Telematics and Informatics 29 (2012) 219232

Contents lists available at SciVerse ScienceDirect

Telematics and Informatics

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/tele

Customer oriented enterprise IT architecture framework

Nasrin Dastranj Mamaghani a,, Fariborz Mousavi Madani b, Ali Shari a
a
b

Department of IT, ITRC, End of North Karegar St., Tehran, Iran

Faculty of Engineering and Technology, Alzahra University, Tehran, Iran

a r t i c l e

i n f o

Article history:
Received 1 February 2011
Revised 2 July 2011
Accepted 23 July 2011
Available online 10 August 2011
Keywords:
Enterprise architecture
Shannons entropy
Information technology
Customer orientation
Axiomatic
QFD

a b s t r a c t
Due to the rapid expansion and complexity of mechanisms, technologies, systems, processes
and communications in organizations, governance and management has become something
beyond the control of hardware and software systems and include integration and convergence of all components of an organization. Enterprise architecture (EA) by breaking down
the organizations systems to its components and determining the relationship between
them in different layers offers an appropriate solution for understanding and investigating
relationships and processes of organizations which develop strategies and information technology plans. This paper proposes a conceptual model for enterprise IT architecture. For this
purpose, conceptual and reference models of enterprise architecture are investigated and
key concepts of them are described. By identifying dimensions of reviewed models, key
dimensions of the proposed model are extracted and by using Shannons entropy, weight
and priority of each dimension is determined. In order to determine building blocks of each
dimension, a mapping has been established between customer and functional requirements
by using axiomatic method and relations between customer and functional requirements
has been validated by experts opinions using Quality Function Development (QFD) method.
Proposed model has been described by determining goals, components and relations. Then
the model is validated by surveying experts. Finally an Iranian telecommunication enterprise
is selected for a case study and the model is tested there and promoting solutions are proposed to improve the status of the organization for implementing the model.
2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
Enterprise architecture shows how organizational components like business processes, organizational responsibilities,
services and information technology platforms adapt to create powerful integrated mechanisms to suit the organizations
drivers (Armour et al., 1999). Currently, there are different enterprise architecture reference models and frameworks for
designing and developing information systems in organizations that each one introduces different structures and principles
to design and implement enterprise architecture based on organizational needs. In this article a conceptual model of enterprise IT architecture is presented for Iranian customer-oriented organizations. Customer-oriented approach means thinking
about products and services that are required for proliferating or recruitment of technology from the viewpoint of customer.
Solutions of customer-oriented businesses combine rigid processes of industry standard frameworks with experiences,
methodologies, engineering mechanisms, technology and industry tools and resources. These solutions help organizations
continue business planning and receive maximum return on IT investments. This approach includes gathering information
about the customers and its applications, such as personalization and integration of service delivery to customers as well as
identifying opportunities for increasing customer value for organization (Rajal and Savolainen, 1996; Chalmeta, 2006). With
Corresponding author. Address: Department of IT, ITRC, End of North Karegar St., Tehran 1439955471, Iran. Tel.: +98 02184977236.
E-mail address: dastranj_n@itrc.ac.ir (N. Dastranj Mamaghani).
0736-5853/$ - see front matter 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.tele.2011.07.001

