Improving Business Flexibility through Application Integration
Application Integration Chapter 2 – 12/15/04


Companies that can effectively use their IT systems to adapt to changing 
business conditions stand to gain significant competitive advantage.
 
IBM’s Business Integration Reference Architecture is the technical 
framework that provides companies the ability to bridge multiple systems 
spread across the entire enterprise. Because its components are modular, 
implementation can start small and grow to cover all of a company’s 
integration needs, both internal and external. The architecture makes it 
possible for software to be delivered as reusable, shareable services, and 
is built to support full implementation of a service-oriented architecture.  

Let’s look at how Global Industrial Corporation used the IBM WebSphere 
portfolio to integrate its existing applications and more effectively meet 
the increasing demands of its customers.

The company chose to build an Enterprise Service Bus, or ESB, which is an 
architecture that enables software applications to communicate with one 
another without requiring any changes to the applications themselves. 
The components of the ESB helped the company integrate its existing 
applications and systems and better connect them to suppliers.

At the core of the ESB framework is WebSphere MQ, which provided the 
company with the transport, assured delivery and common APIs 
necessary for connecting applications that were written for different 
operating platforms, programming languages and message formats.

The company used WebSphere Business Integration Message Broker—
which is built on WebSphere MQ—to enable its message routing and 
transformation among multiple applications. This also increased the 
interoperability of Web Services-enabled applications with those that 
were not enabled for Web services.

The company used WebSphere Business Integration Adapters to 
accelerate the connection of applications to the ESB.  WebSphere 
Adapters can create events for the ESB to capture and route to the 
appropriate application. The company deployed WebSphere Application 
Server, working in conjunction with WebSphere MQ and WebSphere 
Business Integration Message Broker, to track order processing with their 
business partners.  Finally, the company used WebSphere Business 
Integration Connect to create a community integration solution and 
better connect to its trading partners. This helped the company fill 
customer orders faster, improving its on-time shipping record and 
increasing customer satisfaction.

IBM’s Business Integration Reference Architecture helps businesses solve 
difficult strategic integration challenges. Companies can standardize on 
this architecture to increase business flexibility and reduce the total cost of 
ownership.

If you’d like to learn more about solving your business integration 
challenges, ask IBM to schedule a free Business Integration Architecture 
Workshop with an IBM Business Integration Solution Specialist.