The Case For Supporting Always Up-To-Date Operating Systems

Transcription

1 A Forrester Consulting Thought Leadership Paper Commissioned By Microsoft August 2017 The Case For Supporting Always Up-To-Date Operating Systems Reduce Complexity And Accelerate Your Application Release Cycle

2 Table Of Contents Executive Summary Software Vendors Are Shifting From Major Releases To Frequent Updates Historical Enterprise Upgrade Cycles Add To Support Costs And Complexity Cloud-Serviced Client OSes Drive Business And Technical Benefits For Software Vendors Key Recommendations Appendix ABOUT FORRESTER CONSULTING Project Director: Mark Brozek, Senior Market Impact Consultant Contributing Research: Forrester s Infrastructure & Operations research group Forrester Consulting provides independent and objective research-based consulting to help leaders succeed in their organizations. Ranging in scope from a short strategy session to custom projects, Forrester s Consulting services connect you directly with research analysts who apply expert insight to your specific business challenges. For more information, visit forrester.com/consulting. 2017, Forrester Research, Inc. All rights reserved. Unauthorized reproduction is strictly prohibited. Information is based on best available resources. Opinions reflect judgment at the time and are subject to change. Forrester, Technographics, Forrester Wave, RoleView, TechRadar, and Total Economic Impact are trademarks of Forrester Research, Inc. All other trademarks are the property of their respective companies. For additional information, go to forrester.com. [1-13VDEYU]

3 Executive Summary Delivering applications to enterprise customers is a perennial challenge, but software vendors face greater demands than ever as customers expect new capabilities to be delivered on a regular basis. As enterprise customers embrace the mobile channel and migrate to public cloud platforms, they still expect up-to-date support for existing applications. Rapid updates of cloudbased software services and mobile apps are leading enterprise decision makers to expect more frequent security updates, seamless integration with an expanding technology stack, and consistent, fast application support for operating systems (OS) updates across devices. In response, we see software vendors working to accelerate their release cadence while overcoming previous challenges with compatibility and testing, which slow the application update process. One emerging approach to speed up and simplify the delivery of application updates borrows from software-as-a-service (SaaS) design principles. Software vendors and enterprise IT professionals alike are moving increasingly to SaaS delivery, first with web-based tools and, more recently, with operating systems. These cloud-connected operating systems deliver benefits such as a reduced training and deployment burden when delivering incremental changes, fewer breaking changes, lower dependencies, upto-date security capabilities, and new subscription-based billing models. Cloud-enabled client operating systems which receive a regular cadence of security and feature updates keep systems current and reduce the support window for older versions of operating systems. In May 2017, Microsoft commissioned Forrester Consulting to evaluate adoption and usage trends of cloud-enabled operating systems among software vendors. Forrester conducted an online survey of 308 IT decision makers at medium to large software vendors in North America and EMEA to explore this topic. KEY FINDINGS Software vendors now favor frequent updates over periodic overhauls. In order to keep up with their competitors and provide regular value to customers, a majority of software vendors are moving from major releases toward smaller and less disruptive updates delivered using accelerated release cycles. Providing support for legacy operating systems is a significant challenge. The biggest barrier software vendors face to faster releases is the amount of testing and support required for many versions of supported operating systems. When only half of enterprise customers are on the latest operating systems, software vendors find it difficult to reduce the matrix of operating systems and devices that they test against. Always up-to-date client operating systems reduce support complexity and provide measurable business benefits. Software vendors see how operating systems-as-a-service offerings produce value by reducing application upgrade complexity and improving quality through frequent service updates, reduced dependencies, and streamlined testing processes, among other benefits. 1 The Case For Supporting Always Up-To-Date Operating Systems