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regards to globalization, if an organization wishes to be successful and wants to have a large market share and obtain profitability, it must consider customers in all of its affairs. The aim of this paper is to answer to following question:
1. What are the key dimensions of customer oriented enterprise IT architecture and what are their relations?
2. What are building blocks of each dimension?
3. What are the priorities of building blocks (components) in each dimension?
Therefore, Section 2 investigates conceptual and reference models of enterprise architecture. After presenting the methodology in Section 3, in Section 4 principal dimensions of these models are extracted then weighted and prioritized by using
Shannons entropy. In Section 5 by using axiomatic method components of each dimension are extracted and in Section 6 the
proposed model is described by determining goals, relations and components of each dimension. In Section 7, the proposed
model is validated by Friedman test and components of each dimension are prioritized. Finally a telecommunication enterprise has been chosen as a case study and the model has been tested there.
2. Review of conceptual and reference models of enterprise architecture
FEAF1 introduces ve layers of architecture including performance, business, data, service, and technology (CIO council,
1999). Conceptual architecture of HUD denes security architecture beside the other architectures of FEAF and put performance
and security layer crossing all other layers. So these two layers are vertical. Also data layer is in direct relation with service,
business and technology layers (HUD EA team, 2005), While FEAF puts data layer horizontally and relates it just to technology
layer. So HUD is a revised revision of FEAF that consider service oriented features in architecture model. Also HUD considers the
existence of rules and procedures necessary. Conceptual architecture of ACCESS2, include ve building blocks of presentation,
security, application, service and data (IBM, 2005). This model is compatible with DSS3 standards and rules and shows all building blocks required for business requirements. Building blocks of this enterprise architecture are constant over time but as performance or technology will change, technology layer has spread in all layers. Conceptual architecture of Louisiana State is a
fundamental framework of technical architecture in enterprise level. This architecture provides vision, rules and high level
guidelines for alignment of business drivers with vision of enterprise architecture (CT Architecture Team, 2000). This includes
security, network, facility, platform, data, application and management architectures. Besides, this architecture emphasizes
rules and principles. NGOSS4 is an integrated framework for developing business supporting systems. This framework includes
business process model, SID model (common data and information), security model, policy model, business application, services, contracts and fundamental mechanisms (Strassner et al., 2004). NGOSS considers four main aspects including business,
system, implementation and execution that are implemented by business process model of e-TOM (TM forum, 2002), data model (SID) and TNA5. In JTA architecture framework there are four views of business, data, application and technology (DoD, 2003).
These views cover all aspects of RM-ODP international standard. EWTA6 introduces seven interrelated architecture as constructive blocks of enterprise architecture including application, cooperation and workow, data and information, e-commerce, platform, network, system management architecture (DOIT, 2009). TOGAF introduces a scientic standard method for designing
enterprise architecture. This framework consists of four architecture or views of enterprises including business process, application, data and technical architecture (TOGAF, 2007). C4ISR that rs designed for military systems is a comprehensive framework for enterprise architecture description. This framework uses operational, systematic and technical views to describe
different levels of a system (C4ISR, 1997). E2AF ensures that the organization has complete balance between business processes
and IT processes and states enterprise architecture plan should establish relations between internal components and systems of
organization including business, information, information systems, infrastructure and security (Schekkerman, 2006).
3. Methodology
To propose a conceptual model for customer oriented enterprises, conceptual models of EA are reviewed rst and key
concepts and dimensions of them are extracted. Regarding to frequency of dimensions in reviewed frameworks and by using
Shannons entropy (Shannon, 1948), priority and weight of each dimension are determined and therefore dimensions of proposed model are extracted. Then by using axiomatic method and following two steps of it, components of each dimension
are identied and extracted. Axiomatic method is a framework to describe designing components that include all different
designing types. This method is one of the logical methods for identifying step by step process of creating solution for a
requirement that is stated by a customer or enterprise. In this method that has four main steps; rst customer attributes
(CA) are extracted. Then to resolve the extracted customer needs, functional requirements (FR) are extracted. Further according to achieved results in two previous steps, designing parameters (DP) are extracted and nally process variables (PV) are
1
2
3
4
5
6

Federal Enterprise Architecture Framework

A Comprehensive Enterprise Services System
Decision Support system
New Generation Operations Systems and Software
Technology Neutral Architecture
Enterprise Wide Technical Architecture

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N. Dastranj Mamaghani et al. / Telematics and Informatics 29 (2012) 219232

