Application Service Providers in Business / Edition 1

by Luisa Focacci, Robert Mockler, Marc Gartenfeld

Overview

Learn how to use Application Service Providers to enhance the future of your business!

Application Service Providers in Business is a comprehensive analysis of the present ASP model and its place in business today. Business success in today’s information-intensive marketplace depends on a company’s ability to acquire and fully use the latest advancements in business-critical applications. By having these applications delivered as services over the Internet, businesses can lessen the demands on company IT staff, and increase the ability to get complex software into use immediately. Within this context, a new outsourcing business model called ASP (Application Service Provider) has emerged that is transforming how businesses access and leverage software applications. The book explains the specific contingent ASP models, including business, enterprise, functional-focused, and vertical market ASPs, and ASP aggregators. It demonstrates how different ASP models have fulfilled diverse market/customer expectations and explores future scenarios for current ASP business models. Case studies, tables, and figures illustrate important concepts and make complex information easy to access and understand.

Based on a thorough analysis of the ASP market environment, the book provides detailed Best Practices Guidelines that managers of ASPs can use to improve the chances of success of their respective ASPs. It outlines contingency factors such as application offerings, customer selection, operations, and strategic fit. The book also not only assists business managers in deciding on whether to use an ASP, but it presents ways to use ASPs to effectively support their business process. The ability to provide the workforce with access to data whenever and wherever is crucial for positively impacting a company’s profitability, and ASPs provide the software to make it possible.

Topics included in Application Service Providers in Business are:

• Best Practices Guidelines
  
• strategic management
  
• management decision making and planning
  
• IT management and outsourcing
  
• future of the ASP market
  
• ASP business models
  
• and much more!

Application Service Providers in Business is a comprehensive resource for executives, managers, professors, and business students in the US and worldwide. Using the information and guidelines provided, executives and managers can learn how to use ASPs to enhance their business, and managers of ASPs can learn how to increase their chance of success in the competitive ASP market. The material is also appropriate as a textbook for management and computer information/software development classes.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780789024800
Publisher:	Taylor & Francis
Publication date:	06/02/2005
Pages:	224
Product dimensions:	5.81(w) x 8.25(h) x (d)

About the Author

Focacci, Luisa; Mockler, Robert; Gartenfeld, Marc

Table of Contents

• Preface
  
• Acknowledgments
  
• Chapter 1. Application Service Providers: An Overview
  
• Introduction
  
• ASP Defined
  
• ASP Model’s Main Features
  
• ASP Drivers
  
• A Variety of Offerings
  
• Review of ASP Information Services
  
• Trends and Estimated Worldwide Market Growth
  
• A Multinational Perspective
  
• Conclusion
  
• Chapter 2. The ASP Marketplace: Structure and Overall Dynamics
  
• Introduction
  
• The Current ASP Market Environment
  
• Specific Contingent ASP Business Models
  
• ASP Models’ Challenges
  
• Acceptance and Adoption of ASP Services
  
• Conclusion
  
• Chapter 3. ASP Performance Experiences: A Contingency Approach
  
• Introduction
  
• The Right Solution for the Specific Situation
  
• Contingency-Based Performance in Action: How Different ASP Models Have Fulfilled Diverse Market/Customer Expectations
  
• Conclusion
  
• Chapter 4. Emerging Best Practices
  
• Introduction
  
• The Importance of Building Best Practices
  
• Best Practices Developed from Existing Independent ASP Experiences
  
• Microsoft’s Best-Practice Guidelines for ASPs
  
• ASP Industry Consortium’s Best Practice Guidelines
  
• Winning Customer Confidence and Trust
  
• Conclusion
  
• Chapter 5. The Futures of ASPs
  
• Introduction
  
• Future Models: Overview
  
• The Future of Existing ASP Models
  
• The Search for Other Models
  
• Conclusions
  
• References
  
• Index
  

What People are Saying About This

Dorothy G. Dologite PhD

Dorothy G. Dologite, PhD, Professor of Computer Information Systems, Zicklin School of Business, Baruch College, City University of New York
HIGHLY RECOMMENDED. . . . Offers straightforward and practical 'how-to' guidelines for decision makers on both sides of the customer/provider relationship. ASP managers will benefit from the book's hands-on advice on how best to manage an ASP now and in the future. Decision makers in companies looking for a suitable ASP will also find detailed, clear-cut guidelines on how to best choose one.

Jerold Hall

Jerold Hall, Business Development Manager, Amstaff Human Resources
WOW, A BOOK ABOUT TECHNOLOGY THAT PEOPLE CAN UNDERSTAND! This book is full of examples and profiles of real providers that small, medium, and large businesses can utilize to become more lean and efficient. We're a global market now and no longer is access to revolutionary software an exclusive right of large firms. This book tells you the good, the bad, and the ugly about ASPs and how they can affect your business.