6 Hot SaaS, Cloud Computing Startups You Need To Meet

Hot, Fresh, Now

At the All About The Cloud conference in San Francisco, a handful of new cloud computing and software-as-a-service (SaaS) companies emerged from hiding to officially launch. The Software and Information Industry Association (SIIA), the conference host, has identified these newly launched companies as the next generation in the cloud and SaaS space. Here, CRN takes a look at the six newest cloud computing and SaaS companies you need to get familiar with now to get in on the ground floor.

AppFirst

New York-based AppFirst offers SaaS-based real-time application monitoring. The software offering lets users see into the ’black box’ that is their applications, regardless of application language, components, server type (physical or virtual) and whether on premise or in the cloud. The SaaS offering from AppFirst digs into applications to give IT a view into how the apps work and to address issues before they become a problem.

Cloudkick

Cloudkick takes management and portability to the next level. Cloudkick is a management tool and portability layer for cloud infrastructure, offering a common set of tools like performance trending and fault-detection that works across various cloud providers, including Amazon.com and Racksapce. San Francisco-based Cloudkick also launched a hybrid offering, aptly named Hybrid Cloudkick, that lets companies manage their existing non-cloud infrastructure as if it were in the cloud.

Emillion

Identity and access management in the cloud has been tricky, and Emillion hopes to demystify it. With its official launch at All About The Cloud, Finland-based Emillion showcased Distal, its identity and access management offerings for SaaS and cloud applications. Distal lets cloud and SaaS providers offer customers single sign-on capabilities and automated user management based on their existing directories. Distal requires no installation, programming or new training: The company said users just place a text file on an existing intranet server and set a couple of parameters.

Everyone Counts

San Diego-based Everyone Counts drew its inspiration from the 2000 presidential election, searching to find a way to deliver state-of-the-art technology to the election process to reduce the limitations and potential errors of the paper-based standard. Comprised of a team of information security and elections experts, Everyone Counts developed a SaaS platform for secure elections.

Govascend

Govascend has built a platform that lets state and local governments build and deploy custom mobile applications. The Broomfield, Colo.-based company offers a development platform that enables mobile cloud applications to be developed and modified in-house; lets applications be shared between agencies in a Web-based library and enables one-click application deployment. Govascend’s offering requires no infrastructure and is based on the Microsoft Windows Azure cloud platform.

Less Software

Less Software's supply chain management application can boost efficiency in acquiring, managing and selling inventory by enabling better management of logistics and order fulfillment processes, the company said. Based in Thousand Oaks, Calif., Less Software is available in an on-demand, pure SaaS model, meaning less software is required on premise.