Companies that use business software turn to Enterprise Application Integration to automate workload, boost productivity and cut operating costs. The Internet of Things, however, presents a new challenge for entrepreneurs. Here’s how EAI technologies will help you unlock IoT’s business potential.
What is EAI and why should you care?
The EAI term refers to the technologies and tools that enable seamless data flow from one business app to another. Why do you need it in the first place? Your sales manager uses Zoho to store customer data and document his daily activities. What if he needs certain data that can’t be found in his CRM? He will have to contact employees from other departments (which is not always easy). According to the EMC 2015 survey, 46% of business executives believe increased cooperation between departments is a potential game changer when it comes to embracing innovation. Yes, you should facilitate cooperation through building a strong company culture that incorporates elements of storytelling and gamification. The quickest way, however, is to integrate business applications that comprise your IT infrastructure. Although enterprise apps most often use different tech stack, they can be merged through middleware. The choice of EAI tools depends on the size and complexity of an IT infrastructure:
However, the growing demand for mobile enterprise apps – as well as the use of wearables and smartphones in the workplace – pushes enterprises towards more flexible EAI strategies. We’re talking about microservices.
Unlike traditional monolith apps that should be installed on each computer, use the same tech stack and be updated as a whole, a microservices architecture consists of multiple apps that treat[2] each function like email automation or report generation as a separate process. Microservices can be written in different programming languages and updated independently. Netflix, Amazon, Groupon and Gilt were among the early adopters of the new technology. Some tech experts including Kai Wähner (TIBCO) believe[3] the microservices approach means the inevitable death of traditional EAI
Ok, but what does it have to do with the Internet of Things in the first place? IoT and EAI By 2021, the global Internet of Things market will top $ 661 billion. Wearables, beacons and powerful analytics software enable enterprises to fight fraud, prevent machinery downtime, gain a better insight into customer behavior and more; the thing is, high IoT app development costs and interoperability issues still keep the enterprise Internet of Things from going mainstream. Here’s how the Enterprise Application Integration technologies will help you unlock IoT benefits and reach business objectives. Suppose you run a brick and mortar store and want to increase sales. The effectiveness of traditional marketing tricks like decoy pricing and false sense of urgency seems to wear off, so you’ve decided to install beacons and boost your mobile app usage instead. Beacons collect a lot of valuable data on customer behavior that can be leveraged for personal advertising and improving store layouts. However, you should integrate the cloud-based infrastructure app that analyses beacon data with your CRM system. Thus, your IoT ecosystem will feature three major components:
Unless your business apps work in sync, you can neither use IoT data for business purposes nor integrate your current IT infrastructure with the resources outside your company (that is, enterprise software used by your partners, suppliers and even employees). API-led connectivity (alongside its decentralized access to data) is the future of IT system integration services.
Not sure whether your company is ready for IoT right now? Well, you can visit the r-stylelab.com website to discover the benefits of traditional enterprise app integration. A prominent insurance company from Eastern Europe employed our developers to automate policy issuing and report generation. Aeroflot, the largest aircraft operator in Russia, now uses a comprehensive crew notification system which analyses employee and flight schedules and passes the data to a corporate call center. Thanks to EAI solutions, you can get a better view of your current business activities, improve data analysis and automate time-consuming tasks (no matter how big and complex your IT infrastructure is). Why not give it a try?
[1]http://www.business2community.com/marketing-automation/enterprise-application-integration-ultimate-benefits-business-01436570#XEALFcOGb8PH5rYD.97
[2]https://medium.com/@andrei.klubnikin88/microservices-architecture-future-of-enterprise-app-development-e875203ef2bb#.sjk88hy4q [3]https://www.voxxed.com/blog/2015/01/good-microservices-architectures-death-enterprise-service-bus-part-one/
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