CIOL: What, according to you, are the main drivers for the integration of IT assets?

Sajan Paul: The integration of information assets within today's enterprise is one of the key requirements for competing in the global marketplace. Typically, organizations have developed disparate applications and systems over time, each containing large volumes of data. Each new piece of this technology puzzle may not necessarily connect well or interact with the legacy systems that have been deployed in the past, creating a hybrid infrastructure vulnerable to data logjams and too often requiring inefficient, manual workarounds and remediation. The goal of enterprise information integration is to make data, applications and systems available to all employees across a distributed network, thereby leveraging the organization's investments in technology, and allowing the company to better use information to compete.

CIOL: What are the current trends in integration scenario?

SP: From an integration perspective there are four main areas that should be considered; user interaction, business process, applications and data.

User interaction integration -- The focus is on how to create a single business user collaborative workspace by merging Web-based interfaces with the desktop environment.

Business process integration and application integration -- The merging of business process and application technology has been driven largely by both vendors and IT organizations, who are moving toward a service-oriented architecture (SOA) based primarily on Web services. This includes legacy and islands of voice applications and integration of multimedia user front end.

Data - As companies move toward an enterprise approach to data integration, they must reuse and share data integration expertise and resources. This year will see a greater use of the data competency center concept and on building an enterprise-wide data integration architecture.

CIOL: How were the pre integration days?

SP: As described earlier, organizations have evolved various IT systems and information islands dealing with specific businesses; each one serving it's potential client base. Today, with the advent of SOA, driven by software giants and the industry, Web-based interfaces can provide integration to the information islands and present it to a user in a uniform manner. This is true in most verticals like finance, manufacturing, service and hospitality, etc.

CIOL: What are the challenges for integrating IT assets in an organization?

SP: The challenge is in integrating disparate systems and data structures into a Web-based user front end. This involves huge skilled workforce and developmental activities. We should also keep in mind that there is no disruption in the services currently offered.

CIOL: As a vendor, what do you have for the customers in this regard? What are your products that can cater to these needs?

SP: Nortel is in the forefront of unified communications. Though not involved directly in the IT asset consolidation, SOA is a key area that we work on. SOA allows a Web-based single window for voice, video and data integration. With innovative communication alliance with Microsoft, Nortel is in the forefront of SOA and unified communication.

CIOL: What are your efforts in this direction?

SP: Nortel and Microsoft announced a innovative communication alliance to drive SOA and Web-based multimedia contact center and unified communications. The objective is to provide a single window for the user to access legacy IT assets, voice, video and data. This also takes care of integrating legacy voice systems into the ambit of SOA.

CIOL: What do you foresee for the future in this regard?

SP: Services-oriented architecture is the key moving forward. Applications, whether voice, video and data, will be delivered over Web-based media and the user will have a single front end to communicate irrespective of the  backend systems.

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