Based on the company’s TeamTrack software configuration management tool but involving a considerable rewrite, Serena CEO Jeremy Burton told Computer Business Review the toolset is: Aimed more squarely at the people who are thinking about business processes, not developing Java code.
The product is expected to be launched towards the end of the year. Veil will enable business users to build applications using a set of forms, but also to have the ability to ‘mash that up’ with SAP, or salesforce.com AppExchange, or something else, he said.
Burton said the toolset would be scripting-based rather than programming-based, be business-process-centric, offer full support for services oriented architecture, and offer the ability to deploy the finished application in a hosted fashion.
The toolset will be offered free, but users will have to pay if and when they opt to deploy the application into production. We don’t think the tool is the business, said Burton. We will carpet-bomb the world with the tool [free] but what we think people will be prepared to pay for is the run-time environment and management tools.
I don’t think business users want a different tool for version control, requirements management and so on and so on, he said. I think it needs to be one thing, easy enough for business people to use and understand, like a big application server in the sky.
Burton said another key feature of Veil is that it will be fully compliant with the open source Application Lifecycle Framework project that Serena started, that promises interoperability between around 16 different vendors’ ALM tools.
Veil will enable you to mash up ALF processes, supporting any other ALF-compliant toolset, Burton said. We want it to be able to play in whatever environment customers already have. We think Veil will be one of the first ALF consumers, if not the first.
Burton anticipates that business users will opt to pay for the deployment and management of the applications built using Veil on a subscription basis. Applications built using Veil could be deployed locally or as software-as-a-service applications. Serena will also offer various hosting and management options and partner with third-party hosting providers.
Burton said examples of the kind of composite application that Veil will enable business users to assemble include the human handling of errors or exceptions thrown up by an SAP deployment, or the ability to handle discount approval when business users want to have the ability to adjust prices typically hard-coded into ERP systems.
Our View
Composite application development tools aimed more at business users than IT programmers have in the past been a tough sell because getting the balance between ease of use and the ability for users to actually build something that can be deployed is always tricky.
In this case, the term mash-up is key because from what we know so far about Veil, a key element will be the ability to bring together – using scripting and forms rather than coding – different elements from other tools that companies are already using (if they are ALF compliant).
Besides, since the toolset is free and it is only at time of deployment that business users must actually start paying for their use of Veil, the risk of trying it out is low. Business users will be able to see for themselves whether Serena has got the balance between ease of use and power right before they part with any cash.
As for the SaaS angle, we note that Serena’s recent hiring of Rene Bonvanie, the former head of salesforce.com’s AppExhange division, as SVP worldwide marketing, partner programs, and online services, will give Serena some much-needed business model know-how in this area.
As for the riskier aspects of the strategy, we would argue that it may not be so easy to carpet-bomb business users with the free tool, when the privately held Serena is not incredibly well-known in IT circles, let alone on the business side.
Equally, even mashed-up composite applications should have questions asked of them over scalability, security, usage policy, and compliance with corporate and regulatory standards. These are areas with which business users have often been less au fait than the IT department, at least when it comes to the deployment of applications. So it’s quite possible that IT will want or even need to give its blessing to applications developed by business users prior their deployment, which could lead to unease between the two camps, or even the occasional impasse.
