The wave of industrial automation is devouring all kinds of industries and it has given birth to a new kind software licensing, i.e., SaaS. What is SaaS?, well it basically means Software as a Service and this is the modern way of licensing a software. Various corporates are preferring software as a services because of its numerous benefits. Lets discuss this model in brief.

SaaS is a software distribution model which enables the service provider to distribute a particular software over the internet. After that the customer can use that software on the cloud by connecting to the internet. Unlike other licensing methods, the end users does not have to install the software on individual computers.

You must have heard of Netflix or Google Workspace; they all are the most prominent examples of software as a service model. Netflix enables users to access its streaming platform on subscription basis. A user needs to purchase the software on monthly, quarterly, or yearly basis to stream on the site. The end user will not get the whole code of the software and it will be ultimately handled by the provider. Although the software can be customizable as per the user and all the management costs are born by the software provider. Now let’s discuss how this model is different from other types of licensing.

Features Of The SaaS Model

Multi-Tenancy Model

When a company purchases a software on subscription basis, all of their employees will be a part of the software. Nowadays, softwares are developed for multiple users and it consists segregated storage area for the data of each user. Through this the data of all their employees would be structured and most importantly the costing can depend on the number of users which would become more budget friendly.

Budget Friendly

As the name suggests, software as a service is a subscription based model which means the service provider takes care of all the maintenance and infrastructure needs and the end user just need to pay on a monthly/ quarterly/ yearly level. Different businesses have different budget models and the SaaS model can blend into all kinds of budget models. The monthly subscription can cost way lesser than the cost of purchasing the whole software, excluding the separate maintenance costs.

Data & Application Security

As the providers have to deal with various companies, they have to take extra care of data breach. Being the sole holder of millions and trillions of databases, they have to run frequent security checks. Every software provider has a fully dedicated team for security of the all the data and the applications as well.

An application can have many users in a software as a service model and multiple users means a whole lot of data which can be in a compromising state, when it is hosted on a third party platform. Also, the software providers need to be very strict about data policy and do not abide by anyone’s rule as they are always cautious of data breach. We all know one data breach can not only become a threat to whole database but also it can be a huge threat to all the data of other companies as well.

Rate Limiting

Rate Limiting is extremely important to balance out traffic on the platform. Extreme traffic can cause lags in the site and it can even crash which will stop all the activities carried out on the software. The provider always keeps a track of current users on the platform and regulates the traffic to optimize the workflow. Rate limiting is the only reason why you can get a clean and smooth interface on a software.

Availability

When you purchase a software on subscription basis you get additional support for the same. So, every software comes with its own support team which will be available for any issue faced by the customer. When we talk about perpetual licensing, the issues of the software need to be handled by the customer itself. All the lags or errors are not the problem of seller but needs to be dealt by the buyer itself in a perpetual licensing.

SaaS is the new age method of purchasing a software with various benefits. Not only new startups but also old businesses are reshaping their opinions on purchasing softwares. Nowadays, buying a software is an extreme expenditure and corporates do not want to commit to one software, so software as a service model is the only way out of that issue.