The SaaS Race

So I've been back at Oracle for about a month now.  I'd say the biggest change so far is my perspective on trends in SaaS and Cloud.  Prior to gaining that perspective from the inside, I really did not have a full appreciation for just how early in the game we are.  Not just Oracle, but everybody.

During my undergrad days, when remote learning was done with smoke signals (no Internet yet), I remember learning about Bruce Henderson's Growth-Share Matrix:

Cash Cows have high market share in a low growth industry.  Dogs have low market share in a slow-growth, mature industry.  Question Marks have low market share in a fast growing industry (this is where most companies start).  And Stars have high market share in a fast growing industry.

So apply those definitions in the SaaS market.  The market itself is fast-growing, so by definition we don't have any Cash Cows or Dogs.  But I'd also say that we don't have any SaaS providers with high market share yet...it's a pretty competitive market at the moment in terms of market share.  So, by process of elimination, all the providers are still Question Marks - relatively recent entries in a fast growing market, but none of those entries have achieved a dominant market share yet...mostly because the market itself is still now.

With that in mind, I read a lot of hooey in the press:  so-and-so will dominate/collapse/rise/die/excel/be eliminated...whatever the latest news cycle dictates.  Take all that stuff with a grain of salt...we're very, very early in what promises to be a very long race for market share with many players who have the resources to see the race through to the end.  We're just getting started.