Difference Btwn EAI & B2B

EAI

1. Focused on transactions and messages.
2. Standardize and leverage objects/data across systems.
3. Process management automates business processes across systems.
4. High-speed communications provide reliability, availability, and speed.
5. Routing table is used for routing between applications.
6. Route between applications.
7. Look-up and cross-reference is easy.
8. Recovery from lost messages is critical but manageable.
9. Solution must be robust for scalability, reliability, etc.
10. One integration takes one to six months, depending on the tools and system.
11.Implementation timeframes depend on applications and supporting adapters.
12. Reuse is at the event/data layer.
13. Each application requires specialization but there is significant value in architecture to leverage reuse.

B2B

1. Focused on documents.
2. Work with numerous data definitions and standards.
3. Process automation tends to be point-to-point and fragmented.
4. Internet communications may be error-prone and slow.
5. Trading partner profile database is used for routing to each partner.
6. Route between partners and between partners’ multiple applications.
7. Look-up and cross-reference is difficult.
8. Recovery from lost messages is even more critical and difficult.
9. Solution must be good enough to communicate with partners.
10. One integration could take as little as two weeks.
11. Implementation timeframes depend on applications, supporting adapters, and overall e-readiness of an organization.
12. Reuse is at the XML/EDI document layer.
13. Each partner needs specialization so there is significant value in openness/easiness of the tools that are used.

– RGJ

I would offer a challenge: consider why there is no meaningful difference between “internal” and “external” integration. How many of the pros/cons are skewed by the capabilities of a specific tool?

For me, there is no point at all in making a distinction between “A2A”, “B2B”, etc. The concepts and approaches are effectively the same. None of the items in the above lists are unique to one or the other.

Of course, just my opinion.