Amazon has clearly been leading the way in API-fication by providing a broad range of fundamental software services packaged as APIs. From the basic EC2 compute and S3 storage capabilities, they have expanded to now offer more than 30 services across infrastructure categories of compute, storage, networking, database, deployment/management and messaging. All of these components are incredibly valuable and important, but an application developer still has to construct higher level business processes from these fundamental building blocks. In addition, they have launched the AWS Marketplace, which is a catalog of hundreds of software packages that cover everything from application development to traditional business software. However, this marketplace has only taken the first step in making it easy to install and deploy software applications or stacks as machine images. They haven’t yet enabled third-party companies to provide application components packaged purely as APIs.

We are still in a time of transition. More and more technical organizations are realizing they really don’t want to install and manage software — even if it is running in someone else’s data center. The preferred model is to rely on software service providers who can (and must!) deliver a high quality services. Amazon has proven that developers are quite happy to outsource the data center, and Salesforce.com has proven that end users and IT organizations are content to simply consume a Web-based application — but what about all the layers in between?

Enter business process APIs

Enter the providers of business process APIs.  These APIs have three characteristics that distinguish them from infrastructure-level APIs:

-       They are truly plug-and-go, requiring minimal programming, and thereby approaching the promise of *legofication* that I alluded to in my last post;

-       They are usable by a broader range of developers, beyond the most technical ones, including HTML designers and higher-level coders;

-       By targeting business processes such as payment processing or expense management, they are directly linked to revenue generation.

The following table lists some of the new API services providers (APIsps) who provide packaged business process services. (Note: my company is an investor in Alfresco, Gigya, SmartRecruiters, Rubicon and Viralheat.)

In analyzing some of the data from ProgrammableWeb, it appears the infrastructure services are those getting the most reuse. Not surprisingly, the basic capabilities of mapping, messaging and search are the top three. However, many of these basic services are free (or very cheap), so they might not drive significant revenue. Those involving search and transactions (Amazon eCommerce and eBay would definitely provide more lucrative revenue opportunities. There is a long tail of services, which I simply aggregated under “Other,” but within that group are undoubtedly some high value business processes.

Moving on from packaged software to SaaS

After years of packaged software use and the transition to open source, applications seem to be well down the path of SaaS-ification, with the next wave involving the decomposition of the various application services into APIs. One of the comments (thanks Darren) on the previous article reminded me about the long path we have been on to properly package these APIs. It all started with portable DLLs and shared libs, and then we went through a bad phase with DCOM and then moved onto to XML and SOAP which were unfortunately too prescriptive and constraining. Thankfully, http and RESTful services emerged to provide a Web-style stateless approach. Each of these iterations has made it much easier for developers, but I am sure there are amazing ways to further improve the packaging and consumption of APIs. The LEGO (Lightweight Enterprise Gadget Orchestration) concept was an attempt to push the community to think about what comes next. And the NextStep Interface Builder idea that I mentioned last time is another area that a bunch of young companies seem to be exploring.

We are still early in the APIsp adoption phase. Entrepreneurs and developers should identify the top business services and work to create elegant and simple ways to drive these processes through code and beautiful end-user experiences.

Robin Vasan, managing director at Mayfield, invests in cloud, SaaS and mobile technologies. Some of his current investments include Alfresco, Couchbase, Marketo, Centrify and Webroot. Past successes include Akimbi, Trigo and webMethods. Mayfield has also been involved in such other leading companies as 3Com, 3PAR, Citrix, Concur, Legato, Nuance, Tibco and Vantive.

Image courtesy of Flickr user kennymatic.

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SDKs and services

Audible Magic is showing its new TViD content recognition engine which can identify TV shows, including live events or first-time broadcasts. It creates a way for developers to build a second-screen experience tailored to what their users are watching.

Heatma.ps UI Testing SDK allows you to integrate touch tracking in your app to collect aggregate data from beta testers and/or real users of your app. Results are sent back heatma.ps’ server so you can view the data as a heat map of how users are interacting with your software, including where exactly their fingers are tapping.

