The latest InfoWorld features lessons learned from the verticals and in the editors letter the statement is made that consolidation was an overriding theme and that consolidation is the only way to leave anything in the IT budget for innovation.

Consolidation certainly has its place, but taking only a rip and replace approach to solving the hodgepodge of applications is not going to solve the problem either for a number of reasons including:

• Consolidation through custom coding new applications is costly and time consuming, why reinvent the wheel
• Consolidation through implementing packaged applications is also costly and time consuming due to the inevitable customization that is needed for each business
• Consolidation through extending existing applications is difficult if not possible at all due to old architectures and technologies and limited resources to work on them

Instead, a better solution is to "wrap and reuse" existing applications using a Service Oriented Architecture. This will allow investments in legacy applications to be leveraged allowing them to do what they do well, but allowing the new business logic that is needed to integrate the systems to make them appear "consolidated" to be written, usually in a business process. Benefits of this approach include:

• Lower costs - Rather than having to buy new applications or reinvent the wheel writing new apps from scratch, existing investments are leveraged
• Shorter time to consolidation - By leveraging existing assets the initial projects will be completed quicker than if complete consolidation was done, but subsequent projects will go even quicker because of the library of services that are available
• A more agile business - By building on an SOA a business is more agile and able to adapt to the changing needs of the business

Furthermore, if all out consolidation is desired, building on an SOA allows that to be done incrementally without affecting the applications that have been built.

So, when you are encountered with a situation where consolidation seems like the right solution, consider integration on a SOA with a wrap and reuse approach rather than a rip and replace consolidation.