Having an extensive business model, managing expanding operations and meeting service delivery expectations are key reasons why many firms have multiple disparate subsystems that require integration solution to function seamlessly. Companies planning to unify different systems have the option to either develop a suitable software in-house or purchase an integration software package. Though efficient and effective integration solutions are available, many companies are still reluctant to consider them, especially when in-house integration interface development has become the norm.
Whether you want to purchase a ready-to-use integration solution or build one in-house, the objective assessment of your business needs should inform your decision. This article provides an insight into the advantageous propositions of ready-to-use integration software compared to cumbersome in-house development.
Key Issues of Custom-built Integration Solution
Various disparate applications are installed at different points in time in various functional areas, resulting in business process inefficiencies and software integration challenges. Issues usually crop up during, and after in-house integration solution development, like resource unavailability, extended deployment time frame, and the impact of the development process on time-to-market of your products and services.
Key difficulties surrounding in-house integration projects include:
- Complexity: A rapidly growing company can quickly become entangled with a composite application landscape. If you are considering integrating multiple disparate subsystems, an In-house integration development can be very tedious. It will require an extensive assessment of necessary requirements that will make the project successful. Your development staff would need to have the right skills, conversant with the latest integration best practices, appropriate technologies and standards else you might end-up with an inefficient solution. Also, massive effort will be required to limit or avoid disruptions that may occur during the development. Your firm do not need to be burdened with complexities when ready-to-us integration solution is available.
- Time consuming: Your development staff will require ample time to develop a good integration solution from scratch. They will need time to think through various aspects of the project, like planning, development and testing. If an aspect is left out or an issue crops up, the development team will need to go back to the drawing board which may occur many times within the course of the project. This makes most custom-built integration solutions to be time consuming.
- Customer churn increase: The current subsystem architecture of your enterprise will continue to deliver at the same level till the custom-built integration software is deployed. As mention earlier, custom solution development is time consuming and customers expect an improved service delivery. Also, customer acquisition and revenue growth are key pillars to your company’s continued success. With fierce competition, it is essential that your company provide an exceptional customer experience every time or risk having customers take their business elsewhere.
- High maintenance consideration: You might end up incurring more cost than envisaged in the maintenance of your customized solution especially when it has been deployed and further limitations are identified requiring more developments and enhancements. Your development team will waste enormous amount of time and cost in maintaining the custom integration solution when valuable time that could be used to make the business more productive is wasted.
Advantageous proposition of ready-to-use integration solution
- Affordability: Ready-to-use integration solution provides more competitive options with in-built operational specification mechanism which do not require custom coding. It makes use of well-known protocols and formats with a wide range of interconnected options for standard messaging and diverse platforms, enabling time-saving implementation and deployment process that makes the whole procedure affordable.
- Effective and Versatile Implementation: In-house integration usually developed to capture only current business needs, without considering future expanding requirement compared to versatile ready-to-use integration, designed according to best practices to meet increasing user demands, offering instantaneous processes and open architecture that supports both existing and emerging solutions, making it easy for new technologies to be plugged into the enterprise, enabling the solution to remain up-to-date.
- Seamless Integration with Third-party technologies: In-house development may not consider support for other third-party applications that may be required in the future, which might result in limited capabilities. Ready-to-use integration applications are standardized with numerous third-party interconnected options for web services, CRM and ERP applications, standard communication format, data management and efficient API support for effective solution integration.
- Swift Time-to-Market: When considering a swift integration solution deployment for your enterprise, the time consuming nature of in-house development makes it unsuitable for your business need. A more appropriate valuable option is a ready-to-use integration software. Its short learning curve and integration process allows your development team to swiftly complete the deployment with little or no training. It uses simplistic processes and your IT teams will find it easy to use and extend the deployment all over the enterprise. Users can easily connect it to other solutions accelerating the time to market of your products and services.
- Reliability and Proven solution: Ready-to-use integration solution would have gone through rigorous processes to ensure its efficiency and effectiveness. Feedbacks obtained from companies using it would have been applied resulting in a more robust solution advantage compared to custom-built development. Also, it comes with support and maintenance considerations that empowers your IT team and assures the optimization of your business processes.
In conclusion, in-house integration solution development comes with complexities and are time consuming while ready-to-use integration offers seamless connectivity to third-party applications, and swift time-to-market of your products and services. The advantageous proposition of ready-to-use integration solution is inexhaustible as it utilizes adaptable and expandable existing and emerging technologies.
At DIDHUB, our available and ready-to-use integration solution can help you swiftly meet your integration solution plan, delivering more value to your business at affordable cost. Contact us today!
