SOA helps in building Interoperability, Agility, and Flexibility

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Technology that Delivers with SOA-Based Process-Centric Design

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Published on: August 2010 Author: Oracle Pratice|

How SOA helps in building Interoperability, Agility, and Flexibility in mission critical systems

WhitepaperHow SOA helps in building Interoperability, Agility, and Flexibility in mission critical systems

Table of Contents1. Introduction2. Common Challenges with Systems3. Why SOA? 3.1. Example of an SOA-based Work Order Process System5. Benefits of Using SOA-Based Composite Applications6. Conclusion

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1. IntroductionEstimated at approximately $55 billion, the global Maintenance, Repair, and Overhaul (MRO) industry is set to grow at rates between 3 and 5 percent year-on-year. With modest growth rates and the global economic slowdown, reduced travel has played a large factor in increasing the cost pressures on MRO service providers in recent times. This, in turn, has forced MRO service providers to reexamine costs and increase efficiency.

One area where MRO service providers have continuously faced inefficiencies is in the area of MRO systems. With heterogeneous IT infrastructure (with respect to operating systems, applications, application infrastructure, and system software), rigid legacy systems, and little or no interoperability between these systems, MRO companies often struggle to find a way to completely leverage their IT assets.

In this paper, we will examine how a Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) approach can serve to build composite applications to help deliver better ROI on IT investments, more specifically in work order processing.

2. Common Challenges with SystemsThere are several challenges that enterprises face with existing systems. Typically, software systems end up being ‘tightly coupled’. This means that modules within the system that execute different business processes are closely interlinked with each other. As a result: Software updates across modules can become troublesome. For example, an update to one module may inadvertently cause unexpected changes to another module. Changes or modifications to specific modules require significant investment in terms of time and money, which is not always feasible or justified. Reusing modules for various business processes isn’t always possible leading to greater redundancy across systems.

While tightly coupled systems present their own problems, IT strategies that are integration or application-focused create another problem because they result in purchases of numerous independent applications that do not ‘talk’ to each other.

The consequences of these limitations in business terms can be far-reaching. Enterprises are unable to respond quickly to changes in the business landscape or use existing IT infrastructure to tackle new business requirements; systems lack the capability to support new channel interactions that involve suppliers, partners, and customers; IT ends up deploying multiple systems that perform the same task; all of which lead to tremendous inefficiency within the organization.

3. Why SOA?Most often, business demands more agility and flexibility without spending more. At the same time, IT needs resources to ensure that legacy systems are running effectively, the infrastructure is as agile and productive as possible, and required new business capabilities can be added.

Irrespective of their differences, most business and IT folks agree that an organization’s business processes differentiate them from others. And it is a focus on these business processes that can enable organizations to evolve to a more flexible goal-oriented model by pursuing an SOA approach.

In SOA, an application’s independent functions or business rules are converted into modules and presented to client or consumer applica-tions as services. This ‘loose coupling’ ensures that implementation and the service interface remain independent of each other. As a result, developers can create applications by composing one or more services even though they may not understand the underlying implementa-tions of the services.

SOA enables enterprises to seamlessly upgrade existing services or plug in new ones in a granular manner to support new business require-ments. It also adds the capability to make services accessible across different channels and exposes existing systems and applications as services to create better security for the existing IT infrastructure.

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3.1. Example of an SOA-based Work Order Process SystemHere we will examine an example of an SOA-based work order process in action. As you can see in the figure, Oracle SOA Suite forms the heart of this system. The Work Order Management system is a J2EE module, while a Peoplesoft CRM system is used for creating quotations and an Oracle Enterprise Business Suite system is used for inventory management of supplies. It is an example of how a composite applica-tion can be used to leverage existing IT infrastructure.

This is how the business process is expected to flow:1. The customer goes online and initiates a work order in the Work Order Management system.2. The PeopleSoft CRM system creates a quote for customer’s work order after verifying the customer’s relationship with the organization.3. The customer is then notified with the quote in the Work Order Management system and asked for approval.4. The work order is then assigned to a mechanic with the requisite skills to execute the order in the Work Order Management system.5. The mechanic then logs in to the Work Order Management system and requests the equipment required to complete the work order.6. This request then goes to the Oracle EBS system where equipment availability is checked.7. After receiving the equipment, the mechanic completes the work order.8. The sale order/invoice is then created in the Work Order Management system.9. Finally, the invoice is presented to the customer and the work order is closed.

J2EE - Work OrderManagement system

Oracle SOASuite

Web serviceexposed by

BPEL

ComponentInterface

exposed asWeb Service

XML gatewayexposed asWeb service

People Soft CRMsystem Oracle EBS System

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4. Benefits of Using SOA-Based Composite ApplicationsAs you have seen, there are several benefits to developing and deploying SOA-based composite applications. These include: Effective use of multiple enterprise components Creation of a centralized business process repository Increased interoperability between applications Better security Data standardization Agility and flexibility to include custom business processes

5. ConclusionSOA-based composite applications hold a lot of promise for MRO service providers given their ability to empower organizations with the agility and flexibility to respond faster to market demands and business needs. As someone once wisely said, “SOA gives you the ability to refactor your enterprise incrementally.”

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