Most applications today are web-based or have a significant web-based component. Given this fact, it is important that a software consulting firm provide depth of expertise on one of the major web platforms. Each of these platforms has benefits to offer, but as a purchaser of software applications, it is important to consider the following:

• Lifetime of platform - Is this a new platform that is growing in popularity? Or maybe a "has been" platform which may be widespread currently, but is on the decline?
• Pervasiveness of platform - Will it be hard to find a programmer to maintain the system in the future?
• Platform requirements - What kind of server will be needed to run this application?
• Scalability of the platform - Will this platform provide for the amount of data/users/files/bandwidth required by my company?