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CONNECTED SYSTEMS Think Big, Start Small and Get Results Today! soa bite-sized service oriented architecture

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Bite-Sized SOA Booklet

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CONNECTED SYSTEMS

Think Big, Start Small and Get Results Today!

soabite-sized

service orientedarchitecture

SOA Growth and Change: TechTarget Survey Shows SaaS, BPM EmergingART ICLE ART ICLES ART ICLES ART ICLES

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SATURDAY, MARCH 22ND, 2009 WEB SERVICESCOLEEN FRYE

With a difficult economic climate as background, a shift is under way in both the types of infrastructure and the types of service-based applications organizations plan for their service-oriented architecture, according to results from a recent survey conducted by SearchSOA.com and TheServerSide.com.

Software architects and their development teams are looking toward infrastructure software such as grid and cloud computing.

They are moving quickly as well to deploy tactical business process management (BPM) applications.

Also on the application front, software-as-a-service (SaaS), mobile and composite applications are clearly on application development managers’ radar.

Among the survey respondents, 49% said their organization has one or more SOA projects under way, and 60% characterize their current or future SOA projects as enterprise level as opposed to departmental/divisional level (21%), or

single, isolated projects (19%). Still, respondents admit, there are hurdles for broader SOA deployment.

Meanwhile, there is interest and uptick in Business Process Management with 29.7% of respondents marking BPM as one of the critical areas for their organization’s technology efforts. At the same time, 35.8% of respondents counted Business Process Management software among the types of infrastructure software currently used, with 38% planning to use it in the future.

That same question found that grid/cloud software is now used by 17% of respondents, with 38% planning to use grid/ cloud in the future.

The TechTarget SOA Survey 2009 was conducted in February of this year. Respondents (376 total) comprised a mix of developers, architects, C-level execs, managers, consultants and others.

DoN’T CoUNT oUT INTEgRATIoN

Today’s SOA projects are largely about integration. The top benefits organizations hope to achieve are improved data integration (32%), enable legacy application integration (32%) and integrated disparate department applications (23%), followed by cost cutting (21%). Staying competitive (8.4%) and driving innovation (8%) tracked low on the expected benefits list.

The emphasis on integration “illustrates how far we’ve gotten from the original understanding of what SOA is,” said Ronald Schmelzer, managing partner at analyst firm ZapThink LLC in Baltimore. “It reflects the fact that 90%-plus of people thinking they’re doing SOA are really doing Web services/ enterprise application integration. They just got rid of the adapters [but], SOA has to be an architectural approach.” He traces this situation to vendor marketing. “I think we can squarely blame the vendors for this,” he said. “They say ‘if you want to do SOA, buy our product.’ That’s a complete fallacy.”

Massimo Pezzino, VP and analyst, Gartner Inc., thinks the focus on integration and the resulting cost savings is in large part due to the economic climate. Back in June when Gartner asked survey respondents a similar question about SOA benefits, “the top benefits expected were agility, innovation, and were more focused on helping organizations become

more competitive [and] agile,” he said. Now, however, “what we’re finding is when customers invest in SOA technology today they go for low-hanging fruit; the economy is responsible in a big way.”

Dennis Bourgeois, director of professional services at Oracle reseller Mythics Inc. in Virginia Beach, Va., said his customers focus their SOA efforts largely on integration and workflow, driven by cost cutting. “The most dramatic ROI we’ve had is in military healthcare organizations. They have been able to cut their contractor costs way down because they didn’t have stovepipe applications embedded into their lifecycle. They became more agile, and drove costs way down.”

center you have them in your data center but you get greater optimization of hardware resources, flexibility across servers— the elastic scalability concept. It will probably take another 3-5 years before the benefits of cloud can be achievable in the context of SOA projects.”

What is happening right now, Pezzini said, is “many organizations are integrating a SaaS application in the context of their SOA framework.” Indeed, according to the survey, the predominant types of service-based applications planned for the future are: on-demand SaaS (62%), Web services for mobile apps (60%) and composite application assembly (58%).

Bourgeois said his company has noticed more interest in SaaS recently. “We’re working with a couple of companies that want to offer SaaS; SOA is absolutely part of how you’d do it. It’s a very clear standard for everybody.”

Steve Whatmore, Java architect at LYNXDev Inc. in Toronto, said there are several issues to measure when considering SaaS as part of an overall SOA strategy. These include: who determines what is/isn’t part of the services and how much control/input you have into that process; who is responsible for issues that arise in the application architecture; what

BPM, WoRkfloW UPTICk

MBA’s Inc., business and organizational management consultants in Highlands Ranch, Colo., has implemented SOA and infrastructures within several small businesses with high growth potential. “There is a special value within SOA, especially in today’s economic marketplace, that can assist in controlling expenses and technology overhead--if management understands this concept,” said CEO Jeffrey C. Fischer. “The ability to have updated information flowing and support on-call 24/7 for a fixed expense becomes reasonable in calculating cash flow, ROI and margins for profitability on product lines.”

When survey respondents were asked about future infrastructure use, grid/cloud and BPM both showed considerable interest.

