Many Swiss companies are successfully operating in global markets, and Switzerland has become one of the most attractive locations for Multinational Corporations (MNCs) that choose to establish their worldwide or European headquarters in this country. For these companies, information systems play a major role in managing globally dispersed subsidiaries and leveraging global synergies. They frequently use ERP systems to meet their large-scale and international information needs. One of the challenges is to continuosly extend their existing IS architecture to address new business require-ments and to react to technology advances, in particular internet and mobile technologies.

The specific Master thesis topic will be defined together with the student (either as academic thesis or in combination with an internship). Here are some suggestions:

• Global IS architectures – Tradeoffs between global integration and local responsiveness
• Analysis of specific requirements and evaluation of IS architecture scenarios
• IS architecture for integrating (local) mobile applications with a centralized ERP system
• Subsidiary integration in MNCs: Patterns for integrating local sales & service units
• Survey on the dynamics of globalization strategies, notably the turn to the BRIC countries, and its impact on IS architectures

Please contact Kazem Haki or Christine Legner for any further information.

The design of to-be Enterprise Architecture (EA) is a complex task which is supported by EA models and frameworks. In practice, companies oftentimes define architecture principles – such as service-orientation or technology independence – as underlying rules and guidelines to establish guidance for designing their future EA. The selected architecture principles will ultimately be used as a basis to shape EA design, as in the case of service-orientation, which emphasizes the reuse of existing (Web) services when implementing new information systems.

The purpose of this master thesis is to study the choice of architecture principles (context-specific principles) and their impact on enterprise architecture design. For a selected set of architecture principles from the existing literature and enterprise architecture frameworks, e.g. TOGAF, the student will analyze how they shape the enterprise architecture design and enable the expected outcomes out of EA. The ultimate goal is to develop an approach for explaining the “mechanics” of architecture principles on the design and effectiveness of EA.

Please contact Kazem Haki or Christine Legner for any further information.