A band of IT executives have joined forces to launch the
Enterprise Architecture Interest Group (EAIG), which aims to help
companies develop and share tips on building well-structured IT
systems.
The fledgling group will release its first creation next month,
a set of 12 meta models intended as architectural building blocks.
It also has working groups studying ways to measure the benefits of
formalising an enterprise architecture, and developing value models
for use by EAIG members and their organisations.
Founding member Richard Taggart, General Motors' chief
architect, said EAIG's goal is to create standards, methods and
practices for enterprise architecture. For now, the group is
excluding suppliers and basing its work on users' input. "It's
important that we not be technology driven, but driven by
practice," he added.
Developing a general architectural plan has helped GM reduce
computing complexity by trimming the number of applications in use
at the company from 7,000 to 3,000, and has contributed to saving
$1bn annually for the past five years, Taggart claimed.
Creating enterprise architectural blueprints can also help
companies cut costs with outsourcing. "It helps you understand what
can or can't, and should or shouldn't, be outsourced," Taggart
said.
EAIG's members also include Volkswagen, DaimlerChrysler Booz
Allen Hamilton, Oakland University, Sandia National Laboratories
and the Zachman Institute for Framework Advancement, a group that
promotes a model called the Zachman Framework as a starting point
for describing enterprise systems. Membership fees start at $5,000
per year.
If EAIG decided to start tapping suppliers' expertise, it is
likely to have a number of eager participants. Formal planning is
part of the "on-demand" strategy espoused by a number of suppliers,
including IBM, and is at the core of Hewlett-Packard's "adaptive
enterprise" vision.
Last year, HP released Darwin, a reference architecture, which
aimed to help companies plan a standardised, flexible IT
infrastructure.
Stacy Cowley and Elizabeth Heichler write for
IDG News Service