With a lot of SOA projects focused on cost containment, BPM “is an immediate opportunity for customers to get benefits,” Gartner’s Pezzini said. While grid and cloud hold promise for SOA, he said the technology and market are not fully capable yet. “Grid promises to deliver some benefits of cloud in terms of flexibility, optimization of infrastructure and cost reduction, but on the basis of the traditional model,” he said. “Rather than servers running in somebody else’s data

SoA gRoWTH AND CHANgE: TECHTARgET SURVEY SHoWS SAAS, BPM EMERgINg continued. . .

organization. The biggest hurdles then were determining what a CSF was, how it was going to be used and how to manage changes to that function once it was deployed.”

He added that this “should sound very familiar with the hurdles being tackled by organizations today as they move past their SOA 1.0 initiatives.” It appears the old adage of the more things change, the more they stay the same also applies to SOA.

happens when the SaaS service is unavailable; and security of data at rest and at motion.

goT SoA SkIllS?

While organizations may be reaping benefits from SOA, there remain some hurdles. Respondents ranked skills, architecture and governance as the top challenges. Pezzini said Gartner has found similar results.

“Those not doing SOA said it was because of skills.” Also, he added, “governance is becoming more and more popular as an issue. When you start your first couple of SOA projects you really don’t foresee the problem of governance. It becomes more evident as you move forward, your fifth or sixth SOA project, that without solving governance you can’t really get the benefits of SOA.”

Whatmore agrees. “The biggest obstacles found in SOA are not technical but rather organizational buy-in, governance and effectively managing the SOA process, although there still are technical hurdles such as performance, flexibility, versioning, etc. This in fact harkens back to the days of the CSFs [common system functions] on the OS/390, where a number of shared functions would be developed by a common systems group and utilized throughout the

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Neudesic’s Connected Systems Practice

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and provide extended value to users and other software systems. As the connected enterprise evolves and advances toward certainty, the extension of systems to one another and across the business landscape becomes both attainable and essential.

Is your enterprise ready to tighten application integration and extend the promise of your technology investments? Ask yourself:

»» Is there valuable information that’s locked away from users due to rigid application boundaries?

»» Do users have difficulty finding information and performing specific operations within your organization?

»» Do customers often express confusion or frustration when they try to access resources within your company?

»» Do your systems integrate well with partner applications?

»» Is broadly used data locked away in data “silos?”

»» Do your users waste time switching applications and logging in and out of legacy applications while attempting to perform simple tasks?

Neudesic’s Connected Systems Practice helps you optimizeand automate business processes and systems to improveefficiencies, increase agility and create new business valuefrom existing assets.

We deliver Connected Systems solutions that expose systems and software platforms within the enterprise and across business boundaries, improving the value proposition of your technology investments.

Our Connected Systems practice offers comprehensive solutions that minimize ramp-up costs and accelerate project launch schedules. Our EDI accelerators, for example, decrease the time to market and increase ROI for EDI related projects. We also offer a number of re-usable solutions that have been tested in a variety of major integration projects.

ARE YoUR VAlUABlE RESoURCES

UNDERUTIlIZED?

As enterprises evolve, a wide range of disparate systems, software packages and technology platforms emerge independently. Eventually these systems need to communicate

Most enterprises have some trouble with these common issues because their enterprise applications are not optimally integrated. Fortunately, a wide range of Connected Systems solutions are now available to help quickly resolve some of the most difficult integration challenges.

oPTIMIZE SYSTEMS AND EXTEND VAlUE

Neudesic’s Connected Systems practice has a long history of resolving complex application integration challenges and designing optimal solutions. We have successfully delivered more BizTalk Server and Host Integration Server solutions than any other firm in California. We are consistently called upon by Microsoft to assist with training, sales, design reviews, Architectural Design Sessions, Proof of Concepts, and implementation analysis and remediation.

The Neudesic Connected Systems practice consists of individuals with a diverse range of connected systems experience and product/solution exposure. Neudesic has earned the unique privilege of extensive access to internal Microsoft resources. These resources are often called upon to provide targeted support for specific challenges. At times, we interact directly with key engineers that have written the original Microsoft product code. This exclusive access sets us apart from competitors and enables us to provide the highest level of support to our customers.

THE NEUDESIC ADVANTAgE

»» Microsoft Virtual Technology Specialists—more than any other company in the country

»» Certified BizTalk Server experts

»» Members of international MVP program

»» Published co-author of the BizTalk Server 2004 book on staff at Neudesic

»» Authors of numerous trade publications and articles

»» Co-founder and president of INETA on team

»» Thought leadership at industry-wide events, including TechEd, VSLive, Code Camp and .NET user group meetings

»» Enterprise Integration with applications, systems and external trading partners

TECHNologIES

Enterprise Service Bus (ESB)

Microsoft Host Integration Server

Windows Workflow Foundation

Microsoft BizTalk Server Adapters

Microsoft BizTalk Server

Microsoft Business Rule Engine

Microsoft Message Queue

Third Party Adapters and Accelerators

Applications• Oracle • SAP• BAAN • JD Edwards• Salesforce • PeopleSoft• SiebelDatabase• Oracle • DBz• SQL Technologies• Covast • iWay• TopXML Accelerators• Covart EDI • HL7• HIPAA

NEUDESIC’S CoNNECTED SYSTEMS PRACTICE continued. . .

Get integrated.The “no application is an island” mantra of systems

integrators is an ambitious goal and not yet a reality in

today’s disconnected enterprises.With autonomous business units and acquisitions

so prevalent today, it is common to find a number of

stand-alone applications, manual business processes

and data silos functioning within the bounds of the

organization that owns them. Even connected systems

remain encumbered by point-to-point integrations or

direct data connections that lack visibility or oversight

and are difficult to maintain. True Enterprise Integration

will provide a platform for connecting systems

and building robust new applications that expose

automated business processes, data, business rules

and application logic.

