.

-- The split between companies using customized SaaS apps and those using standard SaaS apps: 50/50.

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