2008 Baseline Crystal Ball; The Baseline staff peered into its crystal ball for a glimpse at next year's business and technology trends. Make note of our predictions; they portend things to come

Salesforce.com and NetSuite hacked out the trail for the software-by-the-rink concept. But now the big boys are on board-particularly SAP, with its September 2007 launch of SAP Business ByDesign. Aimed at companies with 500 employees or fewer, SAP's SaaS offering provides the flexibility to modify functionality as business grows and demands changes. With another year of less than 5 percent growth predicted for IT budgets, the SaaS model will expand rapidly in 2008.