BizTalk Server is a robust platform for integration

and business process automation. Our Get Results

program provides you with a well defined start for

your integration needs by connecting people,

partners and systems.

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NEEDS ANALYSISInterview key technical and executive stakeholders to determine the specific integration needs and requirements for the engagement. The program consists of the integration of the two systems and one BizTalk technology (i.e. Business Activity Services, Business Activity Monitoring, Business Rule Engine).

DESIGNIdentify messaging needs and determine the appropriate communication channels for your messages. Design any relevant business processes that are executed between the two systems.

DEvELopmENtDevelopment of XSD schemas, creation of maps and creation and configuration of physical send/receive ports based on requisite communication mechanisms. Development of needed components including accelerators, adapters, pipelines or custom classes, and automation of relevant business processes with BizTalk orchestrations.

DoCUmENtAtIoN• Vision, Scope and Requirements document• Requisite system design specifications• Application-to-application integration Proof of Concept• Solution presentation outlining the specifics of the engagement and recommendations

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Gartner Report: Magic Quadrant for Integrated SOA Governance Technology SetsART ICLE ART ICLES ART ICLES ART ICLES

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TUESDAY, MARCH 31ST, 2009 gARTNER RAS CoRE RESEARCH L. FRANK KENNEY, DARYL C. PLUMMER

The recession and the need for cost optimization, combined with the market’s need of service-oriented architecture in 2008 and the “cover your back” mentality, have caused many companies to rethink the importance they give to SOA governance and related technologies.

WHAT YoU NEED To kNoW

Service-oriented architecture (SOA) governance technologies, much like any other set of technologies, are striving to address needs beyond the SOA realm. Process governance, governing cloud interactions and interactions with business partners (brokerages) are on the radar for most technology providers. Getting the basics correct is a necessity, but these technologies will likely be used to govern peripheral activities.

fIgURE 1: Magic Quadrant for Integrated SoA governance Technology Sets

WebLayers

Microsoft

SAP

IBMHP

Oracle

Software AGProgress Software

SOA SoftwareAmber PointVordel

Alcatel-Lucent

Sensedia

MuleSource

Sonoa Systems

Intel

Fugitsu

Nastel

Sun Microsystems

niche players visionaries

challengers leaders

completeness of vision

abilit

y to e

xecu

te

Layer 7 Technologies

Source: Gartner (March 2009) As of March 2009

MARkET oVERVIEW

The market for SOA governance technologies is still in turmoil, with acquisitions, mergers, new players, and (most importantly) the dramatic maturation of companies procuring and deploying SOA infrastructure and SOA governance technologies. In creating the 2009 Magic Quadrant for Integrated SOA Governance Technology Sets, we immediately noticed a dramatic shift of all the participants toward the median of the quadrant (see “Understanding the Criteria, Use and Evaluation Scenarios for the 2009 SOA Governance Technologies Magic Quadrant”). When assigning vendor weightings for this Magic Quadrant, we detected, via our analysis, client interactions and vendor briefings and maturity of the market. A few key data points became very apparent:

»» Customers are no longer looking for just a registry; instead, they were looking for a suite of projects.

»» A growing percentage of customers are including SOA governance technologies in their initial SOA projects.

»» Customers and technology providers are putting more emphasis on SOA validation and monitoring; the latter is seen as critical to monitoring metrics and measuring success.

»» Customers are deploying SOA centers of excellence, supported by the architecture group and empowered by the CIO.

»» Customers are looking for solutions to easily integrate with their SOA and integration platforms.

»» Customers are looking to govern their interactions with business partners and services provided via the cloud.

However, it’s not just the market shifting. A few new playershave entered the market that represent various niches of customer wants and needs, focused on life cycle management, monitoring and policy enforcement. Vendors that offer some or most of this functionality include:

»» Alcatel-Lucent

»» Intel

»» MuleSource

»» Nastel

»» Oracle

»» Sensedia

»» Sonoa SystemsIn addition, some vendors from the 2008 Magic Quadrant were acquired, and, as a result, the acquiring company has entered this market. Oracle, which acquired BEA Systems in 2008, is now a player in this space. An impressive number of acquisitions have taken place, with vendors in this market acquiring vendors in markets peripheral to the SOA governance technology market. Examples include:

»» Oracle acquiring ClearApp

»» SOA Software acquiring LogicLibrary

»» Progress Software acquiring Mindreef

appearing in a Magic Quadrant or MarketScope one year and not the next does not necessarily indicate that we have changed our opinion of that vendor. This may be a reflection of a change in the market and, therefore, changed evaluation criteria, or a change of focus by a vendor.

EVAlUATIoN CRITERIA DEfINITIoNS

Product/Service: Core goods and services offered by the vendor that compete in/serve the defined market. This includes current product/service capabilities, quality, feature sets and skills, whether offered natively or through OEM agreements/partnerships as defined in the market definition and detailed in the subcriteria.

Overall Viability (Business Unit, Financial, Strategy, Organization): Viability includes an assessment of the overall organization’s financial health, the financial and practical success of the business unit, and the likelihood that the individual business unit will continue investing in the product, will continue offering the product and will advance the state of the art within the organization’s portfolio of products.

