Using Technology to Cross Organizational Boundaries, part 6

Conclusion

We've looked at a number of different approaches to building cross-organization electronic business systems. While each system is unique and has its own benefits and drawbacks, we've seen certain trends:

Document exchange vs. object-level binding. Systems such as EDI, webMethods, and CBL that rely on document exchange as the interaction technique are more suited for loosely coupled relationships. The classic middleware approaches of IBM SanFrancisco, CrossWorlds and Extricity that rely on object-level binding require more tightly coupled relationships and pose challenges to meeting corporate security and authorization needs. These systems can provide richer interactions between the partners, but the very richness of those interactions forces the partners to coordinate more closely. Extending EDI to support these rich interactions is sufficiently difficult to be impractical. Both webMethods's XML middleware and CBL are designed to support extensibility and can meet the needs for rich interactions while preserving the advantages of document exchange.
Reuse and focus on high-value activities. In deploying any of these systems, a goal is to minimize the effort spent on low-value mechanics and maximize the effort spent on high-value activities. Further, work done to set up one relationship should be reusable when it comes time to set up a new relationship. All of the approaches attempt to provide standard support for low-value mechanics. EDI describes a standard set of business interactions and EDI vendors provide the support for mechanics. The middleware approaches, both classic and XML-based, encapsulate support for relationship mechanics within the middleware frameworks and products. CBL provides a toolkit covering the mechanics of business interactions so that particular relationships and protocols can more easily be supported.
Coordination between business partners. Approaches such as the classic middleware systems that attempt to provide a unified view of multiple organizations as a single virtual organization necessarily require close coordination between the business partners. Upgrades and changes to enterprise systems and business processes must be defined in advance and managed in concert with the complete set of business partners to avoid disrupting the cross-organization business processes. In tightly coupled partnerships such as are found in classic value chains, the focus is on cross-organization process efficiency. The systems that address these types of relationships correctly trade off gains in process efficiency against the necessary effort spent coordinating upgrades and system management. In general, the document exchange systems allow for more independence of operation between the business partners. CBL takes this to its logical extreme, allowing a business to describe itself and enable others to take advantage of its offer without the business doing any incremental work.
Evolution of business requirements and protocols. Business requirements will continue to change as businesses adapt to the new opportunities and challenges posed by the Internet and the global economy. In addition, new industry-specific business protocols will continue to be proposed and adopted. A key consideration for any system is its ability to support ongoing evolution and emerging protocols. EDI's clumsy and time-consuming extension process makes it difficult for it to adapt. The classic and XML middleware approaches can adapt, but at the cost of new releases from the system vendors or of new integration and customization work by the implementors. CBL is intended to support ongoing evolution of business requirements and to serve as the foundation for implementing new protocols.

To take advantage of new business opportunities and to exploit current opportunities, businesses today need to work more closely with their partners than ever before. A variety of approaches and systems for enabling cross-organization electronic business are emerging. These systems will become as important to businesses as their current enterprise systems are now. Making the correct choices among these systems requires understanding and exploration of the fundamental differences between the systems. Certain approaches fit business needs better than others depending on the nature of the business relationships the approach is intended to support. Making good decisions now will help organizations maximize their current opportunities and position themselves to take advantage of emerging opportunities in the network economy.

Appendix A. Summary of Approaches

The tradeoffs and applicability of each approach are summarized in the table below.

Approach	Integration Technique	Customization and Extension	Deployment Issues	Applicability
EDI	Document Exchange	Extensions defined per-industry. Customization needed per relationship. Performed by adding new document types.	Integration effort required for each partnership	Stable long-term partnerships w/ loose coupling requirements.
Classic Middleware: SanFrancisco Framework	Object level	Per-application extensions. Per-deployment customizations. Performed using standard Java tools.	Starting point for building actual application. Deployment of SF application must be coordinated across all participants.	Single distributed organization or highly integrated partner organizations.
Classic Middleware: CrossWorlds	Object level	Per-deployment customizations. Performed using proprietary tools.	Deployment must be coordinated across all participants.	Single distributed organization or highly integrated partner organizations.
Classic Middleware: Extricity	Document exchange and coordinated business processes.	Per-deployment data customization. Per-relationship process customization Performed using proprietary tools.	Intended for cross-organization deployments. Deployment must be coordinated across all participants.	Tightly coupled partnerships.
XML Middleware: webMethods	Document Exchange used to carry object-level calls	Per-deployment customizations. Performed using WIDL interface definitions.	Participant deployments do not need to be coordinated. Deployment evolution must be coordinated. Integration effort required for each partnership.	Stable long-term partnerships w/ loose coupling requirements.
CBL	Document Exchange	Per-industry extensions. Per-deployment integration. Performed using XML tools.	Deployments do not need to be coordinated. Integration effort needed for each industry.	Partnerships can be tightly coupled or loosely coupled, long-term or transient. Appropriate foundation for other ecommerce protocols



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