A recent study by IDC of Microsoft’s ISV channel partners, the company’s go-to-market strategy, notes that those partners believe that software-as-a-service (SaaS) is a big opportunity. Seventy-six percent responded that SaaS will “dramatically impact the partner landscape and 70 percent of solution providers view it as an opportunity.

IDC also said that it expects more companies next year to promote SaaS next year, including SAP, Microsoft, Cisco, and IBM. While SaaS is still relatively small today (representing less than 5 percent of all software), it is expected to grow 25 percent annually and become a $14.5 billion industry by 2011, according to IDC.

While none of this is earth-shattering news, I took note that one of the underlining themes of this study was the fact that more and more customers are evolving their businesses towards a model that combines on-premise software as well as on-demand deployments. In short, businesses are looking for the best of both worlds. It’s certainly a trend we’re seeing here at SugarCRM, and one that will benefit those vendors willing to offer their customers shear flexibility.