These acquisitions highlight the vendors’ acknowledgement that monitoring, validation and life cycle management are core to SOA governance.

The job of integrating SOA governance among disparate domains remains complex, because, although obtaining SOA governance technologies from your installed middleware vendor may be less expensive than from a third-party vendor (in many cases, new technology licenses can be combined with existing ones), ensuring that the technology supports heterogeneous environments is essential. Interoperability can sometimes be difficult, and SOA governance standards and specifications are immature in some areas, such as WSFederation (WS-FED), and nonexistent in others (governance interoperability). Ensuring that your vendor participates in some governance interoperability specification can help ease deployments, especially in best-of-breed situations, where appropriateness can no longer be ignored.

VENDoRS ADDED oR DRoPPED

We review and adjust our inclusion criteria for Magic Quadrants and MarketScopes as markets change. As a result of these adjustments, the mix of vendors in any Magic Quadrant or MarketScope may change over time. A vendor

G A RT N E R R E P O RT: MAgIC QUADRANT foR INTEgRATED SoA goVERNANCE TECHNologY SETS continued. . .

customers receive technical support or account support. This can also include ancillary tools, customer support programs (and the quality thereof ), availability of user groups, service level agreements and so on.

Operations: The ability of the organization to meet its goals and commitments. Factors include the quality of the organizational structure, including skills, experiences, programs, systems and other vehicles that enable the organization to operate effectively and efficiently on an ongoing basis.

Market Understanding: Ability of the vendor to understand buyers’ wants and needs and to translate those into products and services. Vendors that show the highest degree of vision listen to and understand buyers’ wants and needs, and can shape or enhance those with their added vision.

Market Strategy: A clear, differentiated set of messagesconsistently communicated throughout the organizationand externalized through the Web site, advertising, customerprograms and positioning statements.

Sales Execution/Pricing: The vendor’s capabilities in all pre-sales activities and the structure that supports them. This includes deal management, pricing and negotiation, pre-sales support and the overall effectiveness of the sales channel.

Market Responsiveness and Track Record: Ability to respond, change direction, be flexible and achieve competitive success as opportunities develop, competitors act, customer needs evolve and market dynamics change. This criterion also considers the vendor’s history of responsiveness.

Marketing Execution: The clarity, quality, creativity and efficacy of programs designed to deliver the organization’s message to influence the market, promote the brand and business, increase awareness of the products, and establish a positive identification with the product/brand and organization in the minds of buyers. This “mind share” can be driven by a combination of publicity, promotional initiatives, thought leadership, word-of-mouth and sales activities.

Customer Experience: Relationships, products and services/programs that enable clients to be successful with the products evaluated. Specifically, this includes the ways

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Geographic Strategy: The vendor’s strategy to direct resources, skills and offerings to meet the specific needs of geographies outside the “home” or native geography, either directly or through partners, channels and subsidiaries as appropriate for that geography and market.

Sales Strategy: The strategy for selling products that uses the appropriate network of direct and indirect sales, marketing, service and communication affiliates that extend the scope and depth of market reach, skills, expertise, technologies, services and the customer base.

Offering (Product) Strategy: The vendor’s approach to product development and delivery that emphasizes differentiation, functionality, methodology and feature sets as they map to current and future requirements.

Business Model: The soundness and logic of the vendor’s underlying business proposition.

Vertical/Industry Strategy: The vendor’s strategy to direct resources, skills and offerings to meet the specific needs of individual market segments, including vertical markets.

Innovation: Direct, related, complementary and synergistic layouts of resources, expertise or capital for investment, consolidation, defensive or pre-emptive purposes.

G A RT N E R R E P O RT: MAgIC QUADRANT foR INTEgRATED SoA goVERNANCE TECHNologY SETS continued. . .

Possible and practicalThe technical foundation for an evolving SOA environment can be realized within days with the combination of Neuron.ESB and Microsoft technologies. Neuron.ESB enables you to develop SOA solutions quickly and under budget while deploying in a fraction of the time and reducing overall infrastructure requirements.

In 10 days we are committed to delivering

• Selected Business Modeling

• Setup and preparation of Neuron.ESB on a Microsoft platform

• Integration to selected systems• Implementation of selected business flows• Operations and performance tests• A crash course in configuration for your

employees and organization

• Documentation of the delivered solution

Why SOA in 10 Days?

A solid foundation for evolving the SOA maturity levels from the basic to the most advanced with lowered TCO and faster TTM as a consequence.

Avoid months of analysis. Our SOA concept and Neuron.ESB provide a quick and proven SOA platform from where your SOA evolution can continue.

Avoid analysis paralysis. Evolve, build and change your SOA business with the flexibility of Neuron.ESB, a unique ESB built upon Microsoft technologies.

Early business implementation. Identify and address challenges as fast as possible and reduce time-to-market and project costs.

A technical foundation that utilizes your existing investments, optimizing current integrations and provides a solid foundation for future business challenges.

