Enterprise IT at this point in time is witnessing a transformation in how applications are being delivered. According to research firm Gartner, applications will not be delivered in the form of application stacks, so to speak, but in the form of services.

Indian CIOs have been lucky, considering they never had to deal with any legacy, however, times will change, applications that have been purchased will indeed become legacy soon.

According to Gartner, over the next five or six years, the current application portfolio—the machinery that is now driving the enterprise—will begin to "rust". "From 2008-2013, managing the transition away from the current business application infrastructure will dominate the CIO agenda (0.9 probability)," predicted Andy Kyte, research VP, Gartner. According to Kyte, talent management would be another key area of concern.

Gartner believes that the options for application suite users from 2008 to 2013, will involve:

Fixing small tech glitches with patches

CIOs should continue installing patches for small time glitches in order to ensure system stability. Patches, fixes are released frequently, by the vendors.

Downloading Dot releases (example 11.1, 11.2, 11.x)

Another available option is regularly upgrading to the latest dot release. These are generally free and provided by the vendor. Releases of this kind are frequent.

Buying Integer releases (example 11, 12, 13)

CIOs can go one level above dot releases and buy the latest integer release. This is not an easy task, considering the amount of time and effort involved in this process.

And finally, Migration

CIOs always have an option of migrating to a different application set. However, this may not always be a wise option.
Over the next few years, Gartner believes that CIOs will have to make one of the three choices, with the changing scenario of applications:

• Do nothing, don’t change

This option does not require any kind of migration, or work for that matter. ‘Work with what you have and stick with it’ logic applies here.

• Do as you are told and follow the vendor roadmap

This option involves discussing a strategy with a vendor, and sticking with it.

• Brave new world (build your own answer)

CIOs can choose to be masters of their own will and choose the navigation path for the enterprise, technology wise.

The days of blind upgrades are over. It’s time to make a plan. That is the need of today.
In the wake of all this, one question worth pondering upon is, how should enterprise managements organize themselves to decide among the available options?

According to Gartner, this can be achieved by paying attention to the following:

• Appoint a program Manager. A program manager could be responsible for setting up some sort of a technology program/roadmap for say the next five years.

• Organize work-streams such as inventory, governance model, Finance Model, architecture solution, re-sourcing, project management and review, validation and release management, in order to achieve effective enterprise platform management.

"Operational IT is already in place, but focus should be on how to get where we want to be," mentioned Kyte.

Recommendations:

Gartner recommends that in order to prepare for the future, enterprises must invest in having an inventory of key business applications. Also, companies must identify the lifecycle of each asset. In addition to this, Gartner feels that companies should extrapolate the life cycles for the next five years, and adapting the seven work streams of enterprise platform migration as mentioned above will definitely help enterprises achieve platform migration.