Coghead closes, leaves users kind of stranded

SAP acquires Coghead Inc., leaving users 2 months to save their data

Coghead Inc., a company that enables users to build cloud-computing applications without code, has been acquired by enterprise software company SAP, for an undisclosed amount. 

This isn't exactly great news for the world of cloud-computing, which is said to be the next big market.

If you don’t know already, cloud computing lets users access applications all online, never having to install the actual software on their computer.  A good example is Google Docs, which allows you to write an entire word document completely in your browser.  Salesforce tools also reside in this category.

The fear in using cloud-computing applications can be seen in this very example of Coghead shutting its doors. 

All those applications built on Coghead's API, are kind of useless now since they can only run on Coghead.  Users will have to figure out a way to rebuild their applications by downloading the XML data within their apps.  Coghead will provide, "basic" support for customers and encourages them to refrain from using or building new applications.  Here's a snippet from Coghead's letter to their customers:

"Effective immediately, the Coghead service and the license agreement to which customers agreed when they registered for the service are terminated.  However, existing customers will be able to access and use their applications and data through my.coghead.com *until April 30, 2009 on an unsupported, “as is” basis without any representations or warranties (express or implied) or indemnity from Coghead or any other party."

Coghead, based out of Mountain View, California, had raised a total of $12 million in VC funding from American Capital Strategies, El Dorado Ventures and SAP Ventures.  According to an interview with Information Week, Coghead CEO Pal McNamara explained, “The Coghead business model is not in keeping with the kinds of things that SAP wants to do."

Coghead, will be available for users to access and download the data within their applications, through April 30th, 2009.