Why SOA Needs Cloud Computing – a case for integration!

Posted by Margaret Dawson on October 5, 2009

Great article this morning by cloud computing expert David Linthicum on “Why SOA Needs Cloud Computing”. The specific example he gives is a corporate acquisition and the need to integrate two companies’ systems quickly, but the IT department can’t move fast enough. In fact, Linthicum claims in this article that IT has become the single most visible point of latency when a business needs to change. Or a business process needs to be updated.

This is a perfect example of why companies turn to a cloud-based integration platform like Hubspan’s, which provides fast, affordable and seamless integration between two systems or many systems. And the focus is on the business process, not the IT capability.

You can follow David on twitter here: http://twitter.com/DavidLinthicum

From his article:

“It’s Thursday morning, you’re the CEO of a large, publicly traded company, and you just called your executives into the conference room for the exciting news. The board of directors has approved the acquisition of a key competitor, and you’re looking for a call-to-action to get everyone planning for the next steps.

You talk to the sales executives about the integration of both sales forces in three months time, and they are excited about the new prospects. You talk to the HR director who is ready to address the change they need to make in two months. You speak to the buildings and maintenance director who can have everyone moved that needs to be moved in three months. Your heart is filled with pride.

However, when you ask the CIO about changing the core business processes to drive the combined companies, the response is much less enthusiastic. “Not sure we can change our IT architecture to accommodate the changes in less than 18 months, and I’m not even sure if that’s possible,” says the CIO. “We simply don’t have the ability to integrate these systems, nor the capacity. We’ll need new systems, a bigger data center…” You get the idea. “

read the whole article here: http://cloudcomputing.sys-con.com/node/1132528