designed (Martin and Kar, 2001). In this study rst two steps of axiomatic is applied to determine components and building
blocks of each dimension of proposed model.
To determine customer requirements, has been concentrated on telecommunication enterprises that are specic types of
customer oriented enterprises. Therefore, business strategies of active telecommunication enterprises in Iran and telecommunication business requirements from eTOM are investigated. Besides, Macro documents have studied to extract customer
oriented requirements. For this purpose Iranian national ICT document and 44 principles that are about privatization of
Iranian enterprises are reviewed. Also as its needed to consider EA new trends, related requirements of EA designing and
development structures are reviewed. After this requirement assessment, a mapping is done between extracted requirements and building blocks of each dimension. To categorize and extract customer requirements, experts of EA area are surveyed and their opinions are considered. Then related functional requirements are extracted according to each customer
attribute by using axiomatic method. Relatedness of each FRs to CAs is validated by experts opinions by QFD method.
QFD is a method to transform user demands into design quality, to deploy the functions forming quality, and to deploy methods for achieving the design quality into subsystems and component parts, and ultimately to specic elements of the manufacturing process. After extracting CAs and FRs, proposed model is presented by introducing its dimensions, components
and relations of dimensions. Then the model is validated by experts opinions. The method of model validation is based
on survey-description research. A questionnaire is designed for this purpose; so EA experts opinions are analyzed. The experts are chosen from EA experts in universities regarding to their research experiences and also from experts of EA in research institutes like ITRC. They are between 40 and 50 years old and their experience is more than 10 years. To determine
importance of each component, different questions are asked which could be answered in likert scale with 5 points: strongly
disagree (1), disagree (3), neither agree nor disagree (5), agree (7) and strongly agree (9). The reliability of questionnaire is
tested by Coronbachs Alfa that must be more than 0.7. The questionnaires are distributed among 44 experts. We received 33
completed questionnaires with a response rate of 75%. The average experience of the respondents was 12 years. Responses
about the agreement or disagreement are analyzed. The higher the average score the most likely its that the expert is agree
with the relatedness of the component. After that, by using Friedman test, components are prioritized. Then, the components
are surveyed from the view of their application in a telecommunication enterprise in Iran as a case study. Then appropriate
solutions are provided to improve the status of organization.
4. Extracting dimensions and components of proposed model
To determine the key dimensions of model, data have been gathered in analytical Table 1. Also, by using Shannons entropy
analysis that is derived from information theory, importance and correctness of these aspects are validated and prioritized
(Table 2). Shannons entropy concept is invented in 1948 by Shannon that is used as a method of content analysis for weighting and prioritizing of data in addition to uncertainty evaluation (Shannon 1948). Steps of this algorithm are as follows:
1.

Frequency matrix obtained (Table 1) is normalized using the formula (1).

F ij
Pij Pm

i F ij

2.

i 1; 2; . . . ; m j 1; 2; . . . ; n

Uncertainty of each dimension (Ej) is calculated using formula (2).

Xm
Ej K i1 Pij  Ln Pij  j 1; 2; . . . ; n

K
Lnm
3.

Importance factor (Wj) of each dimension is achieved by using the formula (3).

Ej
wj Pn

j1 Ej

j 1; 2; . . . ; n

Table 1
Frequency matrix for key concepts of revised models.
Dimension
Business strategy
Business process architecture
Business service architecture
Data architecture
Technology architecture
Security architecture
Performance architecture
Presentation architecture
Application architecture
Policy architecture
Rules and principles

FEAF

HUD

ACESS

NGOSS

JTA

EWTA

C4ISR

E2AF

TOGAF

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Table 2
Weight and priority of each dimension using Shannons entropy.
Dimension

Frequency

P6

Business strategy
Business process architecture
Business service architecture
Data architecture
Technology architecture
Security architecture
Performance architecture
Presentation architecture
Application architecture
Policy architecture
Rules and principles

4
8
5
8
9
6
4
1
5
1
3

1.38994
1.66792
1.38994
1.94591
1.94591
1.66792
1.11195
0.27799
1.38994
0.27799
0.83396

i1 P ij

 ln P ij 

Uncertainty(Ej)

Importance factor (Wj)

Priority

0.714286
0.857143
0.714286
1
1
0.857143
0.571429
0.142857
0.714286
0.142857
0.428571

0.074074
0.037037
0.074074
0
0
0.037037
0.111111
0.222222
0.074074
0.222222
0.148148

3
2
3
1
1
2
4
6
3
6
5

According to results, enterprise architecture must have at least eight building blocks (Fig. 1) including those have the
highest frequency in reviewed architectures. The business strategy layer is necessary as determinant of goals, missions
and strategies for development of enterprise architecture. Process architecture is necessary to determine activities and functions to achieve business plan objectives. To create business applications and services based on needs of customers, there
must be service architecture layer and in order to implement applications, technology or Infrastructure architecture is essential. Since all data and information resources of organization should be stored for use in different layers, it is necessary to
have data architecture layer that have direct relationship with other layers of Process, service and technology. In addition
to these architectural layers, two layers of security and performance in order to control and evaluate the security and efciency throughout all layers of enterprise architecture in vertical state are necessary. Since every enterprise architecture
framework has specic rules and regulations based on the optimal architecture requirements, it is essential to have other
layer including principles and rules and basic characteristics of desirable architecture.

5. Extracting components of each dimensions of model

To extract building blocks of each dimension, axiomatic method is used. As it has stated in methodology, in order to identify customer oriented enterprises requirements, specic types of organizations that are telecommunication enterprises have
been chosen and their requirements are identied by investigating business strategies of Iranian telecommunication enterprises, eTOM, Iranian ICT national document, 44 principles (that is approved in Iran) and new trends of developing and

Fig. 1. Proposed model of IT enterprise architecture.

