Well, for starters those are two completely different names, but on a serious note, SAAS is an integral part of cloud computing. Before we try and understand what SAAS is all about, it is necessary to understand the context of cloud computing itself.
Why do you think businesses all across the globe have all of a sudden started to think about computing rather than relying blindfolded on their brick-and-mortar offices and good old local servers? The basic reason is, if you have an office or business out there, you need a whole lot of stuff to run your business in terms of IT infrastructure and that simply costs a bomb.
The entire concept of cloud computing has its roots in the requirements of businesses that have information technology solutions for cheaper prices. This has only become possible because cloud computing allows businesses to pay only for whatever infrastructure they use and nothing else. In retrospect, good old computing platforms require you to pay for an entire area of hardware, software and the entire IT department and also support team. Cloud computing has been able to minimize the costs because you only pay for what you use.
That being said, SAAS is part of cloud computing that only deals with software. SAAS stands for software as a service and is also known as on-demand software. The name pretty much defines what it stands for and if you haven’t guessed it right yet, SAAS is about taking essential software on rent for less than half the price rather than buying it out completely. Say, for instance, your business requires you to use particular software for just a couple of months, but the software giant’s out there would not sell you the software keeping in mind that if your usage would be for just a couple of months – you would have to pay the entire license fee and might just have to trash it after you have used it.
SAAS allows you to pay for software for periodical use and even if you wish to continue using particular software, you might just go ahead and renew the license for just a couple of more months. That simply means a serious saving because software licenses are expensive and in today’s downtrodden economic scenario, a penny saved is a penny earned! You can simply spend that money on improving your infrastructure or your services to your customers.
Some of the most common types of SAAS include human resource management, customer relationship management, content management and also accounting. The other big advantage of SAAS is, you’ll have to run from pillar to post if the software goes haywire – you simply shoot an e-mail to you about the computing service provider and they’ll fix the problem for you or provide you with a new copy of the software.
So, at the end of the day, you don’t have to worry about maintaining your highly essential software and you also pay less than half the price you would have paid for a complete buyout license.
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