IBM Lays SOA Foundation
Type: Competitive Intelligence Report
Analyst: S. Willett
Report Date: September 14, 2005
Module: Application Infrastructure
ID: CIR14508 |
Current Perspective: Neutral
Vendor Importance: Moderate/High
Market Impact: High |
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Summary
Event Summary
September 13, 2005 -- IBM announced new software, services, and an expanded partner initiative to help clients manage business processes by deploying a service-oriented architecture (SOA). With business processes supported by an SOA foundation, a company can become an on-demand business by making its previously siloed data and software applications interoperate better across business units, as well as with third parties. This approach leverages existing resources to help companies improve productivity, react quickly to changing market conditions, and seize opportunities.
Analytical Summary
• Current Perspective: Neutral on IBM’s new SOA Foundation and its new sets of SOA services, because the company has a huge breadth of products and services, but it needs to simplify its approach in order to fulfill the promise of SOA.
• Vendor Importance: Moderate to high to IBM, since the new products and services in the SOA Foundation will be a major source of revenue and will set the stage as the industry transforms into SOA integration and away from traditional proprietary integration solutions.
• Market Impact: High on the integration and Web services market, because competitors need to respond to IBM’s “SOA Foundation” set of products and services, as it will be the dominant player for the foreseeable future.
Target Markets
B2B Communities, End Users, Global 2000, Resellers/Channels, Systems Integrators, Third Party Implementers, Web Portals
Perspective
Current Perspective: Neutral
We are taking a neutral stance on IBM’s announcement of a number of SOA-related services and products. On the product side, the company has reconfigured many of its WebSphere products under the “SOA Foundation” umbrella, a rather broad grouping that includes integration, development tools, portals, and management offerings from Tivoli. The company has done some positive things here, like bring in a new ESB product and some SOA management capabilities. However, it suffers from complexity -- too many products, too much redundancy, too many entry points. This is a far cry from the model of simplicity that an SOA was supposed to engender.
SOA, at its core, is a concept about making information and processes available as re-usable services. This was supposed to replace the spaghetti strands of information exchange in current corporate networks. On top of these services, it would be easier to build process-driven applications that could be monitored and changed as conditions warranted. IBM is one of the big winners in any move to SOAs, as more and more logic (in the form of processes), infrastructure, and IT dollars would be spent on SOAs, as opposed to traditional applications, which IBM does not sell. Therefore, its not surprising that IBM is jumping all over SOAs with more and more products and services, including methodologies. By throwing too much, too fast at its SOA Foundation, however, the company is in danger of bypassing the main attraction of SOAs for users, which is a simplified IT environment.
IBM is facing the same conundrum that many users face; an SOA will necessarily touch lots of different disciplines that were formerly in protected silos (i.e., systems management, application development, EAI, data integration, etc.). Getting a handle on an SOA, which is distributed in more ways than one, will likely require new approaches and new products.
The company does have new products to foster the development and management of SOAs. As part of its “SOA Foundation,” the firm is debuting WebSphere ESB and Process Server. Although the firm will reveal more details in later announcement, the ESB offering is a stripped down offering with a JMS bus, graphical tools to connect services endpoints, which runs on the WebSphere application server for quality of service and failover. Also part of the SOA Foundation is “Process Server,” which combines the functionality of ESB with a process tool. Additionally, the firm will ship a new version of Message Broker, with full transformation and routing as an “advanced ESB” product. IBM will also ship a Tivoli Composite Application Manager for WebSphere, which provides services management comparable to pure plays and HP, including failover and quality of service. In combination with the ESB product, this can help IT managers deploy and control a widely distributed set of services. There is a barrage of other new products laid down as part of this new foundation. WebSphere Integration Developer includes the firm’s process tool from its application server, along with tools to connect to services easily. This tool is an evolution from its WebSphere Studio Application Developer Integration Edition. Also mentioned is an enhanced version of its main BPM tool, the WebSphere Business Modeler, with more collaboration and a new version of its portal and collaboration services.
IBM would not be IBM without services. The company is expanding its services around SOAs with “Industry Accelerators,” which includes best practices, reference architectures, industry models, and software to help various verticals get started on building an SOA. It is also debuting a host of new services to help plan, model, implement, and manage SOAs. The firm has probably the most extensive catalog of SOA services coming from ISG and WebSphere. This can be a big attraction to larger firms and those with an emphasis on planning and methodology.
