Does Cloud Computing Matter? An Analysis of the Cloud Model Software-as-a-Service and Its Impact on Operational Agility

With the rise of Cloud Computing, many predicted a paradigmatic change of IT-based business processes. However, extant research is primarily focusing on technical aspects, such as security and scalability, hence the assumed paradigm shift has not been explored in more detail yet. Focusing on Software as a Service (SaaS) as underlying Cloud model, we conducted an extensive literature review to derive a conceptual model presenting the influence of flexible, SaaS-based business processes on operational agility. Moreover, these processes were classified into three categories, Enterprise Resource Planning Services, Work Support Services, and Decision Support Services. In addition, we conducted ten in-depth interviews with Cloud experts to reflect on potentially missing categories and to substantiate the categories derived from extant literature. The theoretical and empirical parts of our paper reveal that SaaS-enabled processes have a positive influence on operational agility of enterprises which provides first preliminary evidence for the predicted paradigm shift.