Oracle and SAP will embrace service oriented
architecture in their next-generation products, but the companies
are taking different approaches.
As enterprises demand greater agility in applications software
to meet changing business needs, suppliers of enterprise software
are increasingly embracing service oriented architecture and
business process management. The result will be enterprise
applications unlike any seen previously.
The two largest providers of enterprise applications are
pursuing different paths to their next generation products, giving
prospective users a real choice. The differences are stark. Oracle
will continue to build through acquisition SAP will rely more on
internal development and partnerships.
SAP promises to release its next-generation business application
suite in 2007, Oracle in 2008. The two competitors will focus on
master data management, analytics and repository architectures. SAP
has stronger market momentum, better articulated value for
next-generation applications, and a better partnership strategy
than Oracle.
But Oracle's strong middleware platform and greater support of
standards make it a better choice than SAP for firms that will rely
on custom development as well as packaged products.
Earlier this year, Oracle president Charles Phillips and key
executives provided a progress report on Project Fusion, Oracle's
next generation of enterprise applications.
Phillips' presentation demonstrated that Oracle has made
progress in assembling a foundation for the new applications suite
and provided more details on the functional rationalisation of
Oracle's existing application suites (see box).
Oracle also reaffirmed its commitment to deliver its first set
of Oracle Fusion applications in 2008, but the company still has
much hard work to do to meet its schedule.
Oracle has also discussed how it will integrate its latest large
acquisition, Siebel Systems, but has not yet described exactly how
it will incorporate Siebel's customer relationship management
functionality into Fusion applications.
Assuming that Oracle releases the first Fusion applications in
2008, significant adoption and reference implementations are
unlikely before 2010.
This lag will be the result of the time needed for product
hardening and large-scale roll-outs customary for any new
generation of applications.
Peter Zencke, president of SAP's research and innovation
division, revealed details about Business Process Platform, SAP's
next-generation application platform (an evolution of Netweaver),
and the technical plan for the 2007 release of MySAP Business Suite
(MySAP 2007) at the company's analyst conference in December
2005.
SAP is positioning MySAP 2007 as its first fully service-enabled
software release, using SAP's Enterprise Service Architecture. SAP
published a timeline for MySAP 2007 three years ago and says it is
on schedule.
In the meantime, SAP will build billing engines, electronic
payments management, and other new applications separately under
its xApps brand and eventually move those to Business Process
Platform as well.
Assuming that SAP keeps its promise to ship MySAP 2007 on time,
SAP is likely to need 12 to 24 months in the field before MySAP
2007 is demonstrably rock solid and enterprise-ready. This means
that significant adoption and enterprise performance cases are
likely in 2009.
Where to start with service oriented
architecture
Forrester Research recommends businesses gearing up for service
oriented architecture focus initially on data hubs, portals,
service development, integrated analytics, business activity
monitoring and Business Process Execution Language (BPel). These
are the major technologies and techniques used in Oracle's Fusion
Applications and MySAP 2007.
Select the "entry point" to SOA that is most important to your
business, as opposed to trying to master all elements at once, said
Forrester.
Build an initial application to start the learning. Each of
these technologies has applicability to current applications and
can be used to supplement them - for example, by building a
composite application using existing applications.
It is important to acquire enough Oracle Fusion middleware and
SAP Netweaver to start learning. If you are an Oracle applications
user and do not have licences for Oracle Application Server and
BPel Process Manager, get them.
These products are available at a low licence cost relative to
competitive alternatives and contain the key new technologies on
which Fusion applications will be based.
If you are an SAP applications user, start gaining experience by
acquiring the SAP Web Application Server, Portal Server, and
Exchange Infrastructure SAP has low-cost trial offers to reduce the
financial risk of initial exploration.
Along with these options, you should take the opportunity to
evaluate the other options available to you in plotting your course
to SOA-based applications. You have "buy" and "build"
alternatives.
IBM and Microsoft are the largest alternatives to Oracle and
SAP, but many smaller providers also have products and offerings
worthy of consideration if you decide that either custom
development or a specialised industry package is your best course,
said Forrester.
John Rymer is vice-president and research analyst at
Forrester Research, specialising in application servers and
platforms. This article is taken from his paper "Oracle Versus SAP
In Enterprise Applications: Let The Battle Of Architectures
Begin!"