Making the Most of PaaS for the Channel

The channel community has it rough. Resellers need to find ways to stand out among their many competitors, while also devoting time to understanding a gauntlet of various vendor products and solutions. The bar for creating value is high, as well as costly and somewhat restrictive.

One way that companies have been able to add value and increase productivity is by implementing Platform as a Service (PaaS) solutions. With PaaS, software solutions can be created directly by the business expert, which shortens the time to market for those working in competitive channel markets. For example, a Telco VAR or service provider might add specific templates (i.e. a Telco CRM starter kit or an integrated billing module) or “starter code” that is specific to their segment which helps differentiate their offering from generic versions.

So why is this trend only picking up steam now? Initially, the majority of PaaS platforms were available from start-ups, which prevented many companies from adopting them due to perceived risk. In 2013, however, larger, more established vendors have begun to endorse PaaS platforms and differentiate with offerings that are suitable for companies working in the channel.

PaaS has become highly popular because it reduces the time needed for companies to deploy their software, it is dramatically simpler than on-premise software, a complete IT staff isn’t necessary to support it, and it usually means that customers are always running on the latest version of the software – thus reducing support costs. The great part about these benefits is that the channel partner needs even less expertise than they would supporting their existing on-premise deployments. This lowers the entry bar for developing software assets and for deploying and supporting their customers.

Our Progress Pacific PaaS offering not only offers the aforementioned benefits, it’s also tailored to business experts. Our philosophy is to allow people to build robust and contemporary browser-based or mobile software applications through pointing and clicking – not through writing code. Progress Pacific seamlessly integrates with relational databases (like Oracle, DB2, and SQL Server), with data residing in the cloud (like SalesForce.com, Microsoft Dynamics, Oracle RightNow, etc), and with modern data warehouses (like Hadoop). We also allow your software to be deployed anywhere – for example, on Amazon, RackSpace, or even through a private cloud.

Have questions about how Progress Pacific or how the channel can leverage PaaS? Ask us in the comments or at @ProgressSW.