‘SaaS dependency’ is becoming a major issue for tech leaders

Tech leaders have voiced serious concerns about the rising trend of ‘SaaS dependency’, warning that developers are being hindered by a growing array of tools.

In its SaaS Disruption Report, Onymos found that 84% of technology leaders rely on SaaS tools with low-code or no-code capabilities for software development.

However, there are big challenges across the software development lifecycle (SDLC), with almost a quarter of technology leaders indicating that application performance is a major business impediment.

Technology leaders singled out development (22%), quality assurance (20%), and maintenance (20%) as the three most arduous phases of the SDLC, with more than three-quarters saying that workloads for updating applications have risen in the last year.

Over half identified daily maintenance and application operations tasks as taking the most time. But while 84% of technology leaders reckoned that optimizing application development capabilities was of primary importance, fewer than half said they spend time on application innovation.

"While SaaS tools have seemingly become indispensable for enterprises as they focus on software development to drive business value, our findings reveal critical gaps in the current model – particularly around maintenance, innovation, and data," said Shiva Nathan, founder and CEO of Onymos.

Technology leaders said there are significant business risks tied to unaddressed challenges in software development. More than half highlighted higher operational costs, while 45% cited increased security risks, and 38% compliance and regulatory concerns.

Around one-third mentioned reduced profitability, with 28% citing missed revenue opportunities.

"To truly enable enterprises to maximize their software development efforts and create innovative and differentiated applications and secure their data, we must transform the current SaaS model to offer greater flexibility, empower development teams with more control, reduce the burdens of maintenance and updates, and give data ownership back," said Nathan.

"By reimagining SaaS to address the challenges enterprises face, we can realize new opportunities for enterprises to innovate faster, deliver greater value to their customers, and secure their data and reputations."

Earlier this year, a report from Red Canary found that software ecosystems are riddled with underutilized or inefficient SaaS tools, which is bogging down practitioners operating across a range of different industries.

Three-quarters of security teams said their attack surface had widened by 77% in the past two years.

In a previous study released this summer, Onymos found that more than three-quarters of technology leaders were concerned about SaaS security threats, with 45% saying they'd experienced a cybersecurity incident through a third party SaaS solution in the past year.

The average enterprise uses 130 different SaaS applications, the survey found, with around 85% of IT leaders saying they rely on low-code or no-code SaaS solutions for their application and software projects.