What is a SaaS Escrow Agreement? Everything you need to know

 

SaaS applications provide companies with increased efficiency and flexibility often at reduced costs. However, along with the benefits of SaaS applications come increased risks. In most situations, the SaaS vendor maintains control and storage of your data.

As an increasing number of companies are shifting to SaaS hosted applications, the demand for SaaS escrow solutions hosted within AWS, Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud with the ability to provide robust continuity is rapidly growing. If you are an SMB or enterprise company and want to mitigate the risks of using SaaS applications and ensure business continuity for your organisation, then this article is for you. Find out what SaaS Escrow is, the different SaaS Escrow solutions available to you and the benefits it provides.

What is a SaaS Escrow Agreement?

A SaaS Escrow Agreement is a mutually agreed third-party arrangement between the SaaS vendor, the customer and the . It is the process of maintaining a copy of critical software-as-a-service (SaaS) application data with an independent third party. Similar to source code escrow, where critical software source code is stored with an independent third party, SaaS escrow applies the same logic to the entire cloud environment including the data hosted within a SaaS application. It allows companies to protect their data that resides within SaaS applications hosted by a third party, protecting them against data loss.

There are many and varied reasons for considering a SaaS escrow agreement including concerns about vendor bankruptcy, ransomware attacks, unplanned service outages, and potential data loss or corruption.

SaaS Continuity Escrow Solutions

Companies of all sizes are now turning to SaaS escrow vendors to develop robust SaaS continuity solutions that provide for a continuation of service if something were to happen to the SaaS vendor.

The most popular SaaS Continuity Escrow solutions include:

  • Replicated SaaS Continuity with 90 Days of Live Availability – providing a replicated cloud environment with databases using deployment templates that may be activated in the event of a release situation. In the event of a release, the software escrow vendor will be on hand to keep the lights on and provide a continuity of service for a period of up to 90 days.
  • SaaS Environment Escrow – incorporating a deposit of the cloud environment which may include containers, deployment scripts, templates, automated deposits of databases and source code deposits from Git repositories including relevant documentation.
  • SaaS Access Continuity – including the deposit of the developer’s access credentials to the cloud hosting vendor’s production account. Solutions include the transfer of the access credentials to the Beneficiary and the possibility of the software escrow vendor maintaining the production environment for a 90 day period to ensure continuity post-release event.

SaaS Continuity Escrow Benefits

Over the years, SaaS escrow vendors such as Escrow London have adapted themselves to improve upon their customers’ overall experience and turn SaaS escrow into a painless process. Below are just a few benefits of why companies are investing in a SaaS escrow agreement.

  1. Business Continuity Satisfaction – If your critical SaaS vendor enters into bankruptcy, and you don’t have access to your data, this could be catastrophic for a company. The cost of SaaS escrow is usually a small percentage of the overall cost of an investment in technology. Investing in a SaaS escrow solution will ensure business continuity and will mitigate against the risks associated with modern cloud service delivery methods and the growing responsibility of service providers.

  2. Provides accurate and up-to-date data – A SaaS escrow agreement will only have value if the data and deposit materials are up to date and accurate. Investing in a SaaS escrow vendor who can introduce automated deposits as standard within all their agreements will provide extra benefits to a business. Being in the know that they have safe and regular back-ups of their data which can be released to them if needed, will result in having their business operations running continuously.  

  3. Verification Testing – as mentioned above, investing in a SaaS escrow vendor who can introduce automated deposits as standard will provide extra benefits. In addition to this, verification testing provided by the SaaS escrow vendor can ensure that the system is deployable and operational, offering added advantages to your business.

 

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About Escrow London

Escrow London is a global technology escrow vendor headquartered in the United Kingdom. Our global coverage is provided across our London office, Escrow London North America Inc in Atlanta, and our Australian office in Sydney.

We have invested considerable resources into innovation to reinvent software escrow for a SaaS world. Escrow London provides a range of SaaS Continuity escrow solutions suitable for AWS, Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud hosted SaaS applications. We support a wide range of clients includes major law firms, banks, central banks, insurance companies, technology companies and government organisations.