Service oriented Architecture in 10 daysService oriented Architecture in 10 days

For More Information: Visit the Neuron.ESB website at www.neuronesb.com or contact us directly at [email protected] or 800-805-1805

THE CHAllENgE

ACS’s Commercial Vehicle Operations Division provides a transponder-based system called PrePass that allows truckers to be instantly screened at weigh stations and other checkpoints throughout the United States. A trucker’s onboard transponder communicates with a weigh station or check point’s system, providing the trucker’s safety record and details about the vehicle’s weight and size. Using a green or red light, the transponder alerts the truck driver whether to proceed or to pull in for further inspection. ACS’s PrePass system handles more than 90% of the nation’s electronic pre-clearance of commercial vehicles. ACS currently has 280 sites in 28 states facilitating approximately 4.7 million bypass transactions each month. By enrolling only the safest carriers, PrePass enhances highway safety and efficiency, freeing state weigh and inspection operators to concentrate on unsafe vehicles. All customer service and interaction between ACS and its customers was being handled by phone and by mail, resulting in a high volume of phone calls and in turn, labor costs. ACS recognized that it would greatly reduce operating costs and increase efficiency within its own organization by automating some of these processes, thus providing much better service to its customers.

THE CoMPANY

Founded in 1988 by Chairman Darwin Deason, Affiliated Computer Services, Inc. (ACS) is a premier provider of diversified business process outsourcing and information technology outsourcing solutions to commercial and government clients worldwide. Based in Dallas, ACS is a Fortune 500 company of 58,000 people supporting client operations reaching 100 countries. According to ACS, “It would be hard for you to go through a day without encountering the products or services of our many clients in communications, education, energy, financial services, government, healthcare, insurance, manufacturing, retail, travel, and transportation.”

Affiliated Computer Services, Inc.

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THE BENEfITS

With the implementation of the new PrePass.com web site, ACS has been able to greatly reduce the labor cost of answering incoming phone calls. In fact, today, most new PrePass customer enrollments are originating from the PrePass.com automated customer service system. While the PrePass enrollment process once took 7-10 days, 84% of all enrollment on the web is now processed within 48 hours. The site has also created a much greater efficiency within ACS’s Commercial Vehicle Operations, allowing for the PrePass System to take on an even greater volume of customers. While ACS already serves 90% of the nation’s electronic pre-clearance of commercial vehicles, the volume of vehicles, and thus transponder transactions, is expected to increase dramatically over the coming decades as there are more and more trucks on the road. PrePass.com is ensuring that ACS is ready to handle the additional volume of customers without any reduction in customer satisfaction.

THE SolUTIoN

ACS envisioned a solution consisting of a web site that provided potential customers with information about the PrePass System and made it possible for them to apply online for PrePass Services, while allowing existing customers to maintain their accounts online. Neudesic was called upon to create this web site and its extremely important backend programming using Microsoft technology to create an interface between the new PrePass.com web site and ACS’s CRM platform. This allowed the vision of PrePass.com to become a reality for ACS.

THE CHAllENgE

Roland DGA’s rapid growth resulted in challenges tracking end users and their products, managing warranties and replacement parts, and supporting their diverse network of distributors and dealers. As a result, further challenges were encountered in proactively addressing product problems and supporting Roland DGA’s end users and dealers. Roland DGA was in need of a better way to provide support, facilitate repairs and returns, and track their replacement part inventory.

THE SolUTIoN

Neudesic worked with Roland DGA to define a solution whereby vast amounts of information previously managed manually and in disparate and disjointed systems across the organization and its dealer network could be integrated into a common platform and solution. The goal of the solution was to effectively manage not only internal information and processes, but also dealer network processes and reimbursements from their parent company in Japan.

To help Roland DGA reach its goals, Neudesic used Neuron∙ESB, its own .NET-based enterprise service bus, to integrate SharePoint Forms services with Microsoft Dynamics CRM 3.0 and Dynamics Great Plains 9.0. By our design, Roland’s dealers would enter Service Order Requests in forms

THE CoMPANY

Roland DGA Corporation is the U.S.-based marketing, distribution and sales arm of the Roland DG Corporation of Japan, a worldwide leader in the sign, graphic arts, fine art, photography, engraving and 3D modeling industries. Founded in 1981 and listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange, Roland DG is the world’s number one provider of wide format ink jet printers for the durable graphics market. Roland DG is also affiliated with Roland Corporation, renowned in the music world for developing MIDI technology and for producing sophisticated digital music equipment including keyboard synthesizers, recording equipment and other related technologies.

In 1990, the company established the Roland DGA Corporation in Irvine, California, to provide complete sales, marketing and customer support services throughout the Americas. Today, Roland DGA markets its products through an extensive dealer and distributor network serving the United States, Canada, Mexico, the Caribbean and all countries of Central and South America except Brazil.

Roland DGA

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THE BENEfITS

The new Service Order Management System has allowed Roland DGA to move from multiple paper-based processes to a single, completely automated process. Microsoft Dynamics CRM serves as the front end for the entire service order management process for all non-accounting internal users, and Neudesic’s Neuron∙ESB provides the system’s integration. External users, including dealers and distributors, log into the R-Net Pro portal. Combined, these two components provide a ‘one-stop shop’ for managing all aspects of warranty claims, service requests, and service repairs.

The warranty and service process, which previously was managed via a faxed request or a telephone call, required several service, accounting, support, and administrative team members to physically touch each claim and request. Most service call activity required data entry into a minimum of three distinct systems and all historical data was paper based. As a result of these manual processes, Roland DGA had no mechanism for electronically reporting on any aspects of these processes or managing and measuring performance. Any reports that were generated required hundreds of labor hours to gather information from paper documents and several systems to be compiled into spreadsheets. As a result, reporting was rarely completed, and by the time it was completed, the information was often antiquated.

services on a public facing MOSS portal. The service orders would then be sent to Neuron∙ESB and be processed in CRM and GP. Neuron∙ESB served as the messaging architecture that kept all of the systems synchronized.

