Forrester urges architects to adopt SOA-based BPM tools |
 |
By Rich Seeley, News Writer
11 Oct 2007 | SearchManufacturingERP.com |
|
|
Enterprise architects who are not using integration-centric business process management suites (IC-BPMS) in their service-oriented architecture (SOA) development efforts, need to reconsider this option, according to a new report from Forrester Research Inc.
Vendors are offering mature IC-BPMS products that can help organizations implement combined business process management (BPM) and integration capabilities based on an SOA foundation, according to Ken Vollmer, principle analyst at Forrester.. Architects who are not using them are losing significant benefits, he said.
The IC-BPMS tools, which were first developed in the enterprise application integration (EAI) era, are mature and easy to use, he writes in a report released this month titled "The IC-BPMS Reference Architecture Model - IT View Tech Choices."
"However," he reports, "our recent discussions with enterprise architects at several global enterprises indicate that the comprehensive nature of these products is still not well understood, leading to many situations where enterprises are pursuing BPM, integration and application development projects without the most capable tool kit at their disposal."
The IC-BPMS from major vendors including IBM, Oracle Corp. SAP AG and Software AG's webMethods unit, have evolved significantly from the proprietary version from the EAI days, Vollmer said. While some vendors have built their own and others have acquired the technology, IC-BPMS products are now based on "a solid foundation of SOA."
The tools provide integrated support for business rules, Web services management and governance, model-driven development (MDD), process orchestration/workflow, business activity monitoring (BAM), and process optimization features, he said.
Asked why these tools are being underutilized, Vollmer answered: "The IC-BPMS tools represent a significantly different way of creating new application functionality, from code generated from process models as opposed to manually writing code. Having been burned a few times in the past, many organizations are taking a wait and see approach. However, early adopters are scoring some impressive gains."
Architects willing to take another look at the tools will not find them difficult to use, Vollmer said, when asked if a steep learning curve accounted for part of the adoption problem.
"These tools abstract a lot of technical issues under the covers, so they tend to be easier to work with than the other options that have been around for a while," he said.
For evidence that IC-BPMS tools can make a difference in creating business value in SOA applications, Vollmer pointed to a series of case studies in a September report he authored for Forrester titled "EA And Metrics: For Maximum Impact, Measure The Business Value."
In the case of a corporation identified as "a leading international provider of paper products" that report noted that use of IC-BPMS was used to automate cash receivable business process, providing significant business value.
"The old process required manual intervention to interpret payment reconciliation transactions received from its bank prior to allocating the cash to the correct enterprise resource planning (ERP) system accounts," Vollmer reported. "The new process feeds the reconciliation statements to an integration-centric business process management suite (IC-BPMS) that automatically allocates receivables directly into the correct ERP accounts by electronic interpretation of simple business rules stored in the BPM tool. This change completely eliminated manual efforts while shortening processing times by two days."
In another case study involving a European telecom firm, Vollmer reported that an IC-BPMS tool was used build a service delivery platform to support its new development efforts. He said it cut development time from an average of four months down to one month, a 75 percent reduction. This allowed the telco to undertake development efforts that were beyond the capabilities of its IT resources prior to implementing IC-BPMS.
|