MLState is demonstrating its Opa programming language targeted at web and social app development. Nuance is at the show talking about its consumer apps, but you could hit the company up for info on its mobile developer program if you’re looking to integrate voice in your iOS  software.

Payment solutions

For vendors that sell digital goods direct to consumers, eSellerate is at the show representing its e-commerce platform. You would use this instead of the Mac App Store, either to save money over the 30-percent fee Apple charges or because your app is prohibited from the App Store sandbox for whatever reason.

Fastspring is also present, talking about its all-in-one e-commerce, merchandising and fulfillment solution, which makes getting your sales tools in order an easy task, so you can focus on zapping bugs and getting a product shipped.

Prototyping and rapid development

TapDesigner is a new tool for prototyping mobile apps. It uses a drag-and-drop, WYSIWYG interface to allow you to rapidly build visual representations of what your app will look like, complete with custom navigation and menu bar elements.

WidgetPress FormEntry is in the Mac OS X Zone, talking about its tool for creating forms-based apps for Mac and iOS. This could have potential applications in any number of industries; for example, a realtor could quickly deploy surveys for customers to help them identify exactly what kind of property they’re looking for.

Consulting services

Carr/Ferrell Attorneys are there to guide you with IP, licensing, contracts, and other legal needs, which are still a big concern with ongoing problems like the Lodsys saga. This is one of the thorniest aspects of software development, and ongoing legal disputes between the biggest companies involved could always potentially result in fallout for smaller players, too.

That’s my bite-sized overview of what iOS and Mac developers might find most interest at this year’s Macworld | iWorld conference. Chime in down in the comments if you saw some other interesting displays or vendors aimed at developer’s at the show.

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If you wanted to play Minecraft and ran into this instead, you'd be very disappointed and out $1.

Browsing recent App Store releases, I came across “Minecraft – Pocket Edition,” with a version 1.0 update. Thinking it might be the update that finally brings combat and additional block types to Mojang’s free-form world creation game, I quickly clicked through — only to find a completely different app that’s obviously trying to lure customers who aren’t paying close attention.

The Minecraft – Pocket Edition released Jan. 26 is from developer Onliance, not Mojang, and despite having exactly the same name as the original, and using screenshots from the full release desktop version of the game, actually isn’t a game at all: it’s a guide or recipe list for use with the PC title (and doesn’t even really apply to the genuine Pocket Edition in its current form), but customers searching for the original would be hard-pressed to discover that at a glance.

Here’s the introductory paragraph for Onliance’s app description:

Minecraft is focused on creativity and building, allowing players to build constructions out of textured cubes in a 3D world. Gameplay in its commercial release has two principal modes: Survival, which requires players to acquire resources themselves and maintain their health and hunger; and Creative, where the player has an unlimited supply of resources, the ability to fly, and no concept of health or hunger. A third gameplay mode, named Hardcore, ratchets up the difficulty of surviving and forces the player to delete his or her world upon death. An outdated Classic version is also available for free, although it is no longer being developed. Creative Minecraft resembles Classic, but with many more features.

Before clicking through to “…More” in the iTunes page for the app, you actually see only about the first sentence of that, but the real purpose of the app is buried much deeper still. Much later on, the description does say the following, but it’s the kind of information that should be right up top, and it still doesn’t convey clearly that this title contains only supporting material, and not the game itself:

This app will help you get to know the basic building commands used within the game and help you fight off those nasty creepers!!

Not sure how this one snuck past Apple’s review process (we dropped them a line to let them know and will update with comments if we receive any), but this is a pretty bald attempt to mislead customers and profit from the success of Mojang’s innovative title. Here’s hoping the game quickly gets taken down, or at least changes its name, description and screenshots to something more representative of its actual function.

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SAP is the leader in enterprise resource planning (ERP): the software brains behind most companies’ inventory and accounting systems. But in the tough transition from client-server to cloud computing, SAP lost its way. It launched a subscription-based Business ByDesign ERP offering in 2007, boldly predicting it would attract 10,000 customers and contribute €1 billion in revenue by 2010. It came in just a little bit short — only 100 companies signed up.

