Watch out for more cloud, SaaS and mobility applications, says GXS

The company's Steve Keifer explains in his blog that over the past few years, GXS has published a list of predictions but this year challenged eight of its subject matter experts to offer their opinions about "how changing market conditions and new technologies will impact B2B e-commerce over the next 10 years". Cloud computing is GXS CTO Rowland Archer's choice. He explains that there are three different cloud computing layers – infrastructure, platform and application – and suggests that cloud will "introduce new levels of operational efficiency in the supply chain and B2B integration". Next is SaaS, which Andrea Brody, GXS vice president of product management, explains "will create exponential improvements in supply chain visibility through a new predictive insights capability". By analysing the demand and supply signals exchanged between companies, SaaS applications will offer unparalleled insights into value chain activities, she predicts. As for mobility, Mark Morley, director of industry marketing at GXS, envisions the creation of a "corporate app store" for users of mobile devices such as iPhones and Blackberries. Morley anticipates that the introduction of new, high-speed 4G mobile networks will combine with widespread adoption of smart phones to create this new category of mobile applications. The remaining top 10 include SOA, agile development, open source, social media and demand-driven supply chains.