Pricing SAAS models: perceptions of business Service providers and clients......

The paradigm shift in delivery of software applications from a shrink wrapped / licensed form to a more end- user friendly 'service' was fuelled by the opportunity that the Small and Medium size Businesses (SMBs) created. It created a way to deliver the existing software applications to new markets or serve existing markets in a new cost effective way. The bottom line being, customers who do not have the expertise or capital budget to purchase, install, and manage applications, can subscribe to hosted services for a recurring fee. This model came as a fresh dose of energy to an otherwise matured model, but brought with it a lot of complexities which a service provider will have to address. Key concerns include pricing of such pay-per-use models. The paper has attempted to address the concerns of the service provider, while pricing such services, by delving deep into their internal perceptions as well as extraneous intended end -user perceptions.

Increased interest expense and management's Expense preference behaviour........

The purpose of this research was to examine whether or not firms in a lessregulated industry with high competition exhibit expense preference behaviour, originally posited by Williamson (1963) with regards to interest expense. We used the restaurant industry to examine this issue because the restaurant industry is very sensitive to changes in market conditions due to its low profit margin. Interest expenses are exogenously determined and can have a serious impact on the profitability of the restaurant firms. The major finding of this paper shows that 'other expenses' increase along with interest expense. Managers do exhibit expense preference behaviour.