“Blank” as a Service – Why Businesses Choose “as a Service” Offerings (Part 2)

In our last article in this series, we talked about “as a service” technologies – the newest, most popular way for businesses to use software, hardware, and any other tech solution at a competitive cost.

In Part 2 of the series, we’ll talk about the most popular forms of “as a service” offerings and why businesses of all sizes are increasingly choosing this tech model. I’ll also help you clarify some of the alphabet soup in the “as a service” landscape.

If you haven’t yet read Part 1, I highly recommend that you start there.

The 3 Main Types of Business XaaS

In Part 1, I defined “XaaS,” which stands for “Anything as a Service” or “‘Blank’ as a Service.” XaaS offerings save costs and increase agility for businesses, but since the “X” stands for “anything,” you can’t actually call up your cloud consultants and ask for “XaaS.”

XaaS is actually an umbrella term for a large range of business technology.

The three main types of XaaS offerings are:

• SaaS – Software as a Service, such as your ERP software on the cloud
• PaaS – Platform as a Service, which provides already-configured platforms to speed your development tasks
• IaaS – Infrastructure as a Service, which acts like your servers… but on the cloud

Each of these “as a service” offerings appeal to different business needs, and enterprises often choose more than one XaaS solution so they can streamline multiple organizational areas with ease.

Why Companies Are Choosing XaaS

In the last article, I mentioned that XaaS of all kinds helps companies lower CapEx while increasing agility, but businesses choose “as a Service” offerings for wide range of additional reasons.

In general, XaaS can help you:

• Adopt a mobile-first strategy
• Mix and match enterprise functionality using APIs
• Scale your company, your storage, or anything else quickly
• Outsource mundane software upgrade tasks (in most cases)
• Reduce your technological footprint and save on server and energy costs
• Free up capital to reinvest into business-building activities
• Try new solutions relatively risk free, so you’re always using the perfect tools

A Short List of Additional XaaS Options

To achieve the many benefits of XaaS, you should know that there’s a lot more to it than SaaS, PaaS, and IaaS.

As you learned from reading this series, almost anything can be delivered “as a service,” so your business may want to consider the pros and cons of various solutions such as:

• DBaaS

  Database as a Service, also known as cloud database services, lowers database storage and administration costs by delivering configured databases on demand, with little to no lag time.

• MaaS

  Malware as a Service is used primarily by developers to defend their applications against known malware. This service tracks, stores, and tests applications against the most up-to-date malware, which helps developers find and patch vulnerabilities faster.

• MLaaS

  Machine Learning as a Service provides on-demand machine learning tools that help companies streamline operations and build predictive, proactive, effective AI for both internal use and consumer engagement.

• DRaaS

  Disaster Recovery as a Service offers reliable off-site backup and testing services that keep business data secure, no matter what.

• UCaaS

  Unified Communications as a Service connects phone, chat, email, and other communication systems to ensure employees can reach each other quickly and keep business speeding along.

• DaaS

  Data as a Service provides in-depth and detailed models and information that support data-driven marketing and sales strategies, helping organizations effectively find and target the right customers.

• LaaS

  Logging as a Service compiles disparate log files into a comprehensive view that helps developers quickly identify and repair issues at the source.

Remember, this is only a very short list of all the available “as a service” options out there. An experienced cloud consultant can help you sort through available solutions, so you can make confident decisions and choose the technology that’s best for your business.

Warning: Some Businesses Aren’t Allowed to Use “as a Service” Systems

Although XaaS provides business leaders with many benefits, these systems aren’t for everyone. Some organizations may find that their architecture is too complex for effective, affordable “as a service” offerings on the public cloud. Other businesses may run into problems with software licensing, which can prohibit them from switching to XaaS. Yet other companies face restrictive industry regulations, which may prevent them from utilizing any of the standard, cost-saving “as a service” solutions.

Unfortunately, enterprises that are prevented from using XaaS in the modern business landscape may find themselves falling behind their more agile competitors… but there may be appropriate, effective workarounds available to you. The best way to determine your options is to speak with an experienced cloud consultant.

Discover if “as a Service” Is Right for You

Since 1997, Centroid has been helping customers select the right tech solutions to meet their evolving needs, and we’re proud to say that our award-winning migrations for name-brand companies have been some of the largest “as a service” migrations in history. Simply put: our staff is the most knowledgeable in the industry and we have the most experience with “as a service” cloud offerings.

Actually, we’re so savvy about “as a service” that we offer our own option: we provide DRaaS for clients, along with monitoring and patching services that help identify and prevent threats.

If you have questions about IaaS, PaaS, or any of the other “as a service” solutions available on the market today, you can get fast, accurate answers when you contact Centroid to learn more.