A Comparison Framework for SOA Maturity Models

SOA is an architectural style for both business and IT. SOA adoption is a gradual process and has different levels. These can be referred as SOA maturity levels and represented through SOA maturity models (SOA MM). The paper focuses on SOA MM whose importance has already been realized by industry, as a result we have many maturity models from both industry and academia. However, each of these models address different aspects of SOA and an enterprise may not be able to choose the adequate one. This paper presents a comparison framework by considering the important elements of SOA and their influence in SOA MM. This paper also focuses on prominent trends in SOA and the additional dimensions that SOA MMs needs to consider. The framework is useful to: (i) understand the strong link of SOA MM and enterprise SOA adoption, (ii) identify how far the existing models considers the important SOA parameters, (iii) analyze the gaps in the SOA MM they are adopted (if any), (iv) model or expand SOA MM specific to an enterprise, and (v) understand the influence of recent technology trends in SOA and their roles in SOA MM.