N. Dastranj Mamaghani et al. / Telematics and Informatics 29 (2012) 219232

223

designing EA structures and general requirements of customers (Rajal and Savolainen, 1996; Chalmeta, 2006; Joseph et al.,
2004; Mihelis et al., 2001). Therefore, a complete list of requirements is achieved. To categorize and eliminate unnecessary
requirements, experts opinions are considered. With this process, 19 principal requirements in 9 categories are identied.
These categories include: customer relationship management (maintaining customer satisfaction and privacy), market
(identifying protable customers, multiple access to market, providing services, identifying new areas in the market) resource development (strategic planning and resource development, ensuring the best suppliers), strategies (creating competitive advantages through differentiation, low cost, identifying and communicating with competitors and stakeholder),
enterprise environment (process oriented enterprise, organizational downsizing), service and product (enhancing product
and service quality, product and service variety, providing services to all parts), human resource development, research
and development, investments and assets. After this step, it is essential to determine functional requirements (FRs) according to axiomatic method. Extracting FRs for EA new trends is shown as an instance in Annex 1. Besides mapping between
customer satisfactions requirement to related FRs and also validating those by experts opinion with QFD method are shown
in Annex 2. Some of main extracted FRs are implied in following:























Business development management.

Customers relationship management.
Market and sale management.
Development planning.
Information technology plan.
Service development management.
Interrelationship management of organizations.
Strategic planning and management.
Knowledge management.
Supply chain management.
Supplier relationship management.
Resource development management.
Functional management.
Human resource management.
Effectiveness management.
Service operation management.
Service quality management.
Operational support.
Assets management.
Infrastructure management.
Risk management.
Security management.

6. Proposed conceptual it architecture framework

According to achieved results, the proposed model is shown in Fig. 1. Also Table 3, describe goals, relations and
components.
7. Evaluation of the proposed model
The evaluation method of the model is based on survey-description research to validate extracted component. For this
purpose, a questionnaire is designed as mentioned in methodology. The value of Coronbachs Alfa for the reliability
determination of the questionnaire is 0.87 which is more than 0.7 and shows high reliability of results of the questionnaire
(Dastranj Mamaghani et al., 2009). From 40 EA experts that were chosen, 33 experts responded to questionnaire. In order to
analyze questionnaire responses that are experts opinions in Likert scale, Friedman test is used and then components are
prioritized. Table 4 shows the result of Friedman test. The calculated averages of all components are higher than 5 that show
the high importance of components from experts view.
8. Case study
The studied company is the most active Iranian company in the eld of telecommunications and has allocated the highest
market share. History of the company dates back to 1994. Tasks of this company are as follows:



Preparing comprehensive plans based on telecommunications requirements, needs, standards and regulations.
Preparation and approval of guidelines, standards, criteria and technical standards needed to participate in the
establishment, development, maintenance and utilization of network.

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Table 3
Goals, relations and components of proposed model.
Dimensions of
proposed model

Goals

Relations

Business strategy

Business strategy determines business

lines and business lines determine
business strategic views. Each business
line has an individual role in
implementing business mission and
determines a set of business services.

This layer is a director of business

functions in process architecture with
help of business lines. As an example
business strategy layer set strategies of
service development planning and
according to these strategies, service
creating and supporting functions are
dened.

Business process
architecture

Process architecture shows business

functions. Business functions determine
business operational view. Business
functions describe high level business
processes and activities.
Services architecture comprises
constructive components of services. Each
service component is a business process
with predetermined function that is
presented through business or
technology. Service architecture
determines service application designing
and cooperation.
Technology architecture comprises
standards, infrastructure, platforms and
systems necessary to create business
application and secure transactions

According to determined strategies and

policies, process architecture determine
functions and processes of related
strategies and create processes of
customer services in service layer
This architecture receives service
components from process layer and create
application services with new capabilities.
It is obvious that this architecture should
relate to technology architecture to create
services in technology platform.

Data and information is the asset of data

architecture. These support programs and
operations of business lines. Data
architecture describes structure of data
bases and shows how to keep and relate
data and information to each other. It
includes technical components and
software systems for storing and
retrieving data.
Security architecture includes a set of
security policies, processes, service
components and technologies which
should be seen in all layers. So it is a cross
architecture. Security management
includes protection of physical,
informational and operational assets of
organization.

