Unisys Expands Service Offerings With Business BlueprintsUnisys Expands Service Offerings With Business Blueprints

Unisys Corp. will make a bigger push into the services market next month when it introduces what it's calling business blueprints, designed to help companies create IT infrastructures that more easily adapt to changing business processes. The company plans to help customers use a range of integration technologies, including Business Process Execution Language, XML, Microsoft's .Net, IBM WebSphere, and J2EE, to connect or disconnect applications according to business requirements. The service will include preconfigured workflows tailored to specific vertical industries, including telecommunications, financial services, and transportation.

"The idea is to drive down the cost of designing and implementing business processes," says Ralph Welborn, managing partner in Unisys' business-transformation group. The blueprints will include models for routine industry processes such as airline reservations systems and insurance-policy administration systems, Welborn says.

Although Unisys already derives 76% of its revenue from services, the company is looking to enlarge its presence in the market. During the past year, the company has hired about 200 new partners away from the Big Five consulting firms, Welborn says. Unisys employees about 24,000 services personnel.

The company's efforts to sell business-process modeling services mirror those of other large software and service providers that are looking to cash in on the need among businesses of all sizes to manage and connect disparate applications. In March, IBM launched a number of enhancements to its portfolio of WebSphere Business Integration software, including applications designed to automatically connect departments within a company to create new business workflows. Meanwhile, Microsoft continues to enhance its XML and .Net integration services through its BizTalk server environment.