It’s all about the business case

I spotted this article, by Rich Seeley, outlining some recent findings from Forester, showing that SOA is growing steadily all over the world.

“In 2005, the survey found 53 percent of enterprises were ‘using or planning to use SOA.’ By 2006, that number had grown to 62 percent, and in 2007 it reached 66 percent. More importantly for the theme of the latest survey, enterprises with an ‘enterprise level strategy and commitment to SOA’ went from 18 percent in 2005, to 22 percent in 2006, and 26 percent in 2007.

In an equally telling statistic, the percentage of enterprises reporting that they were not pursuing SOA and had no immediate plans to do so fell from a high of 47 percent in 2005, to 33 percent in 2007.”

The fact of the matter is that the notion and practice of SOA is expanding, but every so slowly when compared to other technology trends. This is a good thing, if you ask me, considering the complexity and scope of SOA, and the good or bad impact it can have on a business.

What’s driving this movement is not as much about the technology, but the business benefit, as Forester is finding.

“The survey also found that the business benefits of SOA are coming to the forefront and helping drive adoption.”

However, where people are selling the reuse concept of SOA, reuse is typically not going to be the business driver. We’ve hit upon that topic many times on this blog and Podcast.

“He warns that the often touted reuse benefit of SOA is a tricky topic, because the values of reuse are not always clear and first glance.”

Good news overall. First that SOA is growing, and second that the business case is driving it. That’s typically healthy when considering how we followed, and them dumped a number of technological trends in the past. However, SOA is far more than a trend…it’s an architecture and should have the proper amount of strategic consideration within the enterprise. Hopefully we’re getting there.