SOA (Service-Oriented Architecture) is finding its place in the IT business world today. It is pretty common to hear the term SOA now days from IT industry and many have came up with their own, strong interpretations.

What are strategy and vision behind MS' latest SOA? Many answers to these questions should be found from upcoming "Microsoft Architect Forum 2006" being held (25th) for major architects and developers at COEX Intercontinental Hotel in South Korea.

"Applying 'People Ready' concept will raise business value. Precisely, it is directly related to how one innovates, make partnership, and improve operations, develop better customer relationships." Charles Fitzgerald, general manager of Microsoft's .Net Platform Strategy group, who came to Korea to promote MS SOA said on his opening remarks of the event.

"SOA is not about a product or skill but rather it's about style of how one come up with a system" and "Basic approaches are replacing or rewriting, depending on a particular business situation." explained, GM Fitzgerald.

Of course, a standard is a key to applying SOA. MS is well known for its role in continuing to develop web service technology and still has governance over it today. GM Charles Fitzgerald pointed out that many times SOA projects stagnate or fail because of impractical approaches. His point precisely, identify a one clear project first and only after its success, move on to next phase.

How fast can one get return of investment (Time to Value) is the key here. Without starting practical approach to SOA first and over crowding with unrealistic goals lead to the failure. Most probable reason behind unsuccessful results is from not applying MS' tool and technology he stressed.

Core strategy behind MS' SOA is .net technology and tool and millions of developers worldwide are basing this in their countless projects. With co-work platforms like Biztalk or Windows workflow foundation, XML protocol can be used on consistent base, he explained.

Having the .net framework that can give a concrete SOA is not enough to come up with a project. Rather, MS is suggesting ‘motion’ as the way to come up with the project.

He gave an example case from KT's operation support system. This is a case where control of OSS was transferred from Oracle to MS system that had many issues. With the change, smoother order flow and rapid service development was possible he said.

"SOA does not require huge consulting expenses" and "MS allows usage by various customers possible and there are plenty of cases that did not require consulting. It's readily available with architecture guidance and architect forum." He stressed.

MS Korea's Namhee Park said, "Not only from this Architect Forum 2006 but also by combining contents from architecture guidance, we will form a SOA academy that can explain the SOA strategy in a coherent way to show MS' vision and strategy in wider scope." @