Several attendees at this week's HP Software Forum here said that as more large companies launch service-oriented architectures, there's a growing need for software that can help users manage the implementation of SOAs and monitor their use.
For example, DHL International GmbH plans to launch an SOA prototype in about a month, said Dennis Deane, the delivery company's Prague-based program manager for European IT services. DHL is eager to deploy an SOA because of expectations that it will enable easy reuse of applications, vastly reducing development time. "It will eliminate the custom connections we have to make to each [business] partner," Deane said.
But managing the process will be complex and require sophisticated software, Deane said. With that in mind, DHL is exploring SOA management tools from IBM and wants to review the OpenView SOA Manager software that Hewlett-Packard Co. announced at the conference, which was jointly sponsored by HP and the OpenView Forum International user group.