Since then, SAP re-launched Business ByDesign and set a target of 1,000 customers for this year. Last fall, it said it was on its way to that goal.  Last month, it ponied up $3.4 billion to buy SuccessFactors, which offers SaaS-based human resources capabilities. That purchase came just weeks after SAP co-CEOs Jim Hagemann Snabe and Bill McDermott (pictured) pledged to push SAP into new markets – by acquisition if need be.

SAP’s preliminary numbers were pretty flashy, especially coming after Oracle announced disappointing earnings. For its fourth quarter ending Dec. 31, SAP software revenue rose 16 percent to €1.74 billion ($2.2 billion USD) compared to €1.51 billion for the year-ago period. Its full-year software revenue was up 22 percent to €3.97 billion from €3.27 billion for the 2010 fiscal year.

But, cloud-related revenue makes up a tiny portion of those earnings, by all accounts. Subscription revenue — one measure of cloudy SaaS implementations — accounts for about €120 million out of  the company’s overall revenue of €14.2 billion, according to Ray Wang, principal analyst of Constellation Research. But he and others expect that mix to change.

There were some positive signs outside of SAP’s legacy ERP business.  SAP’s HANA in-memory database and analytics appliance, available since July, outperformed expectations. The company expected €100 million from HANA this year, but the actual number will be about €160 million. The company also said the €100 million it reaped from mobile solutions came in over target. Those mobile solutions derive from SAP’s $5.8 billion buyout of Sybase two years ago.

In its cloud efforts, SAP is obviously focused on Oracle, its chief rival for enterprise software dollars, but Oracle is only one piece of the competitive puzzle. Perhaps a bigger issue are the new-age cloud companies that are also attacking enterprise applications, like NetSuite which offers cloud-based ERP applications. And Workday, the brainchild of PeopleSoft founder David Duffield, which offers a range of SaaS-based human resources capabilities. These companies, unlike SAP, don’t have to worry about cannibalizing an on-premises software business.

Workday, which is reportedly eyeing an IPO, isn’t some small-but-feisty startup. In October, it snagged $85 million in new VC funding, bringing total capital raised to an impressive $250 million, according to All Things D.

In other words, while the latest numbers look rosy for SAP, the company still has to navigate this tricky mix of on-premises and cloud-based services and outmaneuver both legacy and new-look competitors before it can put its cloud mis-steps behind it.

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The free version of Jaspersoft’s analytics will be offered as part of Red Hat’s evolving OpenShift Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS).

As Red Hat, Microsoft, Salesforce.com’s Heroku, and VMware’s Cloud Foundry PaaS products compete, they’ll add more services and capabilities to the mix just as they’ve raced to add support for all the major programming languages. Jaspersoft will bring an important piece of the puzzle — business intelligence — to OpenShift. Since the deal isn’t exclusive, look for Jaspersoft to add other PaaS products over time — and for OpenShift to shop around as well.

There’s a lot of potential upside here for these analytics vendors. New Gartner research  says by the end of 2013, just 3 percent of business intelligence (BI) revenue will come from cloud-based offerings, although nearly every analytics vendor has one.  Adoption just isn’t there yet, and deals like this could help in that regard.

Developers wanting to build BI into their applications can try out the free community edition of Jaspersoft on OpenShift and move up to the higher end professional or enterprise versions as their needs dictate, said Karl Van den Bergh, VP of product and alliances for Jaspersoft.

The endgame for Jaspersoft — and its rivals — is to get their services in front of as many developers as possible. OpenShift, which targets Java and PHP developers in particular but supports other languages as well, will help do that. “There is no barrier to entry. It’s free for developers that want to build BI into their applications to get started,” he said.

Jaspersoft does not offer a hosted BI PaaS on its own, although it does have JaspersoftLive, a hosted version of its software, on its web site for developers to try out, but not buy, Van den Bergh said.

It’s still early in the PaaS race — OpenShift and CloudFoundry for example, are still in beta — but as the companies that back these efforts seek credibility among developers watch for more services and applications to be added to their platforms in what looks to be the next arms race in cloud services.

