Enterprise Architecture

Enterprise Architecture is the organizing logic for business processes and IT infrastructure reflecting the integration and standardization requirements of the firm’s operating model. Practitioners are called enterprise architects.

Developed to respond to the need to align information technology investments with business strategy, the practice of enterprise architecture has evolved into a broad category of activities designed to understand, justify, optimize and, communicate the structure and relationships between various business entities and elements. Included in these practices are business architecture, performance management, organizational structure and process architecture.

Modelling the Enterprise Architecture is becoming a common practice within the U.S. Federal Government to inform the Capital Planning and Investment Control (CPIC) process. The Federal Enterprise Architecture (FEA) reference models serve as a framework to guide Federal Agencies in the development of their architectures. The primary purpose of creating an enterprise architecture is to ensure that business strategy and IT investments are aligned. As such, enterprise architecture allows traceability from the business strategy down to the underlying technology.

Companies such as BP,Independence Blue Cross,Intel and Volkswagen AG also have applied enterprise architecture to improve their business architectures as well as to improve business performance and productivity.