Data architecture include analysis and

reporting of data in process layer, service
accessibility and integration in service
layer and storing and retrieving systems
in technology layer.

Business service
architecture

Technology
architecture

Data architecture

Security architecture

Performance
architecture






Performance architecture like security

architecture is a cross layer and should be
seen in all other architectures. When
architecture of other layers complete,
performance information like measures
should be collected in organization.

Technology architecture relate to data and

service architecture to implement
business application

This layer relate to all other layers.

Business layer should have policies to
manage vital data and manage business
continuity. In process layer, control and
evaluation of security is done. In data
layer, security management of data and
information should be done. In service
layer, security management should be
seen as a service comprising a lot of
service components. In technology layer,
related technologies of security
management and infrastructural security
should be implemented.
Performance architecture in business
layer includes organization effectiveness
management, policy denitions and
performance measures. Process layer
includes performance control and
evaluation to assure efciency of all
processes. In data layer, performance
measures are analyzed and technology
layer should have a system to collect and
evaluate data

Components
- Strategic management and
planning
- Developmental management
and planning
- Strategic management of
communications
- Regulatory arrangement
- Marketing and distribution
management
- Business
process
management
- Business
developmental
process
- Supporting processes
- Data services
- Application services
- Service components
- Service
components
integration

Platforms
Networks and infrastructure
Middleware
Hardware and software
Integration tools
Analysis and reporting of
data and information
- Accessibility and integration
of data and information
- Data sharing
- Data storing and retrieval

Management security
Security policies
IT security
Security
control
and
evaluation
- Access security
- Customer
transactions
security

- Effectiveness management
- Performance measures and
policies
- Performance control and
evaluation
- Performance analysis

Collaborating with other operators in the eld of communication exchange, transit trafc, roaming and shared use
of other sources.
Membership in professional organizations and national and international forums and participate in conferences
related to business and professional information exchange.
Management, planning and implementation of specic specialist training to develop skills.
Attempt to perform any activity that is associated with the target company.

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Table 4
The results of Friedman test.
Dimensions

Asymp sig.

Components

Average

Priority

Business strategy

0.002

Business processes

0.009

Service

0.00

Data

0.002

Technology

0.00

Security

0.008

Performance

0.00

Strategic planning and management

Development planning and management
Marketing and distribution management
Regulatory arrangement
Communication
Business process management
Operation development processes
Support processes
Data services
Application services
Service components
Service components integration
Analyzing and reporting data
Data integration and availability
Data storage and retrieval
Information sharing
Platform
Infrastructure and network
Middle wares
Security management
Security policies
IT security
Security evaluation and control
Access security
Customer transactions security
Effectiveness management
Performance measures
Performance evaluation
Performance measurements

7.21
7.11
6.48
5.92
5.90
6.76
6.07
5.75
6.80
6.48
6.15
5.38
6.85
6.74
6
5.98
7.25
7
5
7.46
6.84
6.69
5.93
5.8
5
7.5
7
6.87
6.7

1
2
3
4
5
1
2
3
1
2
3
4
1
2
3
4
1
2
3
1
2
3
4
5
6
1
2
3
4






Establish facilities and platforms needed for policies to monitor mobile network.
Provide required services to customers in terms of commercial considerations and customer orientation.
Act in line with network security and protect the rights of subscribers within the relevant laws and regulations.
Services of this company include Call, Waiting, Number display, Connect to fax and data, Short message service,
Voice service and International roaming.

Table 5
Mean scores of components in business dimension.

Strategic planning and management

Development planning and management

Communication strategic management

Regulatory arrangement
Marketing and distribution channel

Component

Average

Enterprise strategic management

Business research and development
Enterprise architecture management
Enterprise collaboration
Enterprise development management
Resource development management
Supply chain management
Market development management
Human resource management
Technology development plan
Stakeholder relationship management
Inter organizational relationship management
Customer relationship
Supplier relationship
Communication management
Foreign community collaboration
Outside collaboration management
Regulatory arrangement
Product portfolio plan
Business development plan
Marketing strategy
Product marketing
Eliminating product

5.4
5.4
5.7
5
6.3
6.7
6.3
7
7
7.3
5
4.8
7
4.2
5.4
5.2
7.4
3.4
5.9
6.4
7.4
7.6
6.3

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Fig. 2. Column diagram for mean score of business component.

