Model Based Design

What is Model Based Design?

Model based design is a set of solutions and services specifically aimed at large organisations with complex IT landscapes who experience significant and regular change. Model Based Design helps organisations to maximise the benefit they get from the use of single-source-of truth, repository-based, EA modelling tools.

Our solutions all deploy onto the leading repository-based tools (such as Sparx EA, BiZZdesign, Planview, Orbus etc) and our services include the identification and deployment of the right tool.

Our approach is designed to ensure that adoption of tools is smooth and sustained and that measurable benefits are realised. Solutions cover Enterprise Architecture, Solution Architecture and Design, Business Analysis and Design, Service Design and Enterprise Portfolio Management.

The Importance of Enterprise Architecture

MI Deployment Methodology

It's important to follow a phased/iterative, value driven, approach both to initial tool deployment and to all subsequent extensions of the tooling.

You also need to consider

Initialisation of the Repository with valuable baseline content
Ongoing Governance and Model Management of the solution

Drive from Value, not from Tools

Model Based Design uses a value driven approach to help implement the most important changes first, with real benefits driving those changes.

Model Based Design is not driven by the tools you chose or the features that they have.

A change to the way you Deliver

Model Based Design is essentially a change to the way that you do your design work.

It isn’t a replacement for your agile or waterfall delivery process; it is an extension of it.

Repository based, not document based

Model Based Design moves you away from documentation and towards the use of models.

Models are stored in a shared, centralised enterprise repository. The repository can contain all your in-flight project models, as well as a baseline representation of your current IT landscape.

A Range of Solutions, A choice of Tools

Model Based Design typically focuses on Solution Architecture/Design first. However, we have also worked on solutions for Service Design, Business Design, Enterprise Architecture and Enterprise Portfolio Management.

Different EA tools have different capabilities. It’s important to choose the right tool for the solution that you are deploying. Our solutions all deploy onto the leading repository-based tools (such as Sparx EA, BiZZdesign, Planview, Orbus etc) and our services include the identification and deployment of the right tool.

We offer a comprehensive range of services to support your entire Mode Based Design journey.

Model Based Design – Powered by Sparx EA

The Sparx EA toolset is one of the most popular EA modelling tools in the world. It is highly versatile and sophisticated and is exceptionally well suited for Model Based Design. Sparx EA provides full support for a wide range of architecture, requirements and solution notations, model types and frameworks.

If you want to use Sparx EA to underpin a Model Based Design approach then we can help you with our Sparx EA and Prolaborate SaaS offering – Sparx as a Service.

Key features of our "Sparx as a Service"

Cloud Hosting

Client Hosting
DB Repository Hosting
AWS (Choice of location)
Private Cloud options on request

Technical Support

2nd Line Support – business hours
Integrated with your Helpdesk
Fault and User Management
Backup/Recovery Services
Service Reviews/Governance
Import/Export/Migration Services

Product Management

MI Licence Management – scaled/mixed to suit your needs
Managed SW upgrades (client driven)
Choice of Sparx Edition
Includes Prolaborate & Repository
Choice of additional companion apps

Integration

3rd party apps (JIRA, Confluence, Sharepoint)
SSO integration (e.g. Active Directory)
External Data Source integration (via APIs)

Our Partners

We partner with leading vendors to provide a full end to end deployment of Sparx.

Success Stories

Telecommunications Client

What the client wanted:

Reduction in delivery delays caused by knowledge bottlenecking, reduction in time to onboard new resources, and a reduction in live faults attributable to poor solution design quality.

How we helped:

Provided a shared enterprise model repository based on our Sparx as a Service platform. We integrated it into the client’s delivery process, using our Model Based Design approach and we rolled the solution out across the entire solution design community.

We provided a team of analysts who harvested hard-to-get-at content from existing documentation and key client staff in order to pre-populate the repository with a large volume of critical current state information.

We set up a dedicated governance and model management function and provided key staff to carry out this work.

Outcome:

Design work has moved away from documents and into the central repository. A central repository containing readily available and Up-to-date representation of the current IT landscape, as well as all in-flight design work has enabled faster onboarding of new staff, greater consistency and quality in designs and a greater access to previously silo’d and locked away information. Tool deployment has been a key enabled for increased delivery capacity (from 100 to 190 architects and designers)