By capitalizing on previous software investments, Roland DGA was able to minimize additional capital expenditures throughout the creation of their new Service Order Management system. The solution design included the development of R-Net Pro, a Dealer Portal built on Microsoft Office Server 2007. This portal uses InfoPath along with Forms Server and Forms-based authentication to provide the dealers and distributors with the ability to manage their service and warranty requests themselves, as well as the ability to verify inventory and status information.

The R-Net Pro dealer portal uses Neudesic’s Neuron∙ESB to integrate with Microsoft CRM which houses most of the dealer/distributor master data, as well as warranty information. This integration provides the dealers and distributors real time visibility via the portal into all service related activity housed and managed within CRM. Warranty reimbursements and other financial aspects of the warranty claims and service call processes that are managed within Microsoft Dynamics GP are also visible in real time. The master dealer/distributor information contained within CRM also pre-populates into claim forms, providing the dealers and distributors with a greatly improved portal user experience.

The new Neuron∙ESB based system also provides dealers and internal personnel with online access to all historical service requests and warranty claims, real time warranty verification, warranty challenging functionality, automated pre-repair and replenishment parts ordering, on-line shipment information, integration with the FASCOR Warehouse Management System, and OLAP performance and trend reporting.

Thanks to the seamless integration provided by Neuron∙ESB, the user acceptance of this automated solution has been positive both internally and externally, and Roland DGA’s future plans include the roll out of the R-Net Pro portal to additional dealers and distributors, as well as upgrades of Microsoft GP to 10.0 and of CRM to 4.0. Roland DGA continues to evangelize Microsoft technology and use that technology as a way of reaching their dealer satisfaction goals. As an early adopter of Microsoft technology, Roland DGA has repeatedly placed itself ahead of the competition in exceeding the expectations and demands of their customers.

Despite the use of GP’s inventory management system, Roland DGA’s replacement part inventory quantities were inaccurate due to the fact that they were completely dependent upon human data entry. Each service order required numerous manual steps both in verification and in processing and dealers had to telephone requests for updates

on the status of warranty claims and service orders. Each service and/or warranty request was touched by up to 8 individuals throughout its processing. Reconciliation of these processes was difficult at best and often impossible. There were no means for accurately tracking performance metrics. As a result of the implementation of this solution, both internal controls and reporting have greatly improved and their accuracy is much more reliable.

The processing of warranty claims and tying these claims to service orders previously involved manually generating reports of parts ordered, manually matching them with a paper-based claim report, researching warranty and dealer information from an informational database managed in Japan for prior service history and to ensure no duplicate claims, and manually constructing a report for accounting for warranty payouts. Double and triple data entry was required in order to ship replacement parts for a service request, risking human data entry error, and warranty payments to distributors were manually tracked in an Excel spreadsheet. All of this data was then compiled and sent to Japan for reimbursement processing. Dealers and internal users now have access to real time information about products, end users, warranties, service repairs, parts orders and shipments, and reimbursement payments.

RolAND continued. . .

In addition, a sizable and measurable benefit has been made in the area of claims processing. The Neuron∙ESB-based solution has saved an average of 8 minutes per claim. At over 400 claims per month, over 50 hours of labor per month are saved in the claims process alone. Intangible benefits are even greater and more important to Roland’s customer satisfaction goals.

These intangible benefits include:

• Quick payment to dealers

• Valuable time savings for dealers

• All claims are entered into one system

• All historical claim information is available in real-time on the same system

• Data no longer has to be entered in multiple systems to request service reimbursement

• Valuable time savings for Roland DGA

• Service parts history now resides in one location for both internal and external repairs and is managed electronically allowing for the easy analysis of repair rates and costs

• Dealer activity is now tracked to monitor repeat repair visits

• Faulty parts are tracked and Roland DGA can now anticipate, plan for, and accrue for failure rates on equipment

• Parts shipments are now tracked, avoiding the previous problem of part shortages, which has a dramatic impact on end users in terms of time to repair their product.

• Roland can now calculate repair costs accurately and further analyze the costs of extended maintenance contracts

Overall, by implementing Neuron∙ESB, Roland DGA has drastically improved their distribution process and is able to provide a much higher level of service to their dealer and distributor network. They have made it easier for their customers to do business with them and made it easier for the dealers to service end users. The time line for receiving replacement parts has been shortened, thereby shortening the time to complete repairs. Reimbursements to dealers are not only made more quickly, but also more accurately. By further reducing the number of incoming and outgoing phone calls and providing this information via the web, resources previously dedicated to pushing paper and managing phone calls can now focus their time and energy on the core aspects of Roland’s business model.

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THE CoMPANY

ThinkCash offers easily-obtainable loans to consumers to cover life’s unexpected events. ThinkCash offers a new option for people who want a short term loan without the hassle of driving to the bank or the costs of a payday loan. The ThinkCash process uses no paperwork, does not have a long approval cycle, and there is no waiting in line. Applicants get an answer in seconds anytime day or night, and with the proper qualifications can have anywhere from $250 to $2500 the next business day. ThinkCash provides access to rates that are typically 25 – 75% lower than payday loans, and unlike payday loans, borrowers can pay back their loan in several installments, or in one lump sum, all with no penalties.

