Why is everyone and their grandmother offering

platforms?

#iforum

this.about

Talk is in English Q&A at the end in English/Russian No code or technical details in this talk Restating the obvious

@olegpodsechin

Russia, Finland, UK, Germany … Working with mediatech startups since before

the bubble 30+ companies in total, expert on failure Do technical due diligence for investors

Breaking apart the Clouds

Software as a Service (SaaS) Platform as a Service (PaaS) Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)

Coined by Tim O'Reilly (but pretty self evident) Benefits of services: economies of scale, ease

of maintenance, seamless upgrades and better revenue model (predictable cash flow)

Software vs. Infrastructure

Software sell value, customized solutions low initial investment, higher profit margins closer to the users, higher risk?

Infrastructure sell a utility, commoditized solutions high initial investment, race to the bottom closer to the hardware, lower risk?

Positive Network Effects

Infrastructure: one VPS is just like another, only differentiator is price

Software like Dropbox can differentiate itself with the user experience & brand (consumer awareness) Also able to tap into user base for promotion Charge each user for shared storage space, but

pay IaaS provider only once (value vs. utility)

Platform Initiatives

SalesForce Force.com, Heroku acquisition

Akshell (full disclosure: I'm helping out) Google AppEngine, Microsoft Azure

Amazon Web Services (AWS), Linode etc. Dell, HP moving into infrastructure, platforms

Why Platforms?

A successful platform requires technology, users & developers – some have two of these covered, makes sense to leverage them

“When everybody is digging for gold, you should be selling shovels” - low risk, high yield

Crowd source development; share common components

Extend ecosystem (think API++)

Why not Platforms?

Giving up control – no clear SLAs Introduce technical debt – trade short term

benefits for potential long term pains Bait and switch – think Twitter Lock you in – think Amazon (without

Eucalyptus)

Food for Thought

Will I be able to run my service on top of this platform in one year, two years etc.?

Thank you for listeningQuestions? Feedback?

@olegpodsechin