## 6 Analysis  
The summary of the results below Table 2 indicates that, for where data is available on improvements, improvements in time/effort during the phases or parts of the lifecycle where an SOA-based platform supporting microservices has successfully been used, exceed 50%. Further, the literature review, see Table 1, also indicates the same type of improvements and reasons for improvement. If the SOA-based platform is used really well, the upper side results indicate very considerable improvements. Thus, the results give a strong indication that this should be of interest for organizations and companies involved in development of automation solutions, or procure and operate such in their own manufacturing/production or distribution processes. In particular, companies developing more than one professional automation solution or having integrations of many systems to manage should be interested. To actually not investigate the potential and use would be daring, as it will eventually lead to lower competitiveness and profitability for both the provider of the automation solutions as well as the end users. Further, it may also make it hard to recruit younger personnel, with needed skills and competencies, if considered to be an incumbent with old low technology.  
Regarding time and effort improvements, in smaller companies, they are often the same, whereas in larger companies or organizations, they may not be, due to the fact that the processes are more complex and involve a lot of other people whose time may not be cut, as the effort or time spent is cut by others. For larger organizations, improved overall cost and total development project time may be better outcomes to measure and use concerning improvements. However, decreasing the time and efforts needed is, in general, a very good thing to achieve and it enables freed-up engineers and experts to do other tasks, to create and craft additional improvements. Thus, this can create a beneficial spiral of improvements and higher overall efficiency, which will likely be appreciated by customers and value-chain partners.  
Concerning the generalizability of the case studies' results, these are deemed to be highly generalizable due to the nature of the cases and their contexts spanning manufacturing and process industries. However, as mentioned in the Results section, there is a threshold and investment required before the benefits/improvements can be reaped, in acquisition of needed skills and competencies, and either finding or developing an own SOA-based platform to use.  
The research question posed in the paper has been answered (see Table 1), as has been demonstrated by the findings from case studies, supported by the literature review, involving both providers and an end user of automation solutions. To sum up the analysis, the results point to potential benefits/improvements of using an SOA-based platform, supporting microservices that are too significant for all organizations and companies involved in the development or operations of automation solutions, to neglect investigation of such a platform. Which SOA-based platform to use depends on the needs and where in the lifecycle the most benefits/improvements are perceived or expected.