As mentioned earlier, this announcement suffers from too many products and “entry points” cluttering up what is supposed to be a simplified environment. For example, process modeling can start in Rational, Modeler, the new Integration Developer, or in the new Process Server product. The addition of items such as portals, the Rational development tools, and collaboration into the SOA Foundation is a stretch and dilutes what it is all about. In addition, the new plan for integration products is incomplete and confusing. While the ESB product is a welcome addition, the company is supplying too few details. Process Server seems to compete with Message Broker. The upgrade path is also confusing. The firm is advertising Message Broker as the “advanced ESB,” although Process Server is built directly on the ESB product. Putting SOA management in the Tivoli suite disconnects basic configuration and management from integration. It also makes it an expensive proposition to purchase Tivoli and WBI
The company needs to do three things: simplify, simplify, simplify. At the core of SOAs are, of course, services; the company should start from there -- how to create, configure, manage, and link services. The new ESB product is a good start, but there needs to be a clear upgrade path and the rest of WBI needs to have new upgrade paths also. The company should consider a stronger role for UDDI as an organizing element for distributed services in an SOA. It should also consider bundling in the Tivoli Composite Application Manager with this basic infrastructure. The firm should put BPM on top of this foundation (and application development, if necessary). There should be more support for BPEL and WS-* standards in these announcements. IBM supports them, but it sometimes is not clear where they end up in the myriad of products that are offered.
IBM’s new products, particularly the ESB and Process Manager, will have a big impact, since smaller competitors will have to adjust to their presence. IBM is giving competitors an opening to compare its overly broad and complex approach to SOAs with a simplified one. Many competitors will take that opportunity.
Positives and Concerns
Competitive Positives
• IBM unleashes a barrage of SOA-related services and products. The company has built up an expertise in SOA implementations, which it is exploiting through an expanded set of offerings. In terms of software, it has re-positioned a number of products as the “SOA Foundation.” This includes products to model (WebSphere Business Modeler, Rational Architect), assemble (Rational tools), deploy (application server, integration, portal, data integration), and manage (WebSphere Business Monitor, Tivoli products). The sheer breadth of products to support an SOA is daunting and hard for any competitor to replicate at this point. With the SOA Foundation, the firm is making some effort to pick out products from various divisions that are vital to an SOA and put them in some sort of common architectural paradigm.
• As part of the SOA Foundation, the firm is debuting WebSphere ESB and Process Server. Although the firm will reveal more details in a later announcement, the ESB is a stripped down offering with a JMS bus, graphical tools to connect services end points, which runs on the WebSphere application server for quality of service and failover. Also part of the SOA Foundation is Process Server, which combines the functionality of ESB with a process tool. Additionally the firm will ship a new version of Message Broker, with full transformation and routing as an “advanced ESB” product.
• The firm is approaching integration from another angle with a new product dubbed “WebSphere Integration Developer,” which includes the firm’s process tool from its application server, along with tools to connect to services easily. This tool is an evolution from its WebSphere Studio Application Developer Integration Edition. The firm is bringing other products to bear on the Foundation, including an enhanced version of its main BPM tool, the WebSphere Business Modeler, with more collaboration and a new version of its portal and collaboration services.
• The Tivoli products will also support SOA Foundation. In particular, the firm will ship a Tivoli Composite Application Manager for WebSphere, which provides services management comparable to pure plays and HP, including failover and quality of service. The product also includes diagnostics to understand service flows and relationships. In combination with the ESB product, this can help IT managers deploy and control a widely distributed set of services.
• The company is expanding its services around SOAs with “Industry Accelerators,” which includes best practices, reference architectures, industry models, and software to help various verticals get started on building an SOA. It is also debuting a host of new services to help plan, model, implement, and manage SOAs. There are entry points for business users, IT, and LOB managers. The firm has probably the most extensive catalog of SOA services coming from ISG and WebSphere. This can be a big attraction to larger firms and those with an emphasis on planning and methodology.
Competitive Concerns
• An SOA is supposed to simplify an IT environment, but this overlapping set of products and product categories from different disciplines seems to add to the complexities of an IT environment, rather than subtract from it. IBM is simply throwing too many products in its “SOA Foundation” to make it meaningful, with too many bewildering choices of where to start. For example, process modeling can start in Rational, Modeler, the new Integration Developer, or in the new Process Server product. The addition of items such as portals, application development, and collaboration into the SOA Foundation is a stretch and dilutes what the it is all about.