To evaluate the proposed model in mentioned enterprise, a questionnaire was used. In questionnaire, rst part is allocated to general information to determine the characteristics of respondents, then in evaluation part, dimensions of all aspects of organization (business, process, service, technology, security and performance) are asked and then in the third part,
questions about each component are raised. Twenty-ve people participated in lling of the questionnaire who were IT managers of mentioned company. Among them six persons had experience of 35 years, 7 of them had experience of 510 years
and 12 of them had experience of more than 10 years in the eld of information technology. Designed Questionnaire assesses
the components of the model in seven dimensions of business, process, service, data, technology, security and performance.
For this purpose, questions have been designed in the range of Likert for each of the dened components. The questionnaire
included questions related to the realization of each component in organization and responders identied their reply in a 5
point Likert scale. existence or absence of components is graded from 1 to 9 that 1 = absolutely doesnt exists, 3 = doesnt
exists, 5 = almost exists 7 = exist 9 = certainly exist. The mean score for each response is calculated. The higher the average
score the most likely the organization can fulll the component. The mean scores from 1 to 4 imply weakness of the organization in that component and require attention to fulll that. Mean score of 46 (except 6) be assessed as average. The
mean score equal to 6 and above is assessed as strong and indicates that the organization has sufcient capacity in the
corresponding component. The mean Scores for business dimension is shown in Table 5 as an example. Besides Fig. 2 shows
the column diagram of achieved scores.
According to analysis of information that is obtained from questionnaires, scores of all components of the business process are higher than average. Thus the organization has appropriate status in this component. Therefore, following guidelines
are suggested to improve conditions of the organization:























Create cooperation in specic areas of work.

Establish consistent knowledge about changes in customer needs.
Develop operational strategies related to information technology.
Clear denition of common processes and opportunities to reduce rework.
Identify customer needs and priorities.
Establish mechanisms to identify opportunities.
Structures and hierarchical control.
Organizing short-term operational and encourage collaboration between functions.
Determine the organizational standards widely.
Identify and develop institutional processes.
Increased awareness in relation to business processes and create opportunities through cooperation.
Development of knowledge-related functions and institutional processes.
Establish and develop process-based structures in organizations.
Adaptive management of business processes.
Agreement on the use of standards among organizations.
Develop skills common between different areas.
Understand the needs and values related to business processes.
Identication of specic custodians of the organization process.
Emphasis on change management, strategic approach to inter organizational cooperation.
Identication of key partners, the current status model and determine optimal conditions.
Develop implementation strategies to move from current stare to the desired situation.
Consultation with the participation in the process to improve these processes.

Also, In Information and service dimension, according to results of the questionnaire, organization is in average situation.
Therefore, the following strategies for increasing the level of organization is these aspects are suggested:

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Annex 1
Extracted FRs for EA new trends.
Component

Functional
requirement

Service Oriented
Enterprise
Architecture

Process orchestration

Criteria
- Increased exibility and
dynamism
- Reduce the complexity
of
processes
and
systems
- Development of intelligent and exible service
- Update
collection,
development and application of resources
- Integration of processes
and systems
- Customer satisfaction

Reference
Schaffner (2006), Krafzig et al.
(2005), Sia (1997), Khoshaan
(2007), Tanrikorur (2007), HAKI
and Wentland Forte (2010)

Connecting business
processes and
information
technology
Dynamic services
Information systems
and software
services

- Developing and improving service

- Update,
development
and re-using resources
- Increased exibility and
dynamism
- Better coordination and
interaction
between
processes and systems
- Integration of processes
and systems
Increased competitiveness

Obtain intellectual
capital for the
organization and
inuence on it

- Developing skills and

capabilities
- Create Value
- Creativity
and
Innovation

Information sharing

- Organizational Cooperation Development

- Facilitate access and
exchange
data
and
information
- Better coordination and
interaction
between
processes and systems
- Facilitate access and
exchange
data
and
information
- Flexibility in distribution and access to data
- Developing skills and
capabilities
- Flexibility in distribution and access to data
- Developing skills and
capabilities

Development
knowledge of
employees and
increase their
capabilities
Reduce complexity and
cost of maintenance,
production and
development of system
software

- Reduce complexity and

cost of implementing
technology

- Breaking large processes

to smaller components
- Dividing workow by a
central controller among
several factors
- Design service components as autonomous
and independent
- Using technology independent standards

- Denition of platformindependent
protocols
and standards and creating Web services
- Designing web services
mechanisms
- Specify
the
required
services
- Specify the duties of the
units, respectively, activities,
dependence
between the activities
and resources
Determination of
intermediary services
between related processes

Improve
interoperability of
Information system
and technology

Presentation and use of

the best options
available from the
collection of business
services

Solution

Eppler (2003), Hansen et al.

