A virtual Silicon Valley in the making

Nandita Singh

SINGAPORE: “A virtual Silicon Valley is in the making,” stated

Marc Benioff, chairman & CEO, SalesForce.com.

Benioff is the man who is leading the “virtual Silicon Valley movement”

from the front. His company SalesForce.com provides a platform AppExchange,

which can be used by developers across the world to create their own

applications without incurring huge cost of buying the platform for application

development.

The company under Benioff's leadership has recognized the wave in time. “This

is an idea whose time has come,” said Benioff.

He was addressing the audience at the iDA Distinguished Speakers Series here.

It is the Web 2.0. “Just imagine you don't need to incur a high total

cost of ownership in buying the software and installing it. The era of software

as we know it has ended,” said Benioff. He elaborated that the future is “On

Demand” software with just about any application available off the web in real

time.

The movement from “Consumer Web” to “Business Web” is picking up

steam and there are converts willing to give Microsoft

the “boo”. It is decidedly not an SMB phenomenon, Benioff said, counting

Cisco as one of its largest converts.

The “Business Web” is changing the way software is distributed. The “On

Demand” plug-in software is quick-and-easy to deploy, highly economical and

allows meta-customization flexibility. It is available as and when you want it

for a subscription fee and the user can customize it to fit the organization

needs.

In 2005, reportedly, Mircosoft sat up, took notice of SalesForce.com and

other companies like it and actually revised its strategy to offer software as a

service and is now offering windows

live. This was said to be Microsoft's major strategy revision in the last

five years.

However, small players with zero legacy baggage have moved faster and you

have a number of such players comprising the Business Web. Just like the “Consumer

Web” comprising Amazon and eBay the Business Web allows a developer to create

and publish applications on ISV standards and then run, integrate and deliver

these everywhere in a secure and scalable environment.

Giving a sneak peek into the potential of the Business Web, Benioff

demonstrated “Mash-ups” — two independent web services get integrated to

form a third independent service.

SalesForce.com has collaborated with Google

under its early access to code program and demonstrated how Google Maps and

SalesForce.com talk to each other and publish a third applications which maps

SalesForce.com offices at various geographic locations and presents the

information in a easy-to-absorb visual. This is just one of the possibilities.

The company is getting aggressive in reaching out to the Asia Pacific region.

On the agenda, later this year, is establishing presence in India in Bangalore.

(SalesForce.com hosted the author in Singapore)

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