7 Reasons Why ISVs are Migrating Platforms to the Industry Cloud

Sep 07, 2021

High-Tech | 5 min READ

The Growing Popularity of Industry Propositions in Cloud ISVs

While the growing popularity of Cloud can't be undermined, there's also this underlying fact that a ‘one size fits all’ approach in cloud (horizontal cloud) cannot meet the unique needs of highly regulated industries such as banking or healthcare. This is where "Industry Cloud" gains the upper hand. Industry cloud solutions are sought to be the next big thing in the technology space as they offer industry-specific applications leveraging a variety of software and services, from partners and have the capabilities to drive value for both customers and public cloud management providers.

Nitin Jindal

Digital Partner

CMT Vertical

Birlasoft

Industry Cloud is a cloud system that has been heavily customized to suit the needs of a specific industry to capture the business, operatory, legal, regulatory, as well as security, and other critical considerations. Besides, the primary emphasis of Industry Cloud is on vertical integration rather than a horizontal one. An Industry Cloud offers many advantages to companies such as Standardized configurations; Improved operational efficiency; Deeper customer engagement; Focused spends, and Customized holistic solutions. All these features help the organizations enhance scalability as it occurs within the constraints set by the policies of an industrial niche. Hence, ISVs need to have a well-carved out platform migration strategy to be able to do make the most of the emergence of industry cloud.

ISVs Moving Platforms to Industry Cloud: Why?

#1 Co-innovation With Partner Ecosystem

As the world is fast catching up with the technological developments and is expecting a lot more from their ISVs, harnessing the expertise of a proven digital transformation leader can be a successful way for businesses to avoid being disrupted. Partnerships and co-innovation are the way to go in order to bring disruptive business propositions for their customers. The ensuing innovation enhances partner and customer ecosystem capabilities by delivering a diverse network of expertise and best-in-class technologies and platforms.

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#2 Leveraging Partner Industry Solutions and IPs

Compatibility with other industry solutions can be an excellent selling pitch for ISVs when joining hands with an experienced partner. One of the IDC studies highlighted that partners that adopt an ecosystem business model would grow 50% faster over the next two years than partners who do not. Successful partners complement each other to expand their business & their capabilities and solve real customer problems.

Different ISVs possess specific areas of expertise in how they serve their customers. In order to leverage the partner Industry Solutions, companies need to know the specializations of their software products most relevant to their industry and make sure that the ISV they select can offer what they are looking for.

#3 Jointly Extending IPs to Domains with Whitespaces

One of the most common challenges for ISVs is developing their own IPs due to the lack of an adequately skilled workforce. The smaller ISVs also lack in marketing their IPs and require the support of an enthusiastic partner to proliferate the merits of the IPs developed by them. There have also been cases where ISVs sold their IPs either through word of mouth or through their industry connections.

Unless the customer comes forward and supports the product through maintenance and upgrade lifecycle, it is difficult for these IPs to penetrate the market further. For the trusted partner to be on board, the ISVs need to showcase consistent performance of their products delivering end-user satisfaction and retention, which will eventually make these customers their extended marketing arms for promotions of the IPs. In such a scenario, a trusted partner will significantly assist in the growth of ISVs.

ISVs Moving Platforms to Industry Cloud: Why?

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#4 Co-Selling and Improving Market Outreach to End Customers

The beauty of each industry cloud is that it provides the flexibility to scale depending on customers’ requirements with its composable capabilities. These solutions are fully customizable and configurable to each customer's environment and ensure that partners have a considerable role in customizing solutions to each customer's need. The dual advantages of partner-led customizability and depth are the biggest pluses for ISVs, which also position their partner network as a vital element of the Industry Cloud experience for customers.

As a software vendor, developing valuable partnerships is the right way to go as it helps establish credibility for the ISV's value proposition and can provide necessary improvements to solution features. As a marketing tool, partnerships enhance visibility for the ISVs since co-marketing or co-selling initiatives can be an integral part of such collaborations. This will aid the ISVs branch out into new markets and expand their customer base.

#5 Lean on Partners for Product Development

Product development and engineering have to be highly agile to evolve as ever-changing business and user requirements. ISVs, to stay competitive in the market and offer a unique proposition to the customers, should partner with experienced product development partners with relevant experience and expertise who are competent enough to provide insights on how to evolve product functionality, improve process flow, elevate the user experience and much more.

Besides, a product development partner also has an excellent analytical mindset to predict the shelf life of a technology application and how to map these applications to customer experience. Additionally, Product development partners can also double up for resource or skill gaps that ISVs must be facing and take the onus for high quality and consistent product release via agile software development.

Customization and purpose-built for the industry are the future of the cloud going forward, and the transition towards Industry Clouds provides an incredible opportunity for ISVs to assist customers in their digital transformation journey. 'Verticalization' is finding a greater prominence in the world of digital transformation, and that's where ISVs have an opportunity to create a differentiated positioning for themselves by partnering with the right players and offering an unbeatable proposition to their customers. Enterprises that are in need of customer-specific standards and processes for bespoke solutions are banking on ISVs to develop 'point applications' to fill specific white spaces in vertical markets.

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