Reference project:
Optimization of business processes, process and application integration while using SOA

• The Mission                                                                                                                                                                                                                     Reduce costs and increase customer satisfaction, develop a standardized platform to hide media disruptions from the user and to ensure an optimized working place in one system environment.
  Introduction of an architecture in which the back-end systems are plugged-in and building on the user interface.

• The Solution
  The communication or the data exchange now occurs through services. Before, the exchange occurred through proprietary interface diagrams so the media disruptions could be kept under control (sometimes copying data from application A and inserting it into application B). The integration platform was developed as an Enterprise Service Bus with the use of a SOA-architecture.
  Heterogeneous systems (for example SAP systems, Host systems and Java applications) are used for specific tasks.

• The Advantages
  Since the introduction of the new incentive system the health insurance company has reduced handling time, reduced innovation costs and has increased the service quality as well as customer satisfaction.

• The Implementation
  A pre-analysis was conducted to display the benefits and potentials. First the core processes were addressed and the ones that had the highest quantity or were closest to customer activity were then explored.
  
  An important element was the connection within the heterogeneous IT environment. This was done on the basis of an integration platform which hides the heterogeneity and the multitude of user interfaces that are being used at the moment. In this manner the user does not see the complexity of the IT landscape. The working and business processes were optimized for the user and were displayed in a standardized way.
  
  The interaction between many people or roles in one business process, the exchange of information and the unfinished tasks viewed by users were also taken into consideration.

• The Future
  The project for the optimization of business processes, process and application integration will be developed progressively. Single business processes will be analyzed, the systems and applications will be defined and divided into services and then introduced into the new integration platform.

Reference project:
Process oriented construction of supplier and client master data in SAP-ERP with the use of SOA and BPM with IBM WebSphere

• The Mission:
  Duplicates in the supplier and client master data produce higher operating expenses and disorganize the company’s reporting system. The process oriented construction of the master data with the means of intelligent address research, various validations and procedure workflows according to the four-eyes principle is meant to stop this from happening.

• The Solution:
  SOA and BPM are used to install the construction process. This allows for the flexible adaption of the process as well as the connection with different internal and external services for address research and validation, including different backend systems for the master data and the usage of portal based „Out-of-the-box“- surfaces for the introduction and validation steps.
  
  In detail the solution encompasses the following functions:
  • Introduction of the information via the potential supplier/customer
  • Full text search for supplier or customer data in a replicated SAP database
  • Validation of the addresses according to different criteria (for ex. name of company, location, area code, tax number)
  • Display of the hits (Scoring) and the validation results
  • Initiation of a workflow in order to approve the new supplier/customer according to the four-eyes principle
  • Introduction of the supplier/customer data in SAP ERP

• The Advantages:
  Through SOA and BPM a stiff application code and difficult to adapt process implementation is prevented. This way further validation and research services and steps are embedded and alternatively to SAP ERP other systems are included on demand.
  The integration into established portal software avoids proprietary web applications, depiction and processing of tasks and the handling of disruptions in the process procedure.

• The Implementation:
  The professional implementation process was modeled with WebSphere Business Modeler.
  The BPMN model was taken over into the WebSphere Integration Developer and used as a starting point for the process implementation.
  Later adjustments in the process were realized in the Business Modeler and then taken over into the Integration Developer. This means that the model and the implementation was synchronized at all times.
  The WebSphere Process Server and the therein contained WebSphere ESB (Enterprise Service Bus) serve as the runtime environment.
  A java based research service, as well as various external web based services was attached through the ESB in order to validate addresses (for example area codes, tax number validations). The web based surface for introducing the addresses, the To Do list and the processing of the steps to be validated were carried out with WebSphere Portal and WebSphere Business Space. The connection to the SAP system took place via WebSphere SAP Adapters. IBM DB2 is used for the full text research in a replicated SAP database.