(1999), Shadbolt et al. (2006),
Matthews (2005), Ping and
Zhong-Jian (2011)

- Use
of
agent-based
architecture
- Diagnosis of organizations
required
knowledge
- Creation,
distribution,
access and use of stored
knowledge
- Developing an appropriate knowledge management framework
- Information storage
- Information
classication
- information searching
- Information accessibility
- Information update

Provide appropriate
mechanisms for sharing
knowledge

- Holding the appropriate

design criteria
- Mechanisms to review
and periodic evaluations
(continued on next page)

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Annex 1 (continued)
Component

Functional
requirement

Improve customer
service

Customer relation

Efcient use of mass

information on the
Web and Feasibility of
advanced business
applications
Store information,
strengthen them for
easy allocation of
resources and nding
the best solutions and
quickly making them
to t with customer
needs
Identify Consumption
patterns of customers
and closer and effective
communications with
customers

Improve service to
customers
Faster attract of clients
and understand their
requirements
Security and network

Ensuring privacy,
accessibility and
integrity of
information
Communications and
information exchange
Security
Security management
Business continuity

Ensure the
implementation of
security law and ethics
Assurance Performance
of sensitive electronic
services
Physical security

Control and security of

development
applications

Criteria

Reference

- Reduce the complexity

of
processes
and
systems
- Reduce
maintenance
cost
Customer satisfaction

Empowerment support of
information technology from
new business decision
Using Web technologies and
Semantic Web

Facilitate access and

exchange of data and
information

Increasing the efciency

and effectiveness

Solution

Eldelstein (2004), Corner and

Hinton (2002)

- Customer satisfaction
and loyalty
- Increased
competitiveness

- Customer satisfaction
- Diversity and attractiveness of the service
- Customer satisfaction
and loyalty
- Increased
competitiveness
Jacquelin (2004)

Analysis of customer
information for business
decisions

- Modeling
customer
behavior
within
the
working units
- Coordination
mechanisms between organization
strategies
and
customer system
Identication and
classication of key
customers
- Create a system for measuring customer satisfaction, protability
- Maintain key customer
- Access control models
- Security Architecture

Security mechanisms of
information systems and
networks (internet, intranet,
and...)
Mechanisms of systems
monitoring and verication
- Create business continuity model
- Mechanisms to evaluate
business continuity plans
Techniques for collecting and
evaluating data and systems
security measures
- Cryptographic
mechanisms
- Management of keys
Mechanisms to protect
resources (data, people,
systems) against physical
access
- Control and security
mechanisms of distributed systems
- Security mechanisms of
information
storage
systems
- Model and frameworks
application security

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N. Dastranj Mamaghani et al. / Telematics and Informatics 29 (2012) 219232

Annex 1 (continued)
Component

Functional
requirement

Criteria

Organizational
cooperation

Reach a common view

in the organization and
development of
cooperation and
decision making teams

- Improving governance
and decision making
- Increasing the efciency
and effectiveness
- Organizational Cooperation Development
- Creativity
and
Innovation

Improve
interoperability
between organization

- Improving governance
and decision making
- Organizational Cooperation Development
- Creativity
and
Innovation

Message transfer

- Organizational Cooperation Development

- Facilitate access and
data and information
exchange

Reference

Solution

Rugullies (2004)

- Create an appropriate
decision structure
- Select appropriate communication tool
- Create an appropriate
portal
- Training of communication tools to users
- Appropriate communication infrastructure
- Create an appropriate
decision structure
- Select the appropriate
communication tool
- Create
virtual
organizations
- Create an agent-based
organizations
- Appropriate communication infrastructure
- Use
of
messaging
systems

Annex 2
Mapping between customer satisfaction with related FRs.
CA
Customer
satisfaction

Service improvement and

Innovation
Increasing relationship
with customers

Increasing market demand

FR
Service attractiveness and
diversity
Innovation and creativity
Focus on Customers
Increasing customer
satisfaction
CRM operations
Timely delivery of orders
Receive market reaction
Maintaining service and
product protability
Different methods of customer
relationship
Service level agreement
Tariffs and billing services
Service support and responding
to customers
Identication of market
demand
Service development
Service attractiveness and
diversity
Increasing revenues and
methods of sale
Different methods of sale
Market competition and
governance
Presenting product
specications

