Many enterprises are exploring their SaaS options and evaluating vendors. These evaluations typically only consider the early phases of a SaaS implementation. IT decision makers must extend their SaaS purview to include the entire data lifecycle, including the eventual termination of the solution.
The SaaS Data Lifecycle
There are five specific phases in a typical SaaS implementation. Most enterprises consider only the first two when making evaluation decisions. Decision makers must extend their analysis to consider the entire data lifecycle.
Each phase has its own considerations:
- Pilot. SaaS vendors provide default templates for uploading data. This data can be entered manually or can be uploaded as delimited or, in some cases, formatted XML files. All vendors can easily accommodate the pilot phase.
- Batch Transfer for Production. Moving to production often requires the bulk upload of large volumes of data from existing production systems. The process of uploading data becomes complicated when moving large volumes...
