Microservices for redevelopment of enterprise information systems and business processes optimization

Due to cost pressure and static technological development, the lifecycle of large enterprise information systems in operation is coming to an end. At the same time and as part of possible solutions, the demands for cloud systems in the enterprise context is continuously growing. Although microservices have become an established architectural pattern used by well-known companies, many especially smaller corporations are shying away from using them. In this paper we present the positive and negative effects of converting legacy applications into cloud-based microservice architectures. In addition to technical aspects such as maintainability and scalability, organizational consequences are considered and analyzed. Furthermore, the positive effects on existing business processes, especially ITIL Service Management Processes, are addressed and it is demonstrated how ITIL metrics such as MTRS, MRTT or TRD can be optimized by using microservices. We show advantages of a microservice architecture in the optimization of existing business fields and how new business areas can be opened up easier compared to conventional enterprise architectures. Even if microservices are not a silver bullet, they should be considered and evaluated as an opportunity for a new software lifecycle of a legacy enterprise application or as an architectural pattern for profound redevelopment.