To Build or Not To Build

 

Increased management costs, implementation complexities and frequent requirement changes are elevating the cost of developing software applications. As a result, businesses are now designing applications around an N-tier architecture, an architecture in which:

• The user interface, the business logic and the data storage are developed and maintained as independent modules, most often on separate platforms, AND
• The business logic consists of one or more separate modules, most often running on different servers.

One benefit of separating applications into distinct pieces is that it enables parallel development of the different tiers of the application. For example, a team of developers can work on the user interface tier, while another writes the business tier, while yet another works on the data tier. More importantly, if you have limited resources--and which software company doesn't?--you don't even need to develop the tier in-house. You can either outsource its development, or integrate an existing application.

To Build or Not To Build

Before deciding which tier(s) to build in-house, ask yourself the following question: What is your company's value proposition? In other words, what is it about your application that differentiates you from your competitors? Any tier that supports your value proposition should be developed in-house. Any tier that doesn't…

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