London - Attenda Limited, the Always On Managed Services company has today announced that it has joined the Microsoft SaaS Incubation Center Program which is designed to bring Independent Software Vendors (ISVs) and hosters together as ISVs move towards a Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) delivery model. Attenda has been chosen by Microsoft because of its proven track record in Microsoft technologies and capabilities in managed service delivery of mission critical business applications.

The Microsoft SaaS Incubation Center Program is an initiative run by expert Microsoft partners, which guides ISVs through a structured series of business and architectural consulting sessions to ensure their business model and applications are ready for the challenges of service-based delivery. Attenda has been selected as one of the managed hosting companies in Europe to participate in the programme and will open an Incubation Center in the UK.

As an SaaS Incubation Center Program partner, Attenda will use the Microsoft Solution for Windows-based Hosting for Applications platform - a robust, scalable infrastructure that equips ISVs with the tools and guidance to design service-enabled software applications and facilitate user provisioning, performance monitoring, usage tracking and reporting. This enables ISVs to provide a strong service level agreement (SLA) to end users — a critical component of online service-based delivery.

“The SaaS Incubation Center Program is hugely important because it equips ISVs with the necessary tools and resources to deliver their own SaaS-based offerings,” said Martin Walker, UK Hosting Lead, Microsoft Communications Sector Microsoft. “Attenda is a trusted and long term Microsoft partner. Combining the capabilities of Microsoft’s Windows Based Hosting for Applications with Attenda’s proven experience will bring significant benefits to our ISV partners looking to employ SaaS delivery.”

“Attenda has a growing client base of ISVs who can leverage Attenda's accreditations, reputation and facilities to assist in reducing their time to market, shortening their sales cycle and ensuring that their applications are always on” says Simon Hansford, Attenda’s VP Products & Marketing. “The Microsoft SaaS Incubation Centre Program enables us to address the commercial, financial and technical challenges that ISVs face in developing their applications as a service, helping them to develop an end-to-end solution that is secure, reliable and scalable, with minimal upfront risk and investment.”

Attenda’s managed service is delivered using best practice accredited operations to an agreed industry leading SLA (Service Level Agreement) at a fixed cost, allowing ISVs to focus on their core business, differentiating, marketing, and developing their application.

Commenting on Attenda’s participation in Microsoft’s Incubation Center programme, Colin Smith, CEO BIW Technologies says, “Our Customers are running multi million pound construction projects, so performance and availability are key. The Attenda managed service is an essential part of our business and has supported our requirement for a rapid response to growth.”

Phil Hollingdale, CEO Staffcare, says, “We are a fast growing business and selected Attenda as our strategic partner for delivering our software as a service, and they have provided us with great business support enabling us to increase speed to market and adapt rapidly to the changing needs of our business as we continue to grow.”

Recent research suggests a growing trend for buying software as a service rather than as pre-paid, packaged applications, representing a significant business opportunity for the ISV community. This is expected to spur traditional ISVs to expand their existing business model to include SaaS.