By the end of 2006 nine out of 10 companies will have begun the transition to a service-oriented architecture (SOA), according to analyst company the Aberdeen Group. A survey of IT and business professionals revealed that large enterprises are committed to SOA adoption, with many having made significant progress in their strategies.

Many large organisations are using their enterprise resource planning application as the lynchpin of their SOA strategy, Aberdeen Group reports. Peter Kastner, vice president and research director for enterprise integration at Aberdeen, says that SOA is seen as the answer to problems around high IT integration costs and customisation challenges. “SOA is broadly seen as a real technology step forward, with the largest companies, who have the biggest integration problems, leading the way,” he says.