InformationWeek

July 24, 2000

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Prudential Finds Integration Is Key To Success

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"This is something the other vendors don't offer," says Roy Schulte, VP and research director at Gartner Group. "It provides more complete shielding of the client from the back-end applications and databases."

The result, he says, is much higher performance.

Prudential did hit some performance snags that were traced to configuration issues with the MQSeries, but they were quickly resolved and didn't cause the implementation schedule to slip.

Level 8 has done some merging of its own since the Prudential project began. The Geneva line of products is being extended beyond enterprise application integration. The line includes a broad suite of components that target business-to-business E-commerce as well.

The extension is facilitated by the architecture of the Geneva technology, which essentially separates the presentation of the application on the client from the data content and from the communication with the back-end data sources. It's transport-independent and object-model-agnostic, supporting object-oriented and procedural interfaces. Consequently, the back ends can be external to the company using the system.

"Using Geneva Integration Broker to integrate Siebel with legacy applications is a tactical move on Prudential's part, but it also conveys a strategic advantage," says Tyler McDaniel, an analyst at Hurwitz Group. "It provides an enabling platform for further E-business initiatives."

In light of Geneva Integration Broker's extensibility, the work Prudential has already done with it can be leveraged across other platforms as they become available. Vaughan expects the integration to contribute considerably to the company's E-commerce initiatives.

Jonathan Vaughan Photo by Gary Gelb "We'll be making products and information available over a variety of distribution channels, and we won't be able to control their infrastructures," Vaughan says. Geneva Integration Broker lets Prudential deliver legacy data in formats that are defined externally.

Level 8's business-modeling approach also helps business-to-business E-commerce. "This is very important in business-to-business integration, where you can't specify the IT interfaces in the other company," says Aberdeen's Dwyer. "If you can define things at a process level, you can trigger the right responses in the external systems--whatever they may be."

Level 8's XML support is an important factor for Prudential, because the insurance industry's own standard-setting bodies are embracing it. And XML has a much lower implementation cost than traditional electronic data interchange formats.

"Geneva Broker provides a messaging layer for delivering an XML structure on the front end," Vaughan says. That will be important as electronic marketplaces and new classes of mobile devices emerge.

"You can't predict what features people will want, but they almost always want to get at data," Vaughan says. "The ability to abstract and standardize data so that front ends can get at it is essential."