Levion and the Promise of Hybrid Accounting Software
As the accounting software industry moves to a general acceptance of the fact that customers demand the sort of benefits that cloud application bring, there are two distinct approaches vnedors are making; Pure-play cloud vendors (FreeAgent, Xero etc) build pure Saas applications and do away with any need for desktop
Back to the Future–FreshBooks is Accounting
On my first ever trip to the Bay area, six or so years ago, I attended the, now defunct, Office 2.0 conference. At the event I moderated a panel looking at what Accounting 2.0 actually meant and the value it could drive. The panel was a who’s who of the space and included folks from […]
Xero Nabs Intuit Exec
I’ve long wondered how Xero will execute upon its North American opportunity – after all North America is the real goal for the company, and also where they face the biggest hurdles to success. I’ve even been roundly criticized for articulating this question I’ve spent some time with Xero’s US president Jamie Sutherland who seems […]
MinuteDock Launches on Intuit’s Partner Platform
Exciting times today for the team from MinuteDock (more on them here) the neat little time trapping application from my own hometown, Wellington, New Zealand. Formerly a product that was primarily intended for users of the Xero accounting product, MinuteDock is broadening its approach and is now tightly integrated with
The Google Apps Marketplace–Chances of Survival
Over on his blog, VC Brad Feld posted about the experience of three of his portfolio companies being part of the Google Apps Marketplace – Spanning, Yesware and Attachments are all built on top of Google Apps and Feld is particularly positive about their experience; While Google has been building
Looking At Platforms
Earlier this year at the Enterprise 2.0 conference “platform” was the name of choice. Seemingly every company I spoke to was a platform player. It seems the latest “fart on demand” iPhone application is a “platform for virtual flatulence generation”, that the latest Twitter clone with negligible uptake is “a platform for global collaboration” and […]
Software+Services…. Intuit Bets that Desktop Software Ain’t Dead Yet
Considering CloudAve’s core thesis is the move to cloud computing, and given this authors penchant for cloud applications, one would have thought any development in the desktop software space would be dismissed. The truth is somewhat different however. I’m a major user of web apps but I’ve also got installed software on my machines – […]
Finding the Hub – A Common Data Model
A couple of weeks ago I roused myself at 1:30am to moderate a radio show in my ongoing series for VoiceAmerica “Kepes in the Clouds”. This time I had the pleasure of speaking with Sunir Shah, Chief Handshaker from FreshBooks, and Alex Chriss, Business Lead for the Intuit Partner Platform (disclosure – the IPP is […]
Six One Way, Half a Dozen the Other – Traditional Vendors and SaaS
Someone sent me an email the other day alerting me to the fact that Accomplish, a vendor of desktop small business accounting software, has just announced that it’ll be providing a SaaS product. Nothing overly interesting in that, but what was interesting was reading the interview with Accomplish General Manager Grant Hewson and seeing the […]
Boston Here I Come
In an attempt to single-handedly support the global aviation industry, I’m once again heading on a plane to travel 30 hours or so across the world to attend a conference. This time I’m stoked to be attending Enterprise 2.0 in Boston in the third week of June. I’m a blog/media partner for the event which […]
Another Radio Show…
Actually talking to people makes a nice change from written correspondence. A month or so ago I took part in a really fun live radio show with a bunch of SaaS accounting vendors – following on from that show (and totally due to the good things the participants had to say rather than anything I […]
