Amazone News, iPhone Counted In 'Open Platform' Trend

But this trend called platform-as-a-service, or PaaS, could have huge implications. In theory, PaaS makes it far easier for businesses and other enterprises to develop their own applications, instead of licensing or buying the applications from software companies.

The change represents a fundamental disruption to how software gets distributed and consumed, says Paul McNamara, chief executive of small PaaS vendor Coghead. The trend marks "a significant watershed event," he said.
Nearly everything is finding a home on the Internet, and software development is no different.

PaaS can be applied to any market, by any company, according to William Blair & Co. analyst Laura Lederman.

"The emergence of the PaaS offering also represents something more fundamental: a challenge to the way applications are developed and to the vendors that currently dominate software platforms," Lederman wrote in a recent report.

One such dominant software platform is Microsoft's MSFT Windows.

How much of a threat PaaS might be for Microsoft or others is still unclear, but a number of companies are jumping into the fray.

Salesforce.com CRM provides a PaaS, called Force.com.

Force.com is an online hub that customers and partners use to build business software. For example, Electronic Arts ERTS used Force.com to create 14 new applications for managing global recruiting and purchasing.

Other tech vendors have similar types of development platforms. For instance, many view Facebook as a development platform for social networking, while Amazon.com AMZN is a platform for Web sites and e-commerce. Apple AAPL has opened its iPod and iPhone to outside developers.

The PaaS trend is especially hot in business software. A host of small, privately held companies have Web-based development platforms, in addition to their own software that they license to users. These companies include Archer Technologies, Bungee Labs, LongJump and Coghead, whose investors include No. 1 business software maker SAP SAP.

By offering software platforms, these Web-based firms can grow "far beyond the scope of the current application they offer," Lederman wrote.

For instance, Archer makes software to manage corporate risk and compliance. It recently launched a PaaS that lets outsiders write and share new applications on its SmartSuite development framework. So far, 60 new applications have been built for the exchange, says Archer Technologies CEO Jon Darbyshire.

"People use the framework to build so many things that it's the hottest part of our company right now," he said.

Clients pay an annual license fee of $8,000 for unlimited access to SmartSuite and all other applications on the Archer exchange.

Even nontechies can build applications with SmartSuite, he insists. The platform lets users compile software functions by simply dragging and dropping software modules they want to use.

"This approach is taking off because it puts control back in the hands of business people, so they don't have to wait around for software developers," Darbyshire said. "Our view is that this is going to be very disruptive to the market because it forces traditional software companies to rethink their delivery model."

Coghead runs its entire business and development platform on computer systems hosted by Amazon. This is an example of a parallel trend known as cloud computing, in which applications are hosted on external servers. Users access the software via the Web.

"Our platform allows you to do away with managing networks, security, databases and computer infrastructure," said Coghead's McNamara. "All that is really complicated."