By Boomi
Do you know exactly how many SaaS tools and applications your organization has deployed? What about how much they’re costing you or how they are actually used?
As software as a service (SaaS) ecosystems become increasingly complex, effectively managing them becomes increasingly challenging. Optimizing your SaaS ecosystem requires a way to maintain centralized control and connectivity and enforce security measures. The right integration platform as a service (iPaaS) solution can manage all of these and more. Read on to discover how to ensure a thriving SaaS ecosystem and why iPaaS offers the best solution to optimize yours.
What Is a SaaS Ecosystem?
A SaaS ecosystem refers to the broader environment of software solutions, integrations, users, and operational practices within a digital architecture. It also can include data governance, API lifecycle management, workflow automation, and B2B partner networks. As in a natural ecosystem, finding the right balance of each element is the key to health. A well-organized SaaS ecosystem enables organizations to streamline operations, enhance collaboration, and adapt to changing business needs more efficiently.
The Software Components of a SaaS Ecosystem
Every SaaS ecosystem differs in the specific tools, processes, and practices required by each industry. However, most components will fall into one of the following categories:
Core SaaS Applications
The fundamental SaaS applications in an ecosystem typically include customer relationship management (CRM) platforms, enterprise resource planning (ERP) software, human resource management (HRM) systems, project management applications, and collaboration solutions, among others. SaaS applications usually require infrastructure as a service (IaaS) resources for hosting and need some platform as a service (PaaS) components to run.
Primary Business Tools and Services
This category includes the productivity software central to your business’s functioning and profitability, such as marketing automation tools, analytics tools, and customer support platforms. When integrated with your SaaS ecosystem, the utility of these applications is significantly enhanced, helping you break down data silos and reduce manual processes.
Integration Solutions
It’s common for businesses to attempt to integrate their legacy systems directly with newer SaaS products using point-to-point or custom application programming interface (API) integrations and Software Development Kits (SDKs). However, with this approach, integration is limited, fragile, and requires significant development time and resources. The most effective integration solutions are middleware platforms, such as iPaaS, which serve as central hubs for connectivity and interoperability between different software applications and services. They allow seamless integration, data flow, and workflow automation across legacy and cutting-edge SaaS systems and offer advanced API lifecycle management capabilities.
Security and Compliance Tools
These include a wide range of software solutions and services designed to protect your data from cyber threats. They are critical to ensuring compliance, data governance, and security.
What Are the Benefits of an Integrated SaaS Ecosystem?
A well-managed SaaS ecosystem enables organizations to connect data, facilitate growth, and control costs. Let’s look at these advantages in more detail:
Enables Composability
With a SaaS ecosystem management solution, such as iPaaS, in place, software application integration is straightforward. This allows you to escape vendor lock-in and enhance your agility by embracing composability. Composability allows you to leverage the most useful multicloud SaaS applications to improve productivity, quickly respond to change, and seize emerging opportunities.
Provides Scalability and Flexibility
Thanks to scalable subscription-based models, flexible integrations, anywhere/anytime access, and continuous updates, SaaS ecosystems are always primed to grow as your business expands and your needs evolve.
Reduces Costs
The subscription-based SaaS model is less costly than purchasing, supporting, and upgrading software or coding your solutions in-house. This approach also allows predictable budgeting with no surprises.
5 Ways iPaaS Optimizes SaaS Ecosystems
A SaaS ecosystem won’t flourish without the proper care and attention. Successfully managing a host of disparate software systems, integrations, users, data, and operations requires a unifying solution. Here’s where iPaaS makes sense. An effective iPaaS can offer you the following advantages:
1. Simplified Integration
Integration isn’t always easy, especially when trying to integrate legacy applications. Customized in-house solutions are complex to maintain and require extensive coding. They also become exponentially more expensive as requirements evolve. iPaaS reduces the need for custom coding and simplifies integration with pre-built connectors, standardized APIs, and automation tools.
2. Native Scalability
With some systems, initial low investment costs can be negated when transaction volumes increase or more integration is required. However, iPaaS offers scalable integration solutions that can automatically adjust resources based on load to meet the evolving needs of your SaaS ecosystem.
3. Unlocked Data Silos
Maintaining multiple legacy and SaaS applications can leave data locked in systems that can’t talk to each other, hindering efficiency. iPaaS eliminates these silos and enables information updated in one application to be shared across your systems automatically. Creating a single source of truth with a master data hub enables workflow automation and delivers real-time data no matter which system a user is accessing.
4. Data Security and Compliance
Data security and compliance protect your business, customers, and reputation. iPaaS provides tools for robust and up-to-date security, data governance, and compliance measures within your SaaS ecosystem, including audits, compliance checks, encryption, and role-based access controls.
5. Centralized Control
As the SaaS ecosystem expands, IT teams face the challenges of rising costs and increasing complexity. iPaaS provides centralized governance, ensuring adherence to organizational policies and allowing you to monitor performance, track usage, manage subscriptions, and optimize costs from a single dashboard, giving you overall visibility and control.
Optimize Your SaaS Ecosystem With Boomi
Boomi provides a single, low-code development platform for data integration, data governance, API lifecycle management, and workflow automation. The Boomi platform provides enterprise-grade features and support for managing complex SaaS and legacy integration patterns across cloud, on-premises, and network edge deployments.
Elanco leveraged the Boomi platform to create a flexible SaaS ecosystem of apps, data centers, and ERP systems, migrate 15,000 users and devices across 50-plus countries, and transform itself into a lean, digitally-native organization.
“By using Boomi for our integration needs, we have been able to shift away from legacy technologies to embrace a start-up spirit,” says Matthew Bull, Chief Technology Officer at Elanco.
Compared to brittle and restrictive point-to-point integrations, Boomi’s iPaaS offers your IT team a robust and secure set of tools for centrally managing integration and automation across your organization. With self-serve tools, Boomi can empower your teams to unlock your data and maximize the capabilities of all your SaaS solutions.
See how the Boomi platform can help you optimize and harness the full power of your SaaS ecosystem.