Woolies gets SOA

Woolworths in Australia is about to introduce its service-oriented architecture (SOA) across the business after several months of intense testing, reports Australian IT.

The first phase of deployment would be in the next two months, Woolworths integration competency centre manager Walter DeWildt said.

The retail giant is using Software AG's Centrasite SOA platform, after testing it across a number of business units for several months.

The need for application and data integration between government departments has made the public sector the leader in SOA adoption, according to Computer World.

"A variety of challenges such as siloed back-end systems, information proliferation and popular demand for efficient online services have combined to drive SOA-related investments in the public sector," said Balaka Aggarwal, senior manager of emerging software for Springboard Research.

Public sector IT spending in Asia Pacific (APAC) will account for an average of 23% of total IT spending as measured from 2005 to 2010, according to the Springboard report SOA in APAC's Public Sector.

Despite high initial start-up costs, SOA centres of excellence can save organisations a significant amount of money in the longer term and are crucial to ensure service quality, consistency and reuse, says Computer Weekly.

According to analyst Gartner, creating such centres enables enterprises to save an average of 30% in time and expenditure on application integration and data interface development, and cut maintenance outlay by 20%.

It can also help them to ensure component reuse levels of about 25%.