October - 2015 - issue > CXO INSIGHT

There is Data Gold in Those SaaS Hills

Satish k. Palvai

Co-Founder and MD-Xactly Corporation

Tuesday, October 20, 2015

Forward

In 1848, the Gold Rush took California by storm. More than 300,000 people made their way to the state for a piece of the action, and in search of that little nugget that could change their fortune. One hundred and sixty-seven years later, we are about to hit another gold rush - this time, the currency is in data.

Conventional wisdom may indicate that the data ship has already sailed, waiving a huge flag that reads BIG DATA. And I wouldn't disagree. But we are sitting on the cusp of another data goldmine, this time, it's led by Software as a Service (SaaS) companies.

Here's why...
The Rise of Data Monetization

While the origins of SaaS data go back several decades, it was roughly 15 years ago when SaaS as a term first appeared in an article by the Software and Information Industry Association entitled "Strategic Backgrounder: Software-as-a-Service (SaaS)." Since then, SaaS and cloud computing have completely revolutionized the IT industry. While the initial goal was to ease the cost and complexity of IT deployments and updates, as SaaS companies continue to mature, the secondary benefits have become far-reaching.

For starters, many SaaS companies are now sitting on 5-10+ years of data. And instead of being isolated in on-premise silos as it was in the past, this data resides centrally in one location. What does this mean? The information can now be aggregated and anonymously analyzed to find data gold.