THE CHAllENgE

With ThinkCash’s continued growth, the company’s automated loan application process required an ever-growing amount of resources to maintain. This left very little time for ThinkCash’s development team to spend on extending their platform to accommodate growth and to add new features. The company knew that as their growth continued, less time would be spent on the development of the platform and implementation of the new features that would be required in order to maintain the company’s competitive edge in the market place.

THE SolUTIoN

ThinkCash turned to Neudesic to provide a solution that would reduce the amount of labor hours that were required to maintain the systems that supported their automated loan application process. With a wealth of connected systems experience in industries that included Financial Services, Neudesic quickly recognized that an enterprise service bus, built on the Microsoft Platform, would best solve ThinkCash’s challenges. Neudesic chose Neuron∙ESB as the enterprise service bus to drive the solution and reduce the development time needed to build ThinkCash’s automated loan application.

In addition, the deployment of a business rules engine and Windows Workflow Foundation would provide ThinkCash with additional functionality without the need for additional coding.

THE BENEfITS

Neuron∙ESB was a perfect fit for ThinkCash because it allowed them to complete new features and functionality they had been previously unable to implement, and do this in record time with fewer resources and lower costs than expected. ThinkCash has a strong commitment to a service-based software and wanted to evolve their legacy platform into something that allows them to offer a broad variety of services to their customers more quickly, and at a better price point than their competitors. Although some services were available in the current platform, it was not service-oriented and the

ThinkCash

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architecture was mostly that of a classic “n-tier” application, not that of a message-based system. As ThinkCash explored ways to move to a services-oriented approach they began leveraging elements of .NET 3.0 such as Windows Communication Foundation, but after some efforts found that along with services comes the need to manage, maintain, and control those services, something that was missing from their implementation.

In addition, ThinkCash wanted to reduce the complexity of their applications and reduce the time required to develop new features, so they looked for ways to remove business logic traditionally buried deep inside the code out to more efficient components. Neuron∙ESB provides the platform, tools, and infrastructure to handle ThinkCash’s message routing, service management and enablement, business process flow, and governance requirements. The use of Neuron∙ESB reduced ThinkCash’s codebase by close to 80%, and reduced development costs by nearly 75%. In addition, in less than 2 months, ThinkCash rolled out new functionality that had been previously thought near impossible to achieve due to their constraints, and the development group experienced huge improvements in productivity by leveraging Neruon∙ESB as a standard platform. With eight members of the ThinkCash development team that are now familiar with and productive with the solution, developer resources can be better deployed across a wide range of projects, including the development of new features.

“Neuron∙ESB provides the messaging backbone for all of our critical applications” said Jeffrey Sullivan, Chief Information Officer of ThinkCash. “Neuron∙ESB allowed us to leverage our developers much more effectively while providing us the ability to go to market quickly with new solutions. We were able to shift our service development from the architect role to the more ubiquitous developer role while decreasing our deployment time of new services by 50%. We started with just one developer who received four days of Neuron∙ESB training. Within six months and no additional training, we had a 15X increase in the number of our internal developers who were able to use Neuron∙ESB.”

THE CoMPANY

BlueCrest Capital Management LLP is a leading UK-based financial services company which manages significant institutional assets across a number of diversified strategies. Since its inception, BlueCrest’s objective has been to construct a trading infrastructure of investment bank quality, upon which trading teams can be built and new strategies developed. BlueCrest believes in a model by which it employs teams of market specialists across numerous disciplines, all operating with state-of-the-art proprietary analytical technology.

THE CHAllENgE

Managing a large portfolio on behalf of their customers and staying abreast of the ever-changing financial market means dealing with thousands of transactions securely and efficiently from a technology perspective. The BlueCrest team knew they wanted to use the principles of SOA and an infrastructure based on the Enterprise Service Bus paradigm to handle the trade flow. They needed a tool that would be easy to use and not require days to install, months to learn and years to actually start producing a return on investment. Their research led them to Neuron∙ESB.

THE SolUTIoN

Due to the heterogeneous nature of their best-of-breed environment, BlueCrest required a tool that could help them bridge systems but still offer the ease of use and efficiency found in a Microsoft-based solution.

Neudesic worked closely with the BlueCrest team to capture their vision of the required solution and established criteria for a Proof of Concept (POC). Once the organization’s criteria for success were established, the team quickly developed a scenario for BlueCrest to test as the basis for the POC. Neuron∙ESB was then presented as the solution to meet all of their requirements and to handle thousands of transactions securely and efficiently.

“After the evaluation it was very quick for us to incorporate Neuron∙ESB into our Sinai trade posting architecture,” said BlueCrest’s head of implementation, Alan Ambrose, describing the company’s experience with introducing Neuron∙ESB into their organization. “We soon had quite a complex message flow running between our various trade capture, trade administration and risk systems. Using Neuron∙ESB, we’ve created a way for individual systems to connect to each other and share a standardized protocol for many of our data structures.”

BlueCrest Capital Management LLP

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Upon successful completion of the POC, BlueCrest immediately provisioned a first class production environment and went to work finalizing the solution. Within a matter of weeks, the newly integrated systems on Neuron∙ESB were in production and ready to help BlueCrest’s customers prosper.

THE BENEfITS

To some, the concepts of SOA and ESB inherently mean a long, complex process of establishing committees and classes prior to any integration. However, BlueCrest has proven otherwise. The BlueCrest project has validated that a company can utilize Neuron∙ESB to help them succeed in managing a complex trade flow without a long and costly up front effort.

