That was a cheap shot at a timeless Shakespearean line, but the question still stands: Should your organization move towards a hosted model for your business technology or should you stick with the traditional way?


Hosted solutions are the new trend in the arena of business software, especially because it offers a lot of options and flexibility, but the answer to the question varies from organization to organization. Here we decided to list out some of the advantages and disadvantages of hosted solutions, but maybe we should start by defining hosted applications: Hosted solutions or Saas (Software as a Service) are software models where the application and the data are hosted by a vendor and made available to clients through a network. “Cloud” has been a buzzword for hosted solutions recently, and generally speaking a cloud service is a hosted service that’s accessible over the internet.

Advantages:

➢Expertise: The vendor for your hosted service probably has specialists in many different fields. Networking, database administration, security, and other areas of activity that require expertise are handled by the vendor. That allows you to reduce your IT staff or leverage them in other areas.

➢Scalability: If your demand increases or decreases, vendors of hosted services can usually accommodate that change quickly. They are usually able to provide you with more storage or add more users to your license agreement in hours or even minutes. Also, in this scenario you would only pay for what you really need.

➢Support: Most vendors will offer support services with your subscription. That eliminates the need for you to have an in-house support desk to deal with IT issues. Also, the fact that you will probably pay for these services on a monthly basis (as opposed to yearly contracts), generates good service from the vendors. They know you can move to the competition with a few days notice, and they strive to keep you happy with their product.

➢Security: If you choose a vendor who passed a comprehensive audit of their processes and activities, you can have the peace of mind that your data is secure. Statement on Auditing Standard (SAS) No. 70 for Service Organizations is a widely recognized auditing standard and it often includes controls of information technology.

➢Fast Set Up: By eliminating the need to size, plan and order hardware and other equipment necessary to self host your storage and applications you arrive at a production-ready scenario much faster.

Disadvantages:

➢Integration Risks: If you are planning on integrating your hosted application with some of the other applications you already possess, make sure they are compatible. Your vendor should assist you in thinking about all possible scenarios and risks of this integration.

➢Limited Customization: A lot of hosted applications follow the “cookie cutter” approach, and don’t allow you to customize the tool for your needs to a large extent. During the discovery process, be sure to ask all vendors if they can address your specific needs.

➢Performance: One of the reasons hosted services are cheap, is the fact you are sharing resources with other organizations. If the vendor has not planned and sized the infrastructure appropriately, performance may be an issue.

There may be other things to consider when making your decision, but the points above will get you under way. When done correctly, hosted or cloud computing is a great way to reduce operating costs, increase efficiency and streamline operations.