4 Software Vendors Are Shifting From Major Releases To Frequent Updates Software vendors feel perennial pressure to innovate to keep pace with their customers and competitors as each adopts new technologies 62% rank increasing innovation and 61% rank adopting new technologies as fast as our customers among their top five company initiatives for the next year. If customers accelerate adoption of new software and operating systems, software vendors must respond. Our study found that: Software vendors are accelerating their release cycles. The modern release cycle for the typical independent software vendor (ISV) includes annual major version releases, minor update releases every two to three months, and quality fixes/patches even more frequently, as needed. These smaller, frequent updates are not only necessary to keep up with advancements in technology but are also critical for customers to perceive value from their annual support contracts, which represent a significant portion of revenue for many software vendors. Almost half of our respondents (47%) indicated that accelerating release cycles is one of their top five priorities in the next year (see Figure 1). Figure 1 To what extent will your company prioritize the following initiatives in the next year? (Percentages represent respondents who ranked each initiative in their top five.) 62% Increasing innovation 61% Adopting new technologies as fast as our customers 57% Improving our technical competencies 54% Growing our customer base Increasing innovation and keeping up with customers are top priorities for the next year. 50% Staying compatible with the latest builds 47% Accelerating our release cycles 47% Staying in compliance with security requirements 45% Growing our channel partner network 44% Building an open dialogue with our channel Source: A commissioned study conducted by Forrester Consulting on behalf of Microsoft, May The Case For Supporting Always Up-To-Date Operating Systems

5 Faster release cycles provide strategic advantage. Software vendors realize a number of business benefits from accelerated release cycles. Top benefits include higher quality releases with less code churn or regressions (62%), the ability to stay ahead of competition (56%), better predictability on release dates (49%), and more stable revenue streams (46%) (see Figure 2). Figure 2 What do you consider to be the benefits of adopting an accelerated release cycle for your software products? (Select all that apply.) 62% Higher quality releases with less code churn or regressions 56% Ability to stay ahead of competition 49% Better predictability on release dates 46% More stable revenue streams 41% Fewer customer defections due to a lingering 'bad' release 35% Lower costs Source: A commissioned study conducted by Forrester Consulting on behalf of Microsoft, May

6 Historical Enterprise Upgrade Cycles Add To Support Costs And Complexity As software vendors work to accelerate application release cycles, they must first develop strategies to deal with enterprise upgrade cycles. Releasing new application updates requires compatibility testing, configuration, and certification across a range of devices and operating systems. The matrix of operating systems, devices, and browsers that software vendors support is generally dictated by what their customers use. Usually, the slower that enterprises are to upgrade, the more timeconsuming and labor-intensive the application support matrix becomes for commercial developers. Our research found that: Nine in 10 software vendors support older OS versions in some capacity. Organizations vary widely in their support policies, but only 12% of software vendors surveyed limit their applications support solely to the most current OS. The remaining 88% support the immediately preceding OS or offer paid, time-defined, or best efforts support for even older versions (see Figure 3). On average, roughly half of customers are using the most current OS version. Software vendors decisions to support older operating systems are indeed driven by the customer; top cited factors include support for common browsers used by their products (51%), install base at large business organizations (42%), and explicit demand for support (33%). Certifying products on old operating systems leads to complex and time-consuming testing processes and continuity issues. There are a number of challenges with supporting old operating system versions. Testing is particularly cumbersome, especially for applications that run across multiple mobile devices, browsers, and desktop operating systems. Our study found that the top challenges when certifying a product on one or more operating system are support for very old versions, setup and configuration processes, extensive testing across many operating system versions, and customer-reported defects that are hard to reproduce (see Figure 4). 4

7 Figure 3 What is your support policy with respect to the operating systems your software products run on? (Select one.) 12% Support for the current version of the OS only 32% Support for current and directly previous OS version 24% Long-term support for older operating systems offered on a custom paid basis 17% Time-defined (i.e., support a release on an OS for X number of years) Nearly nine in 10 software vendors provide support for older versions of operating systems. 16% Best effort Source: A commissioned study conducted by Forrester Consulting on behalf of Microsoft, May 2017 Figure 4 What are your biggest challenges when certifying your product on one or more operating systems? (Rank up to your top three with 1 being the most challenging.) Support for very old OS versions 22% 14% 13% Setup and configuration process to certify support for an operating system Number of operating system versions or configurations requires extensive testing Customer-reported defects that are hard to reproduce Lack of advance access to OS builds before they are released to general availability Defects related to service releases or frequent updates/patches 18% 16% 19% 18% 17% 17% 17% 18% 17% 15% 15% 15% 10% 19% 15% Source: A commissioned study conducted by Forrester Consulting on behalf of Microsoft, May The Case For Supporting Always Up-To-Date Operating Systems

