In our coverage of IT integration for customer experience, we have discussed the business and technology drivers for enterprise integration, the overall integration solution landscape, an eleven-point best practice integration strategy for customer experience, and the pillars of that strategy: scenario-based integration and a networked integration environment. We believe an enterprise service bus is a viable candidate to provide backbone integration services in a networked integration environment. Unfortunately, the ESB is awash in confusion, propelled by the industry’s need to associate products with service-oriented architecture. In this report, we answer the major questions surrounding the ESB.