Project objectives

The aim of the project was to select an integration platform for the customer which will make it possible to implement the automation of business processes and operate integration services over the long-term. Selection included the setting of criteria with regard to the company's operating and development capacities.

The customer wanted to choose a platform that it would be able to develop using internal capacities, or would be able to outsource these capacities on the market or to its suppliers.

The customer will use the integration platform to interconnect its systems, which are both on-premise environments and in the cloud. At the same time, these systems are located in different countries around the world and the platforms must run 24/7. The implementation of services will proceed over time on the basis of business requirements.

Implementation

An assignment for suppliers (RFI) was created based on an analysis of the customer's processes and requirements for the integration platform. The assignment included a description of simplified integration services in order to make it possible to compare individual technologies from the perspective of the costs of the platform and the relevant service. On-premise and cloud platforms were offered as part of the selection solution.

In terms of operational and technological capacities, technologies were selected for RFQ that enable cloud operation, primarily due to the simpler operation of such a solution, the insufficient capacities for operating on-premise platforms and, in the case of 24/7 support, the higher prices of follow-up support.

A demonstration service was proposed and described for the technologies selected, with those suppliers implementing these within the technology offered, and the details of development and possible operation of the platform were dealt with in demonstrations. Both SaaS platforms and PaaS services made it into the final selection.

Result

After evaluating all criteria and the presentation of individual suppliers, the Azure platform with the following PaaS services was selected together with the customer:

• Azure Functions
• Azure Event Grid

The combination of these services makes it possible to effectively satisfy customer requirements and at the same time gradually develop and scale the performance of the integration platform. Individual integration services can be gradually added and implementation can be divided among various development teams. At the same time, the price of subscriptions rises with a higher number of services. As a result, major sums do not have to be invested in licences at the beginning of implementation.

Individual functionalities can be implemented in technologies and languages that the internal development team knows, meaning that experience can be gained with this technology.

The customer is presently evaluating PoC, where it is already implementing the first integration services.

What says the customer about our services?

"Wesecon helped us choose an integration platform for transferring data between systems across Linet. They analyzed the requirements for the platform and helped us to create the terms for the tender. Thanks to the recommendation to consider cloud solution, a technology that meets the functional and economic requirements was chosen. When working with Wesecon, I particularly appreciate their high expertise and pro-customer approach."

Miroslav Lapour, CIO, LINET Group SE