Predicting the Next Decade of Enterprise Software

Enterprise software consultancy Sandhill.com just published the results of an interesting survey entitled Predicting the Next Software Decade. This is info-porn rather than statistically significant, but the results are still very interesting. (The survey was done with a self-selected group, the attendees of their 2007 Enterprise Conference, and the questions appear to have been multiple-choice.)

Among the findings:

• Linus Torvalds and Marc Benioff were tied for first place (with 26% each) as the software leader who has had the most impact on enterprise software since 1997, both well ahead of Bill Gates at 17%.

• The Internet was far and away the winner, with a 70% vote, in answer to the question on which trend had had the most impact. Open source was a distant second place, with 13%. SaaS (which in many ways is tied to the internet) was third, with 9%.

• Looking forward, 62% thought that Google was the company with the greatest likelihood of affecting enterprise software in the next ten years, followed by "a newcomer" at 26%. Interestingly, IBM wasn't even one of the choices (which of course says something about the survey.)

• Of the major independent software companies, Adobe was thought to have the greatest likelihood of remaining independent (31% thought so.)

• 71% of attendees expect to see a new $10 billion plus enterprise software company in the next decade. ( I agree, but I think it will be a very different kind of company, and our very understanding of what an "enterprise software company" is will have changed by then. This question is analogous to asking business people early in the rise of the personal computer if there would be a $10 billion plus personal computer company. Yes, but it turned out to be a software company, not a hardware company, that mattered. Similarly, I believe that the next $10 billion plus enterprise computer company will be much more a data aggregator and provider of services against that data than an "enterprise software company" as we know them today.)

• 73% think SaaS will be viewed as a success in ten years, while only 7% think that of Web 2.0. (I think that means they don't understand Web 2.0, since SaaS is a big part of Web 2.0, and in fact, I'd argue that Web 2.0 is an attempt to understand and explain the new rules of business in the SaaS era! But it's certainly quite likely that the Web 2.0 monicker will have burned out long before ten years have gone by..)

The survey is well worth a read. It makes me think it would be fun to construct such an unscientific but enjoyable survey for our Radar readers and some of our conference attendees in future. Feel free to suggest questions in the comments.