For banks that have long struggled with delivering multiple solutions across multiple channels, there’s some new help. Microsoft’s Banking Integration Factory is a set of best practices and standards that will help banks achieve consistency in integrating services and optimizing the various channels through which they reach customers.

“It’s about beginning to put together a lot of our thoughts toward software development as an industrialized process – that’s why the integration factory. It’s a broad initiative within Microsoft,” said Marley Gray, Microsoft banking industry technology strategist.

The idea of software factories is not a new one for Microsoft. In the past couple of years, Microsoft has unveiled components of guidance, or factories of sorts, ranging from the Composite Application Block (CAB) to the Enterprise Library to its Mobile Guidance for mobile applications. Last year, it released the Web Services Software Factory to aid architects and developers in building higher quality Web services with more predictable results.

“There are about 100 permutations for creating a single Web service,” explained Gray.

The project aims to improve the integration of Microsoft and partner technologies at the services level, and introduce interoperability via composite line-of-business applications. The project does not aim to develop a new messaging standard, just to establish a commonality between vendors to make integration easier.

As an industry specialist, Gray came into the project to focus on the challenges specific to the banking industry.

“Based in Charlotte, I have spent a lot of time with large banks, and I know the business. My challenge was the partner solutions,” he said.

Looking at the competitive pressures in the industry, the team found a few inconsistencies among vendors that a software factory framework could address.

“We came up with the thought of some fundamental blocking and tackling at the services level to get consistencies across partners,” he said.

For example, some vendors have heavily customized products, but in some instances, it might make more sense for that level of customization to be taken down a notch so that different systems for different mediums could better interact.

“Customers might rather a solution that meets 80 percent of their needs, but makes it easier across channels for the teller and the Web site to see records of each other’s interactions,” said Gray.

Gray cautioned that the objective is not to decompose applications into perfect puzzle pieces. Nor is it aimed at finding the single solution for the whole bank, as different channels often have different traits that need to be appreciated.

The Microsoft Banking Integration Factory initially uses the latest advances in the Microsoft platform, as well as technology solutions from ARGO Data Resource Corp., Corillian Corp., Getronics, Harland Financial Solutions Inc., and Jack Henry & Associates Inc. Other industry partners that are supporting the initiative include AdviceAmerica Inc., Fair Isaac Corp., Fiserv CBS Worldwide and Portrait Software PLC.

The next step, said Gray, is to convene a summit in which partners could evaluate which customers they have in common that might make an ideal real-world reference example. For further reading, a white paper on the concept is available at the Microsoft Web Site at: http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/architecture/bb190164.aspx.


By Renee Wijnen Caruthers