Does iPhone’s Success Validate Microsoft’s S+S Strategy?

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Whenever I criticize Microsoft on Cloud Computing, in general, and SaaS, in
particular, to people affiliated with Microsoft, they show the success of iPhone
to add legitimacy to their Software + Service strategy. In one of my posts
criticizing Microsoft’s attempts to frame SaaS as something similar to S+S, one
of the Microsoft employees has quoted the same example to add
legitimacy to convince us that Microsoft has the winning approach when it comes
to SaaS. This brings into focus whether iPhone’s success implies that Microsoft
has the correct strategy for the future of computing. My answer to this question
is an unequivocal no and I will explain why I feel this way.

As an end user, my idea of cloud is very simple and I am sure many people
share this view of the Cloud. For me, Cloud is the place where I dump all my
data and access it from any place I want using any device I want. Technically, I
am not religious about the idea of Software as a Service but the benefits of SaaS are just overwhelming (a topic for another day). Basically, I don’t care if I access my data using a web browser or a
software installed in a device. All I care is that I want to access my data from
anywhere. When I say that I want access to my data from anywhere using any
device, I am expecting a complete control of how I can dice and slice my data.
For example, if my data is just the contents of a document file, I should be
able to read it, edit it, delete it, etc.. This is the ultimate cloud nirvana
from an end user perspective.

If all I want is just the data in the Clouds and all I care is accessing it
from any device from anywhere, one might wonder why I fuss so much about
Microsoft’s S+S strategy. Obviously, it shouldn’t matter if I access the data
using Microsoft’s software or Rich Internet Applications developed on Adobe
platform or iPhone Apps or the browser. However, there are some subtle
differences between the S+S approach of Microsoft and that of Apple’s iPhone or
Adobe.

In the case of iPhone, the service part plays a central role in most of the
apps without any need for powerful resources at the end point (ie. iPhone). Most
of the S+S iPhone apps are, simplistically speaking, a front-end for the
services running on the Cloud. Very rarely do they take advantage of the
computing power available on the iPhone. The iPhone apps play a subsidiary role
for the Cloud based services. It is the same case with Adobe AIR apps too. In
fact, Adobe’s approach beats iPhone in the sense that it is multi-platform and
it is possible to use these apps from Windows, Mac or Linux machines. If Adobe’s
dream comes true, they will also be running their platform on mobile devices
soon.

On the other hand, Microsoft has been pushing Services as an add-on to their
existing desktop applications. Their approach is not to give the same kind of
user experience across various platforms and devices. Rather, they intend to
offer reduced functionality through their browser based access. Users cannot
mimic everything they do with Office desktop software using their browser based
service. Unless we have a powerful, expensive machine running Microsoft desktop
software, there is no way we can have a seamless experience on our data from any
location. Unlike the approach of Apple’s iPhone or Adobe, Microsoft’s approach
puts services in a secondary role to their desktop application. Instead of
accessing your data on the cloud using their desktop applications, it becomes
something like you can also put your data into the clouds. 

There is no way Microsoft strategy is similar to the Software+Services
approach of Apple with iPhone or Adobe with AIR. Any comparison between these
technologies is like comparing Apples to Oranges. From what I heard recently,
they are not one and the same. Any attempts to use iPhone’s success to
legitimize Microsoft’s S+S strategy is just plain PR and nothing else.
Period.