BlueCrest knew that SOA was more than simply replicating point-to-point architecture over web services and they were looking for a solution to meet their needs quickly and with enough scalability and agility to be applied across the organization. BlueCrest’s staff leveraged Neuron∙ESB to build an effective and flexible trade flow architecture with immediate focus on the cost/benefit aspect of the implementation.

“Our trading teams expect fast-paced development and rollout to maximize business impact,” said Alan Ambrose. “After establishing the shape of our trade messages for various instruments, we gave these to our various development teams

together with the Neuron∙ESB API and we now have the bulk of our trade flow running across this architecture. The great benefit to us, in addition to the speed of rollout, is the flexibility of being able to route trade flows from one system or organization to another.”

Another benefit BlueCrest has experienced is the true partnership that forms between a customer and the Neuron∙ESB team when that customer chooses Neuron∙ESB as their Enterprise Service Bus solution. “We are very pleased with both the level of skill and the response speed of the Neuron∙ESB team,” said Alan Ambrose. “This is a critical piece of infrastructure for us and the Neuron∙ESB team continues to demonstrate their understanding of this by showing a great deal of enthusiasm and dedication.”

Webcasts

Bite-Sized SOA: An Iterative Approach to SOA

Presented by Monish Nagisetty, Neudesic

Implementing a Service Oriented Architecture can seem like a daunting task; however, if one starts with a single business process and takes an iterative approach, the chances of success improve significantly. In this webcast, Neudesic will explore ‘starting small’ by decomposing a business process and designing services to facilitate it. We will demonstrate how this ‘middle-out’ approach can be extended in subsequent iterations to continuously add value and align to business objectives.

For a recorded version of this webcast, please visit:http://www.neudesic.com/insight/Presentation/Pages/ PresentationAndWebCasts.aspx

Bite-Sized SOA: Think Big, Start Small, Rinse and Repeat

Presented by Rick Garibay & Todd Sussman, Neudesic

In only 6 months, a leading commercial transportation company transformed their customer operations with a SOA solution built on the Microsoft platform. Learn how they partnered with Neudesic to automate interaction between their customers using best of breed Microsoft and partner technologies in order to handle a growing volume of transactions, reduce increasing labor costs, and provide better service to their customers. With the bite-sized SOA approach, they were able to drive success within their organization and quickly see the ROI.

For a recorded version of this webcast, please visit:

http://www.neudesic.com/insight/Presentation/Pages/PresentationAndWebCasts.aspx

Bite-Sized SOA: Effectively Leveraging an Enterprise Service Bus,

Presented by Marty Wasznicky & Christian Martinez, Neudesic

SOA is often approached with a myriad of complex ingredients, seemingly intangible at times, that sometime takes years to coalesce into a final solution. But it doesn’t have to be that way. Neuron ESB, the Enterprise Service Bus built on the Microsoft Platform, was specifically developed to reduce complexity and enable organizations to use their own resources to quickly develop and deploy SOA solutions today, not tomorrow.

For a recorded version of this webcast, please visit:

http://www.neudesic.com/insight/Presentation/Pages/ PresentationAndWebCasts.aspx

In-Person Events

BITE-SIZED SoA: Cost optimization strategies to

make your soa implementations more palatable

Learn how you can remain competitive in today’s cost conscious landscape and maximize your current investments in legacy applications while delivering new solutions with greater agility. Join Microsoft and Neudesic at one of these roundtable dinners in a city near you. For an exclusive invitation, please contact [email protected] and reference this event information.

SOA IN-PERSON EVENTS

BITE-SIZED SoA

Roundtable Dinners: Cost optimization strategies to makeyour SOA implementations more palatable.

Dallas, June 10 5:00p-8:00p Central

Denver, June 16 5:00p-8:00p Mountain

Houston, June 11 5:30p-8:30p Pacific

Irvine, June 25 5:30p-8:30p Pacific

Philadelphia, (TBA)

Phoenix, July 15 5:30p-8:30p Mountain

BI IN-PERSON EVENTS

SolVINg THE BI PUZZlE

Neudesic takes SQL/BI solutions from tactical and specializedto pervasive and strategic, all without breaking the bank.!

Chicago, June 3 9:00a-12:00p Central

Dallas, Aug 19 8:30a-10:30a Central

Denver, Aug 25 5:00p-7:00p Mountain

Houston, Aug 20 8:30a-10:30a Central

New York, (TBA)

Philadelphia, July 8 9:00a-10:30a Eastern

Phoenix, Sept 17 8:30a-10:30a Pacific

Seattle, July 14 9:00a-12:00p Pacific

SP IN-PERSON EVENTS

SHAREPoINT DollARS & SENSE

Learn how sensible solutions to maximize your SharePointinvestment can add dollars to your bottom line.

Dallas, July 8 11:30p-1:30p Central

Denver, July 22 8:30p-10:30a Mountain

Houston, July 9 11:30a-1:30p Central

Irvine, June 19 8:30a-11:00a Pacific

Malvern, June 16 9:00a-10:30a Eastern

New York, June 17 6:00p-9:00p Eastern

Philadelphia, June 16 1:00p-2:00p Eastern

Phoenix, June 24 8:30a-11:00a Mountain

San Diego, June 18 8:30a-11:00a Pacific

Seattle, June 23 8:30a-11:00a Pacific

For an exclusive invitation, please contact [email protected] and reference this event information.

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