Migrating to the cloud is a major technology shift and one that you should weigh carefully given your current investment in legacy systems and varying levels of cloud application maturity.
For a period of time, you will need applications that work together in order to share information and run your business. Cloud applications by their very nature have a more flexible architecture and can integrate with on-premises applications. For example, integration between Oracle E-Business Suite and Oracle ERP Cloud works well with single sign-on.
This strategy requires that cloud-based SaaS integrate into your existing environment. How challenging that is depends upon a number of factors, most importantly the complexity of your on premises enterprise applications which will remain in place during the hybrid stage in your maturation.
There are different strategies and applications that address the challenge of integrating cloud applications with on-premises applications. If it is a one-to-one integration and data is flowing one way, leveraging a web services API may make the most sense. If you have several integrations and they require data to flow both directions – cloud to on-premises, on-premises to cloud, and cloud to cloud – then Oracle’s Integration Cloud Service (ICS) may be a better option.
Finally, if your future-state architecture calls for numerous on premises and cloud applications all requiring information from the same data objects (customers, inventory, sales, etc.) then perhaps you are a better candidate for SOA Cloud Service. The options are numerous and the right partner can help you determine what the best strategy is for your organization.
In our new guide, we explore the cloud marketplace, key considerations, integrating the cloud with legacy applications, and challenges of current cloud implementations. If you’re considering Oracle Cloud, this guide will provide some clear steps on how to make the move.