8 Cloud-Serviced Client OSes Drive Business And Technical Benefits For Software Vendors Delivering rapid application updates across a large support matrix is an increasingly unsustainable situation for software vendors, but operating systems-as-a-service represent an escape from the trap of increasing complexity and expense. Modern software development, distribution, and servicing are currently and will increasingly be cloudserviced, as evidenced by the growing popularity of app stores. Cloudserviced OSes are able to facilitate quick, always up-to-date quality and security patches. Configuration and deployment are easier in this model as profiles, policies, and data are stored in the cloud and therefore simple to push out. And perhaps most importantly, cloud-enabled OS defragmentation reduces the complexity and cost of application development and support and creates new methods for validation that are more effective and less costly than traditional testing approaches. Our research provides evidence that software vendors are moving in this direction: Software vendors are actively moving to cloud-serviced infrastructures. Sixty-two percent of software vendors currently support a cloud-serviced, always up-to-date client operating system, and another 19% have plans to support these OSes in the future (see Figure 5). Broader SaaS adoption rates are even higher as 74% of software vendors plan to offer some kind of SaaS solution within the next 12 months. Figure 5 What level of experience do you have working with operating systems that use a cloud service and management approach? 15% Our software is not compatible with this type of operating system, and we have no plans to move in this direction in the future 62% We currently support a cloud-enabled operating system 19% Our software is not currently compatible with this type of operating system but will be in the future Source: A commissioned study conducted by Forrester Consulting on behalf of Microsoft, May The Case For Supporting Always Up-To-Date Operating Systems

9 Customers increasingly demand cloud-enabled OS support. Customers not only want the attributes of a cloud-enabled OS, but our survey found that they value cloud integration specifically above other capabilities. Other common requests and expectations from customers including frequent software updates, up-to-date security features, and compatibility with existing apps and infrastructure indicate that customers want easy mechanisms for keeping their apps up-to-date (see Figure 6). As-a-service OS models are perceived as offering better features that provide measurable benefits. Compared to the slower deployment and update cycles of past operating systems, software vendors feel operating systems-as-a-service reduce complexity through frequent service updates, reduced dependencies, and streamlined testing processes, among other benefits (see Figure 7). Software vendors even those that are not creating SaaS solutions themselves currently also expect to benefit from a desktop software solution combined with a cloud-enabled OS. From this type of solution, software vendors anticipate better data around which OS versions customers use, faster adoption of newer OS versions, and greater predictability around support releases (see Figure 8). Figure 6 What are the most frequent requests/expectations from your customers? (Please rank up to your top three with 1 being the highest.) Cloud integration 19% 16% 15% Frequent software updates 18% 15% 12% Up-to-date security features Compatibility with current versions of other software and/or operating systems Support across different types of devices 14% 15% 14% 15% 11% 17% 11% 14% 14% The ability to test or demo apps before purchasing Ability to control/define maintenance schedules for different devices or user groups 12% 12% 14% 11% 15% 10% Source: A commissioned study conducted by Forrester Consulting on behalf of Microsoft, May The Case For Supporting Always Up-To-Date Operating Systems

10 Figure 7 How valuable to you are the following features of operating systems-as-a-service?. Extremely valuable More frequent service updates No more dependency between app version and OS build Supports streamlined compatibility testing process Valuable 48% 40% 35% 40% 42% 36% Advance access to releases Knowledge repositories to help us support the OS and help our customers discover compatible and supported apps 35% 29% 39% 44% Cumulative updates that defragment OS 27% 42% Tools, guidance, and access to engineering help 26% 41% Control and flexibility over deployment 33% 31% Helps us offer application support without any cutoffs 24% 34% Source: A commissioned study conducted by Forrester Consulting on behalf of Microsoft, May