• The new plan for integration products is incomplete and confusing. While the ESB product is a welcome addition, the company is supplying too few details (more are expected next week) on pricing, product functionality, and for which use cases it is designed. At this point, it looks like transformation is not in the product, nor is a BPEL process tool. This will put it at a disadvantage from some of the ESBs on the market. The upgrade path is also confusing. The firm is advertising Message Broker as the “advanced ESB,” although Process Server is built directly on the ESB product.
• The Process Server is also a hybrid product that seems to compete with Message Broker, or at least significantly overlap it. The role of Interchange Server in the continuing evolution of the firm’s WBI product is unclear. Of course, all of this overlaps to some degree with the Integration Developer.
• Putting SOA management in the Tivoli suite disconnects basic configuration and management from integration. It also makes it an expensive proposition to purchase Tivoli and WBI. There is evidence that an SOA, as a distributed integration environment (distributed in the profound sense that services are appearing from many different sources), necessarily demands integration and management be tied together. The other element of management is a directory. IBM does not mention its UDDI directory at all, which is part of its application server.
• IBM’s clear leadership in SOA services is a double-edged sword. Competitors will claim it is necessary to make sense of the numerous products and approaches. It could also ratchet up the cost of building an SOA.
Recommended Actions
Recommended Vendor Actions
• IBM needs to simplify its approach to SOA development and management, not simply list dozens of products that overlap or are somewhat superfluous to an SOA. At the core of SOAs are, of course, services; the company should start from there -- how to create, configure, manage, and link services. It should then overlay this with additional functionality, such as process tools and more complex integration brokering, which can enable higher-level applications on top of an SOA. Just because an application can be exposed as a service or can consume a service, does not make it part of an SOA infrastructure or foundation (re: portals or Rational application development tools).
• The company should consider a stronger role for UDDI as an organizing element for distributed services in an SOA. This goes beyond discovery and could include policies and management. It should also continue to standardize on BPEL and BPMN for its different process tools to interoperate.
• The company is already grappling with a host of acquired products in WBI; now, it has thrown two new ones in the mix. The company needs to sort out its ESB and how it relates to other integration products. It should consider low-level BPEL processes and some transformation in its ESB, as well as implementations of new WS-I standards. It should clarify what the upgrade path is for WebSphere ESB and, for that matter, what it is for other WBI products in light of Process Server. The firm needs to differentiate Process Server from Message Broker (or “Advanced ESB,” as it will be called).
• The firm should include the Tivoli Composite Application Manager in a suite with its ESB product and/or process manager product.
• The company has several different process tools, including Rational tools, which could be entry points in building higher-level functionality on top of an SOA. While it is not unreasonable to have duplicate process tools, it should better explain what entry point is best suited for what user or use case.
Recommended Competitor Actions
• Competitors in the integration space that do not yet have an ESB product (i.e., TIBCO, Microsoft, etc.) should consider one.
• Competitors with ESBs should consider some basic management capabilities (for services not running on their platform) and they should consider UDDI as an organizing force for distributed services.
• ESB competitors should consider a basic BPEL flow tool in their ESB (not necessarily a full-fledged BPM), transformation, and brokering/messaging capabilities. They should hasten to add new WS-I standards in their ESBs.
• While few competitors can compete with IBM on breadth of products, most can counter with more simplified offerings, minimal duplications, unified interfaces, and clear upgrade paths and use cases. The key to competing against IBM is to reduce headaches for IT, not create more.
• Competitors should develop their own SOA methodology and best practices, but also turn to larger SIs for help in consulting and professional services in order to counter IBM.
Recommended End User / Customer Actions
• Users should consider IBM for building their SOAs, due to its wide range of products, services, and expertise.
• However, users should plan in advance what subset of IBM products they will employ and how, and ask IBM for discounts for this bundle.
• Users should keep in mind that they will likely need to manage services in a profoundly distributed environment and will need SOA management and UDDI to achieve this. In many cases, this type of distributed management will be linked tightly with traditional integration functionality.
• Current WBI customers should ask for clarification on the roadmap, given the new Process Server product and ESB product.
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