Before the noise of Hybrid Cloud, multi-Cloud and various 'As-a-Service' offerings took over our minds, it was Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) Cloud model that ruled the industry as an 'on-demand software', which is only gaining momentum with the Industry 4.0 era.

California-based Oracle, which has been a pioneer in helping enterprises run their daily affairs across sales, marketing, HR and finance verticals with its Cloud applications, is now set to empower both large enterprises and small and medium businesses (SMBs) in India with the next-gen SaaS solutions.

According to Prasad Rai, Vice President, Applications, Oracle India, in India and globally, the number of companies choosing Oracle SaaS solutions over the competition is increasing.

"These customers are a mix of large firms, mid-size SMBs and Cloud natives. We have helped large and older firms like Indian Oil, Hindalco, Indian Hotels, SBI Card, Genpact and Sandhar Automotive in their digital transformation.

"At the same time, we have Cloud-native disruptors like Oyo Rooms, Rivigo Systems and KLAY Prep Schools in our customers' list," Rai told IANS.

The requirements for both the set of organisations is very unique.

"Oracle has understanding and dexterity to support customers of any size, with every thinkable requirement from any sector. We have customers from sectors like manufacturing, retail, hospitality, social welfare, engineering and construction, logistics, oil and gas, among others," Rai elaborated.

According to Gartner, the SaaS market will grow up to $110.5 billion by 2020, from the current $94.8 billion.

SaaS has become a common delivery model for many business applications, including customer relationship management (CRM), management information systems (MIS), enterprise resource planning (ERP), invoicing, human resource management (HRM), talent acquisition, learning management systems, content management (CM), office software, payroll processing software, management software and so on.

According to Rai, Oracle Cloud applications, built on Machine Learning, offer the most complete application suite with the best technology, enabling fast innovation with a modern user experience and customer-first approach.

"In 2020, emerging technologies like artificial intelligence (AI), automation and Blockchain will cease to be emerging and will become the mainstay of Cloud computing in general and of the SaaS, in particular," said Rai.

Businesses will invest in SaaS applications for churning out business intelligence.

"The organisations will incorporate analytics-based AI and ML to monitor and improve their core as well as secondary functions. In 2020, marketing and automation are likely to become more synonymous as marketers will use automation across their tech stacks, from their email marketing tool to their accounting system and CRM," he explained.

Till now, businesses are using SaaS on providing core functions like HR, finance, operations, etc.

In the coming times, according to the Oracle executive, businesses will seek vertical-specific SaaS solutions.

"Though Blockchain has not gained much steam in SaaS, in the coming year, however, it could pick up a significant amount of speed," he added.

The SaaS market has been growing over the past few years and with the advent of the industry 4.0 era, the scope of the growth of the SaaS market is not going to diminish soon.

According to Rai, the real opportunity for technologies like AI and ML, IoT, Blockchain, containers and serverless and human interfaces is to enable companies to embrace innovation on a scale as we've never seen before.

"Enterprises have gone from experimenting with these technologies in a sandbox to implementing them for mission-critical applications, to building new business models and creating business value," he said.

Oracle, which is set to organise 'Modern Business Forum' in Mumbai on December 17 to tell a story about how it is accelerating customers' digital transformation in India, embeds AI and ML into SaaS applications.

"For example, built-in AI tools are integrated into Oracle CX applications that better predict account health, deliver next-best-service actions, automate answers, and provide a more personalised service," Rai informed.

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