Software-as-a-service (SaaS) applications are being adopted at a good pace, although there is still much room for expansion.
So says Christo Erasmus, MD at Unit4 Business Software, who notes many software providers in SA are coming up with innovative offerings of their current (legacy) products that are only available through SaaS but it's all about agility in the end.
Unit4 Business Software, in partnership with ITWeb, is conducting an online survey to gain valuable insight and perspective into the current and future strategies for SaaS utilisation and adoption within South African organisations.
"The objective of this survey is to identify and understand thought leaders in the South African SaaS market who are contemplating the move of their core systems to the cloud but are still seeking a suitable and effective business partner to achieve this," says Erasmus.
He notes traditionally, systems like finance, HR and procurement were labelled as support functions to the operations of business and treated as such.
"These functions are prime candidates for preventing companies modernise as they are more often than not, old 'whales' that are difficult to change, very often customised to the hills and not ready for the digital revolution," he says.
Erasmus believes these functions need to be turned into "partners" of the business operations and enable as many resources as possible to create a highly effective digital heart for any business.
For the success of the implementation of SaaS, the applications need to be agile for quick change to survive an ever-changing business environment, he adds.
Erasmus also states if the application or applications used in a SaaS deployment do not support this agility, they will quickly become redundant and be put out to pasture.
"Organisations that have systems in place that support innovation and embrace transformation will reign supreme in their fields. The digital era demands constant changes and SaaS applications better be ready for that."
Erasmus points out SaaS agility is not the same as flexibility - most leading business software solutions are flexible enough to meet the needs that an organisation identifies before implementation but lack the post-implementation agility to react to changes quickly.
Click here to complete our online SaaS survey and be eligible to win a two-night stay at Ehlathini Lodge, including dinner and breakfast.
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