Generative AI Solutions
November 22, 2023
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When it comes to developing application infrastructure, companies have a lot of decisions to make. Remodeling, designing or extending infrastructure requires firms to make a number of choices. Whether you’re embarking on a new project or working on existing systems or integrations, using microservices design can provide you with tremendous flexibility, saving you a lot of money in the future.
In this guide, we’ll explore microservices software innovation in detail. But before that, it’s important to distinguish between monolithic application and microservices architecture.
Monoliths vs. Microservices
Before discussing how microservices software has revolutionized the world, examining microservices against the older paradigms should be helpful. The monolith software is analogous to spaghetti, a meal that contains noodles and sauce. While you can customize the dish during the preparation phase, once ready, it becomes impractical to swap one of the parts for another because it’s too tightly integrated. The meal can’t adapt to the needs of a newly arrived guest who is gluten intolerant, for instance.
That’s exactly how monolith architecture works. Even for the Service Oriented Architecture (SOA), which is an improvement over a single monolith, you need to shape the services carefully to work with the overall solution. Also, SOA has dominated vendor lock-in, which means you don’t have the flexibility to switch between vendors.
Taking our food analogy forward, microservices architecture is comparable to a box of donuts. To accommodate guests who’re gluten intolerant, you can replace one piece with a wheat-free chocolate cookie or a piece of fruit. In microservices, no single component is dependent on another. Each one is a self-contained part of software designed for a discrete function.
Innovative Efficiency
Microservices are interchangeable and reusable. This makes replacement with new pieces remarkably easier than replacing the entire monolith. It establishes an evolutionary architecture that is capable of growing and adapting to the rapidly changing corporate landscape. For example, if your needs remain unmet with your existing business intelligence dashboard, you can switch to a more feasible option without disrupting the entire system.
By leveraging the modular nature of microservices, enterprises can become much more resilient and attain cost savings. Compare this with the conventional IT governance environment where firms look to standardize as much as they can to allow for maximum resource sharing. In other words, they’d develop a list of the most complicated use cases and find a single tool to accommodate all scenarios.
And what if a team only needs a simple data store without advanced query functionalities? The team would still have to settle with a full-fledged database server with industrial-strength that carries unnecessary functions, leading to high inefficiency and considerably high licensing fees.
You may also be impressed by the risk management/mitigation potential of microservices. Since functionality is dispersed across more than a single service, an application is less likely to have a single point of failure. Thus, applications should have low downtime and perform much better.
If your company has numerous subsidiaries or branches, microservices will help ensure smooth and seamless functioning at minimal costs and times. A clear example is that of Coca-Cola, which transitioned from on-premise software to microservices. This greatly helped the company enhance the customer experience.
Incremental Improvements
Microservice-based software is also capable of fostering incremental improvements with superb agility. Since microservices can be independently replaced, any upgrade to its modular components can be done in an agile manner. As a result, custom software projects are shorter, simpler, easier to understand, and faster to realize.
Continuous improvements can help you improve customer engagement and retention. This can be done by aligning the incremental improvements with the needs and behaviors of your customers.
Plus, keep in mind that talented engineers want exposure to and experience with the latest technologies. They’d stay committed to an organization that fulfills this need and would switch to another organization if they feel deprived of innovative systems. That’s exactly what many of the monolith vendors are facing out there. Stuck in the old paradigms, they’re losing the best talent to innovative companies. Microservices-oriented systems are a great way to attract and retain top talent.
Fostering More Adaptive Business Models
By fostering new business models, microservices allow enterprises to quickly adapt to the changing needs of employees and customers. It can help them be just as innovative as those startups with high-velocity deployment. You might even be able to outplay the competition and fend off other players by launching a new business line, a new service, or even a separate startup.
To keep growing in today’s fast-paced world, a large organization needs to set up a culture of experimentation, according to a McKinsey study. Microservices serve as the driver of experimentation.
An example of an organization that switched from monolithic to a microservices architecture is the REA group that operates the realestate.com.au platform. It made the said transition in 2014, gradually replacing the most important services, including the buyer’s section and the ‘sold’ section, to adapt to the changing customer needs.
It’s due to the new nimble infrastructure that enabled it to launch a world-first innovation in collaboration with NAB. The aim of this release was to bring property search and finance together on a single platform. In case the two parties had a cumbersome ERP to navigate, this kind of integration would have been problematic. The functionality is instead powered by microservices running on AWS infrastructure.
Final Word
To sum things up, microservices software has revolutionized software development. Not only has it decreased the risks, but it has also brought down the costs associated with development and maintenance.
In all the phases, including development, testing, scalability, and deployment, microservices software has enabled concurrency. Such an environment allows for quick adaptation to changes, allowing you to provide unprecedented support and demonstrate unmatched responsiveness to customers’ needs.
To make the most out of microservices software, get in touch with Enterprise Cloud Services AI.
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