NetSuite, Zoho post app suite gains

Two on-demand business software firms reported accelerating adoption of their suites today.

NetSuite reported second-quarter 2008 revenue of $36.6 million, up 43 percent from the same period in 2007. Net loss per GAAP was down to $3.1 million in the quarter, compared with $9.6 million in Q2 2007.

Sign-ups for Zoho.

(Credit: Zoho)

The company also announced new midmarket and enterprise customers for its ERP and CRM suites, which are delivered as Web applications. Surgical robotics company Intuitive Surgical adopted NetSuite CRM; Nestle UK used services from NetSuite to launch an online store; and sports market firm Wasserman Media Group adopted NetSuite for accounting functions, replacing an installation of Microsoft Dynamics-Great Plains, NetSuite announced.

Meanwhile, Zoho, a provider of business software-as-a-service to small and midmarket companies, prepared to announce that it has reached the milestone of 1 million sign-ups for its services. Zoho's Raju Vegesna says that of those, roughly 300,000 to 350,000 still log on to the service each month. He also believes that Zoho is tracking at about one-third of Google Apps adoption. (Google Apps is Google's business-focused app suite; Vegesna did not consider individual or business use of Google Docs, which offers some of the same services.)

These success stories, in addition to the continued strong performance by Salesforce.com, put continued pressure on the distribution models and market that Microsoft and other traditional software houses rely on.

[Pank2008]

The above mentioned success stories underline the bourgeoning of the SaaS market, which has continued to grow inspite of the economic slowdown. With the SaaS market expected to grow to $10.7 billion by 2009 (Gartner Study) there is space for lots of other success stories. Another upcoming area, where success stories will be created is business applications which are interoperable between mobile devices and desktops, especially with the coming of powerful and internet friendly devices like iPhone.

In addition to the names you mentioned, there are other successes as well, if not so explosive, but growing steadily and surely - for example HyperOffice who have touched 150,000 customers for their integrated web based collaboration and messaging suite. It has also been doing very well in the mobility domain because its application has mobile specific enhancements and features.

[Calico321]

Netsuite is a fine mid market tool, but let's not overlook products from the other ERP/CRM SaaS providers such as bizautomation.com