Development strategy and planning

Technology research
Identication and Analysis of customer
requirement
Customer governance

Business research and

development
Customer relationship
management

Support CRM
Customer order management
Market research
Brand management
Customer relationship management
Service quality assurance
Bill and auditing management
Customer problems management
Identication and Analysis of customer
and market
Product portfolio planning
Service customization
Business development management
Creating different sales channels and
service distribution
Product marketing
Advertising

 Use standard mechanism for sharing information and resources with other organizations.
 Application of principles of integrated information management in government.
 Establish approach of reusing data in the Organization.

Sales and marketing

management

230

Annex 3
Validating the relatedness of FRs and CAs extracted in annex 2 by QFD method.
Priority

Customer relationship management

Sales and marketing management

Development

Technology

customer

Customer

CRM

Customer

Market

Brand

Customer

Service

Billing and

Customer

Identication

Product

service

Business

Creating

Product

strategy and
planning

research

requirement

governance

support

order
management

research

management

relationship
management

quality
assurance

auditing
management

problems
management

and Analysis
of customer

portfolio
planning

customization

development
management

different
sales

marketing

channels and
service
distribution

and market

Service improvement and Innovation

Service attractiveness and
1

diversity
Innovation and creativity

Increasing relationship with customers

Focus on Customers
2

9
3

3
3

9
3

9
9

3
1

9
9

9
3

9
3

Receive market reaction

Maintain service and product
protability

3
2

3
1

9
3

9
3

3
4

Service support and

responding to customer

9
3
9

Increasing market demand

Identication of market

demand
Service development

Service attractiveness and

diversity

Increasing revenues and

methods of sale
Different methods of sale

Market competition and

governance

Presenting product
specications

Technical importance

176

105

152

160

168

195

147

9
3

321

9
9

3
9
9

3
9

51

9
9

38

3
3

9
9

3
2

Service level agreement

Tariffs and billing services

Different methods of
customer relationship

CRM operations
Timely delivery of orders

9
3

Increasing customer
satisfaction

Advertising

51

130

177

39

1
1

143

80

183

173

170

N. Dastranj Mamaghani et al. / Telematics and Informatics 29 (2012) 219232

Business research and

development

N. Dastranj Mamaghani et al. / Telematics and Informatics 29 (2012) 219232












231

Specialized training for staff in the use and sharing of information.

Allocating sufcient funds for activities related to information management.
Design protocols of using information in accordance with statutory and political requirements.
Provide some method for understandable information documentation.
Identication of laws and policies affecting procurement and use of Information.
Training staff and users about requirements and legal limitations of using information.
Standard concepts and denitions for storing and organizing information.
Decision making based on information.
Emphasis on information management.
Gather data based on actual operations.

Besides, organization is lower than average in technology, security and performance dimensions. So, following solutions are
suggested:
 Use appropriate and new security standards in various technical elds.
 Establish appropriate security and communication infrastructure for information sharing.
 Use open standards.
 Compatibility with existing resources on the Internet.
 Establishment of a unied portal for users to access organizations services.
 Integrate platforms used in all areas of the organization.
 Establishment of a specic database to store information.
 Development of performance criteria and tools for monitoring and management of them.
 Use of agreed performance criteria to monitor progress and identify areas of improvement.
9. Conclusion
This paper proposed an enterprise IT architecture. For this purpose reference model of Enterprise Architecture were investigated and key dimensions of them were extracted. After determining the frequency of dimension in reviewed models, by
using Shannons entropy, they are weighted and prioritized. According to results an enterprise IT architecture should have at
least 8 main dimensions of principles and rules, business strategy, business process, service, data, technology, security and
performance. By using axiomatic method and mapping customer requirements to functional requirements, components of
each dimension were extracted and proposed model was described by goals, relations and components of each dimension.
Enterprise IT architecture model shows the ways and methods of being optimal in scientic and coherent way for organizations. As technologies develop and organizations become complex, there is a need to design Enterprise Architecture model
based on organizations needs to respond to all requirements in an integrated manner. However extracted requirements of
this paper are based on telecommunication enterprises but it can be generalized to a lot of customer oriented enterprises. For
future studies, the migration plan to implement the suggested model in organization will be presented. Also the maturity
model of EA for the mentioned organizations will be proposed.
Appendix A
See Annex 13.
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