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Happtique wants to change all that. The company spun out of the Greater New York Hospital Association Ventures to build an app store for hospitals and doctors. Its initial pilot involved 11 hospitals including Mount Sinai Hospital, the NYU School of Medicine, Beth Israel Medical Center — all in New York. But outside of creating app stores for individual hospitals to offer to patients, Happtique is now focusing on a bigger goal — creating a trusted standard for all medical apps.

Corey Ackerman,  president of Happtique, explained that the hope is Happtique’s team of four experts can create a set of criteria by which to judge health applications and build a standards program around those criteria in the next six months. That standard will in turn help consumers and doctors know what apps to trust and help them filter the myriad options out there. Once those standards are set, Ackerman envisions developers paying to get their apps certified from Happtique, but would welcome a different model, provided it helped compensate the many doctors he believes will have to spend the time to review apps.

“Patients can go and can see a value in a set of standards for apps judged by actual doctors who treat that issue,” Ackerman said. “For example, oncologists won’t review diabetes apps.”

Developers who submit their apps would get feedback on how to make their app pass muster if it didn’t in the first place. It’s a model that would be similar to how device makers pay the Wi-Fi Alliance to get their gadgets certified. Happtique has convinced the following people to join its panel of experts to create the standards criteria:

• Howard J. Luks, an associate professor of Orthopedic Surgery at New York Medical College and the Chief Of Sports Medicine And Arthroscopy at University Orthopedics, PC and Westchester Medical Center.
• Franklin A. Shaffer, the Chief Executive Officer of CGFNS International, the certification organization for graduates of foreign nursing schools and largest global credentialing organization for nursing and allied healthcare personnel authorized by the Federal government.
• Shuvo Roy, the director of the Biomedical Microdevices Laboratory and Associate Professor, Department of Bioengineering and Therapeutic Sciences, School of Pharmacy at the University of California, San Francisco.
• Dave deBronkart, a cancer patient and blogger who has become a noted activist for healthcare transformation through participatory medicine and personal health data rights.

But as necessary as some kind of standard for medical apps might be, it’s unclear if Happtique has the clout and knowledge to build one from scratch. While many of the hospitals it works with are “name brands” in the health space, it’s a big leap to get from a name brand for doctors to helping an app stand out in a crowded app store and a crowded field. Happtique has found that there are 23,000 medical apps for iOS and Android devices alone.

Happtique will have to attract consumers and doctors to the standard while also convincing developers to pay for that seal of approval. Presumably it will seed some apps to the app store to give consumers a taste of what the seal means and help them trust it. That consumer demand might convince developers the certification is worth paying for. While Happtique is trying to do a useful thing, marketing isn’t just about offering utility, a fact that has doomed equally noble efforts. But as a confused customer who would rather get a doctor’s recommendation than some random tech blogger’s when it comes to medical apps, I hope this, or a similar effort wins out.

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The value of companies in the HCM (aka human resources management) space is clearly on the rise. Two weeks ago, SAP bulked up its own HCM stable with the acquisition of SuccessFactors for a whopping $3.4 billion in cash.

John Wookey, a respected industry veteran, will lead the new Salesforce.com business unit. Wookey led Oracle’s tricky effort to stitch together its applications strategy after Oracle acquired PeopleSoft, Siebel Systems and other enterprise software companies. After Oracle, Wookey joined SAP where he directed the ERP giant’s SaaS push. Wookey joined Salesforce.com  in November, six months after leaving SAP.

Rypple’s Software-as-a-Service offering aims to help teams work better together and help management better recruit and train employees, help  them set goals and recognize their contributions.

Salesforce.com CEO Marc Benioff has not been coy about his desire to fill in any and all gaps in Salesforce.com’s business services offerings. The company, which started out offering CRM and sales force automation capabilities, has expanded into  a range of business applications — both  homegrown and acquired. It has also added a full-fledged platform as a service with its Heroku acquisition.

His goal is to be no less than the SaaS-based equivalent of Microsoft, which was the gold standard of office productivity applications and tools in the pre-cloud era.

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