Plymouth University
Delivers improved IT and business outcomes with web-based erwin EA Agile
CLIENT PROFILE
Plymouth University is the 15th largest university in the United Kingdom with approximately 27,000 students and 3,000 staff.
CHALLENGE
The Enterprise Architecture (EA) Practice of Excellence is part of the university’s centralised IT organiation and is responsible for delivering services and support. The team relied on disparate spreadsheets, diagrams, documents and databases, and tying all the information together was an enormous challenge.
SOLUTION
They selected erwin EA Agile to organise their assets through a centralised repository for more efficient use. Much to their delight, they realised they could start using the erwin solution within a day.
They were able to use their existing information and data to produce some initial architecture models and, thanks to the SaaS-based tool, were up and running promptly since no software implementation was required. “Getting started was totally painless and very quick as the tool is intuitive to use,” commented Craig Douglas, enterprise architect.
The team is continually building out and maintaining a baseline architecture so they can understand the impact of change across the entire organisation. Working collaboratively, technical and solution architects can submit information into erwin EA Agile, which is immediately available to others for modeling and analysis. As a web-based tool, everyone can access information regardless of whether they use a PC or Mac.
“Once the data is entered into the tool, the reporting and analysis comes into play. Impact analysis lets us see how changes and investment decisions in one area
can affect related concepts elsewhere in another department or another area of the university,” said Craig. “Customising and reporting on the meta-data is also extremely useful for our business planning activities.”
“By utilising the efficiencies in erwin EA Agile, our team can add value to business areas outside of IT, which reinforces how a modern and agile IT function can aid the entire organisation,” said Adrian Hollister, head of strategy and architecture.
RESULTS
- Established a centralised, web-based enterprise architecture repository
- Proved the value of enterprise architecture to the business by eliminating
costs and business/IT complexity - Adopted a collaborative approach to enterprise architecture management
- Increased agility in producing reports and architectural analysis for senior decision- makers
- Created closer alignment of overall business and IT strategy objectives
erwin Enterprise Architecture
erwin offers two distinct paths for enterprise architecture (EA), based on customer needs. If you’re following industry frameworks, such as TOGAF® and ArchiMate® 3.0, we provide a SaaS-based, out-of-the-box platform called erwin EA Agile (formerly Corso Agile EA) that will have you up and running instantly. If you’re looking for an on-premise solution that can be customised and fully integrated into your environment, we offer erwin EA (formerly Casewise). With either option, you’ll be able to better plan, govern and manage change while staying focused on innovation.
