Enterprise information systems develop with wide differences over time to suit projects. Different types of applications are randomly accumulated from mergers/acquisitions or from consolidation/deconsolidation. In large enterprises, there generally is significant redundancy in the data, services, and their use cases.

Under these conditions, it becomes increasingly difficult to integrate new applications into existing information systems and to handle technological evolutions.

The purpose of "city planning" for information systems is to define the main principles in the implementation and construction of computer applications, to ensure consistency throughout while decreasing the costs of building and integrating new applications. This should improve the company's ability to respond to a constantly changing environment.