Software Hairballs – Edgy but Illustrative
October 12, 2010 1 Comment
“What the F***, another software hairball?!”
Netsuite’s new campaign builds on their theme of integrated suites winning the day. It is a little edgy, but a lot of fun. The gist is that “best of breed” software that all needs to be integrated and maintained resembles a hairball, making companies “cough up profits”. 
Point Solutions Becoming Pointless
I wholly agree with the premise that suites will prevail over best of breed point solutions. Most point solutions – and generic suites – have tons of features. They have way more features than most anyone can make use of. They end up being cluttered with features for a wide variety of industries but do not fully serve the needs of any one industry.
Over-developed software that tries to be all things to all people tends to be clunky and hard to use. As users move from one software package to another the user interface is often different, leading to inefficiency and confusion. Maintaining multiple interfaces between packages, even with SOA, is time-consuming, disruptive and expensive – hence the hairball analogy.
Vertical (not generic) Suites will Win the Day
Users want software that works for them. A user in a manufacturing company does not want to wade through jargon and transactions associated with the insurance industry and vice versa. The most useful tools are those built for a particular purpose, just as multi-use stadiums gave way to those made specifically for football or baseball.
It just makes sense.
I am very pleased to be CEO of Plex Systems. I have always been focused on how technology can add value to businesses. At Plex we live that mantra every day. We never develop software for technology's sake. I started my career with Arthur Andersen (the part that is now Accenture) in Boston. I have led and been part of business technology companies my entire career with a focus on manufacturers and distributors in various vertical industries. I've always loved the fast pace of innovation in the technology business and I am thrilled to be part of a discontinuous disruption.
Mark,
I could not agree more that the most useful tools are those built for a purpose. Clearly a rock can be a poor hammer as well as a paper weight. However I believe that being able to configure the solution to be customized to the unique customers requirements outweighs the generic vertical requirements. Shouldn’t the ability for mold an iron rock into a hammer be more important than having every type of hammer available? At some point there are enough unique businesses that enabling configuration has to eclipse building vertical solutions.
Pat