SOA filling the Gaps

After lecturing on SOA  concepts, Architecture and Technology, I present Case Studies . While presenting Case Studies , I ask my students: "Why many Case Studies and Success Stories are from the Telco industry?"  Usually they do not provide a good answer to the good question. It is a good question because the answer is based upon Business dimension, Technology dimension and the relationship between the two dimensions.  Why SOA implementation is necessary for Traditional Telco Service Companies? For many years, Traditional Telco companies revenues were based upon telephone calls billing. In USA Bell Labs was split to Baby Bells. In other countries these companies were Monopolies or Duopolies .   Due to lack of competition, their revenues were high. When Voice over IP matured they found a lot cheaper competition such as Skype .  When someone traveled to other countries, he called his family in his home country. The Telco service providers earn...

In all Vendors Survival posts (e.g. Google , Apple , HP ) I argued that no company will surely survive for a decade. People may think that I am wrong as far as a giant market leaders are concerned. However, I recently read two interesting articles about  a leading Virtual World company almost vanishing 5 years  after  its peak . The article is titled: Why Second Life failed?    The second article is more surprising: it is about a giant company included in my Vendor Survival posts,  as well as in other posts. The company is: Microsoft . On June 8th I wrote the post: Will Microsoft Survive until 2021?  which discuss the possibility that Microsoft will not survive until 2021. Less than a month prior to this post I wrote a post titled: Microsoft's Skype acquisition: Warning Signs ahead . The title depict my message: probably, Skype acquisition will not solve Microsoft's Mobile market challenges.  The Business Insider 's article titled: Steve...

Microsoft and Skype announced that they have entered into a definitive agreement under which Microsoft will acquire Skype , the leading Internet communications company, for $8.5 billion in cash from the investor group led by Silver Lake . The agreement has been approved by the boards of directors of both Microsoft and Skype . There are mixed opinions concerning the expected acquisition.  I see the warning signs ahead .  I do think that analyzing important factors such as the number of months Microsoft's profit's sum to 8.5 billion USDs or tax reduction due to acquisition of a Luxemburg based company are irrelevant or at best secondary. Even if a company profits are high, the company could find better investment alternatives, e.g. spending more on R&D , buying other companies or investing in companies without acquiring them. The last option was chosen by Microsoft in order to invest in Facebook . The significant factors are: What Strategy is used for increasing...