Evaluating Integration Architectures – A Scenario-Based Evaluation of Integration Technologies

A major aspect of complex Enterprise Architectures is the integration of existing heterogeneous IT-systems in a business process oriented way. The paper starts with the definition of terms as Enterprise Architecture and process orientation. Based on an empirical study the paper shows that there is no significant business process orientation in information system integration projects. Among other reasons this is due to deficits in understanding and managing integration methods and technologies. Therefore the paper addresses the evaluation and comparison of relevant integration architectures as a first step to work on that issue. The paper differentiates individually coded interfaces, centralized hub&spoke and distributed approaches based on standardized interface descriptions (Service Oriented Architecture – SOA). The mentioned empirical study was extended by an action research based prototyping to assure a reliable evaluation and comparison of the three integration architectures. To make them comparable they have been implemented in the same fictitious business scenario which is described briefly. The paper finally compares the integration architectures with a set of 11 criteria which summarize over 400 variables taken into consideration in the evaluation process. The conclusion of the paper is not a solution but a suggestion for further research.