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EAI (enterprise application integration)

By Robert Sheldon

What is enterprise application integration (EAI)?

Enterprise application integration (EAI) is the process of connecting an organization's business applications, services, databases and other systems into an integrating framework that facilitates communications and interoperability. An EAI platform enables the seamless exchange of data, while automating business processes and workflows. The platform ensures that the organization uses its data consistently and that changes to data by one system are correctly reflected in the other systems.

An EAI platform operates like a type of middleware that connects the disparate systems together. The platform can be implemented without reprogramming the participating systems or altering them in any significant way. Instead, the platform uses technologies such as message-oriented middleware (MOM), service-oriented architecture (SOA), enterprise service bus (ESB) or application programming interfaces (APIs) to enable the systems to work together.

An effective EAI platform can accommodate a wide range of on-premises applications and cloud-based services. For example, EAI can be used for systems such as accounting and billing, customer relationship management (CRM), human capital management (HCM), supply chain management (SCM), enterprise resource planning (ERP) and many others. The platform's flexibility also makes it easy to add, remove or update applications or services without impacting productivity or requiring large-scale system redesigns.

Why is enterprise application integration important?

Most organizations rely on numerous applications and services in their day-to-day operations. In addition to serving different purposes, these systems often have their own data stores, proprietary processes and methods of communication. Such disparate systems can create multiple data silos, resulting in duplicate and inconsistent data or data being available to one system but not another.

Siloed data can present a number of challenges. For example, users might need to manually copy and paste data between applications to accomplish a single task or be required to consult multiple applications to carry out their daily routines. At the same time, data analysts must contend with incomplete, inconsistent or inaccurate data, making it difficult to answer important business question or make data-driven decisions.

An EAI platform includes the tools and capabilities necessary to enable the applications and services to share their data and workflows, which in turn can help reduce manual steps, limit the number of data errors, and lead to better insights into the organization's data. System integration becomes even more important as data volumes continue to grow and applications become more sophisticated. In such an environment, an effective EAI platform can offer an organization several important benefits:

An EAI framework can offer other benefits as well. However, implementing such a platform can also bring with it challenges:

Goals of enterprise application integration

The primary purpose of an EAI platform is to integrate disparate systems so they can exchange data in a way that increases operational efficiency and delivers better quality data. To this end, the platform provides integration at several levels:

Types of enterprise application integration

Vendors take different approaches in designing their EAI platforms, giving organizations a wide range of options from which to choose. Selecting one design over another will often depend on the organization's specific requirements and circumstances. However, EAI designs can vary significantly, and it's not always clear how they might differ. Here are several common designs often used by EAI platforms to integrate disparate systems:

An EAI platform is not necessarily locked into any one of these designs. A vendor might offer a variation on a particular design or opt for a hybrid approach that mixes different designs. A hybrid platform can be especially beneficial when working with both on-premises and cloud-based systems. For example, an EAI platform might use ESB technologies for legacy on-premises applications and integration platform as a service (iPaaS) for the cloud resources.

Explore three top integration frameworks. Find out if an integration platform as a service is right for you.

05 Mar 2024

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