11 Figure 8 What do you feel are the advantages of a desktop software solution combined with a cloud-based operating system-as-a-service strategy? (Select all that apply.) 40% Better data/analytics on operating system version adoption at customers 40% Faster adoption of the latest version of an operating system by consumers and businesses 34% Faster adoption of the latest version of an operation system by large businesses 34% Greater predictability around when to support new releases/updates of operating systems 34% Faster retirement of older versions of operating systems in use by customers 31% Ability to tie an on-premises application with a cloud application 27% A regular cadence of smaller updates that makes each release less risky to support 26% Fewer variants of operating system versions to support deployed across customer base 24% Less time spent tracing unique combinations of operating system patches and updates during customer support issues 2% Don t know Source: A commissioned study conducted by Forrester Consulting on behalf of Microsoft, May

12 Key Recommendations Forrester s in-depth survey of application support and update strategies and the impact of cloud-enabled operating systems yielded several important recommendations for software vendors. As you evolve your support and release strategy: Increase release velocities to match customer expectations. Information workers are now conditioned to expect immediate application updates like they get from their smartphone or the SaaS software they use at work. Meanwhile, purchasing managers need to ensure they get enough return on their support dollars. To satisfy both sets of needs, the directive is clear: Make plans to increase your release velocity, and expect to execute a sustained campaign to do so. Get behind operating systems-as-a-service. Embracing cloudconnected operating systems that are always up-to-date is a win-win. Customers seek consistency across systems to increase reliability and reduce maintenance costs, management tools that provide flexibility over the pace of upgrade deployment across targeted devices to ensure continuity of critical line of business apps, and a path to modernize and/or virtualize legacy apps. With operating systems-as-a-service, customers get these new features, while software vendors are able to reduce the complexity of their test matrices and deliver their innovations to market at a pace that s best for them rather than being constrained by the dependency on an OS release. Take advantage of app store distribution models. As consumers, employees are increasingly used to getting apps and updates from app stores. This update mechanism extends to private enterprise app stores as well when applications support them. Consider support for curated stores as a table stakes feature for new apps and a good way to make sure that updates propagate rapidly across a user base. Smooth out revenue streams with new business models. Perpetual license- and upgrade-driven licensing models create uneven revenue streams that complicate budgeting cycles. A delayed release or slow customer adoption can further impact revenues. Regular, automatic updates coupled with subscription-based billing turn peaks and valleys into regular revenue streams, which help improve planning, R&D investment, and visibility into a product s health while lowering initial buy-in costs for customers. Prepare for new business model opportunities. As OS-as-a-service adoption grows, expect enterprises to demand similar pay-as-you-go and subscription streams to replace perpetual license and support or upgrade cycles. The good news is this means a more regular revenue stream that makes budgeting and R&D more predictable. 10 The Case For Supporting Always Up-To-Date Operating Systems

13 Appendix A: Methodology In this study, Forrester conducted an online survey of 308 IT decision makers at medium to large software vendors from the US, Canada, UK, Germany, and France to evaluate their adoption, investment plans, and perceptions of cloud-enabled operating systems. Survey participants included manager-level and above with direct responsibility or influence for product decisions. Respondents were offered a small incentive as a thank you for time spent on the survey. The study was conducted in May Appendix B: Demographics/Data CA, N = 51 UK, N = 53 DE, N = 50 Which of the following vendor labels best describes your organization? (Select one.) US, N = 102 FR, N = % within IT, 100% ISVs Company size Developers by company size Mean 20,000 or more employees 5,000 to 19,999 employees 1,000 to 4,999 employees 500 to 999 employees 100 to 499 employees 51 to 99 employees 21 to 50 employees 2 to 20 employees 5% 12% 29% 22% 18% 8% 4% 3% 20,000 or more employees 5,000 to 19,999 employees 1,000 to 4,999 employees 500 to 999 employees 100 to 499 employees 51 to 99 employees 21 to 50 employees 2 to 20 employees 6, , , The Case For Supporting Always Up-To-Date Operating Systems