Blogger: Larry Cannell
Cloud computing and software as a service (SaaS) has been getting some bad press lately. In an interview last month Richard Stallman said “If you use a proprietary program or somebody else's web server, you're defenceless. You're putty in the hands of whoever developed that software." This should be a concern for any enterprise considering SaaS. A SaaS provider can be just as proprietary as any software vendor.
In our recent enterprise SaaS e-mail report we addressed this concern and concluded Microsoft Outlook is the most flexible enterprise SaaS e-mail client available. The reason: Outlook can be used with three of the major SaaS e-mail services we expect to see in the very near future (Microsoft, Cisco/PostPath, and Zimbra/Yahoo). By supporting Outlook these vendors can provide a near seamless transition from on-premises to SaaS e-mail. Since there is no need to sell a new e-mail user interface the business case for making the switch is simpler.
With Cisco/PostPath and Zimbra/Yahoo we are seeing the emergence of viable Exchange-compatible competitors. This level of compatibility is made possible through both the MAPI (Messaging Application Programming Interface) interface and Microsoft’s publication of Exchange protocols. Today, Zimbra has good support for Outlook using its MAPI client software. PostPath (recently acquired by Cisco) does not even require the MAPI client code. In addition, both of these products support Exchange ActiveSync for synchronizing with mobile devices.
Take a situation where a company has employees using an on-premises Exchange Server with Outlook for their e-mail, calendar, tasks, and contacts. This company could switch to the Microsoft SaaS offering (Exchange Online) and could also use Cisco’s or Yahoo’s offerings when they become available. At this time the only issues appear to be with Outlook’s mail rules (mail filtering is available but manageable only through their web interfaces).
Having a separate client (like Outlook) that can speak to multiple SaaS e-mail providers offers the enterprise needed flexibility. Web-only SaaS e-mail vendors do not presently offer this. Zimbra comes closest with their Zimbra Desktop client, but only supports e-mail (via IMAP or POP) and no support for calendars, tasks, or contacts.
By the way, Bill Pray and I will be hosting a Burton Group telebriefing this week discussing our enterprise SaaS e-mail report. Burton Group customers have a choice of two dates:
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
2:00 p.m. EDT/11:00 a.m. PDT/18:00 UTC GMT/19:00 CET
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
9:00 a.m. EDT/6:00 a.m. PDT/13:00 UTC GMT/14:00 CET
You can register for one of these telebriefings HERE. I hope to see you online at a telebriefing this week.
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