Defining a theoretical model to assess transition from on-premises to Software-as-a-Service

Transitioning enterprise applications (EA) software from on-premises to Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) is a crucial question for IT adoption decisions. Grounded in the literature, this article suggests a research model to support enterprises assessing a transition strategy from on-premises to a SaaS model. The research model proposes eight hypotheses to be tested and analysed with data collected from a questionnaire among firms that have EA software. This paper goes beyond the software functionality and usage to address the strategic challenges of selection in a new landscape of the enterprise software industry, also considering the industry’s software deployment chain, business model, and the moderating factor of firm’s business process sophistication. We aim to provide new and significant guidelines for enterprise’s and software vendor´s decision-making.