APIs: the cornerstone of your Digital Transformation

Essentially, Digital Transformation is built on top this simple fact: every organization in the world has valuable data and functionality in its systems (otherwise, they wouldn’t be in business). But on their own, what these organizations can do with these digital assets could be limited in scope. In order to overcome this limitation organizations are part of Digital Ecosystem which is made up of suppliers, customers, trading partners, applications, third-party data service providers, utilizing digital technology and all interconected to provide an enhanced offer and experience to end customers. In such an scenario, integration and interconnection are of paramount importance.

Figure 1 How to Tap into Digital Ecosystems Value (source: Institute of Digital Business Strategy)

...and this is when APIs come into scene. But APIs are?dynamic by nature : it is important to continually manage and improve your APIs to adjust to the changing customer and business needs.

API Management Platforms

A powerful API Management platform gives companies the agile, modern and integrated architecture they need to deliver faster digital experiences, consolidate and monitor digital channels and boost partner ecosystems.

To understand better what an API Management Platform, it’s worth having in mind a simplified diagram of the API Platform (see Figure 2). The API Gateway receives and handles calls from apps and sends the calls to the correct servers. Then, it receives the responses from the servers and sends them to each respective app. The whole process of receiving and answering calls is part of the API runtime and takes place in what we call the?data plane.

At runtime, the API Gateway applies a series of settings that are established by the user at the API design-time, which occurs in what we call the?control plane. These settings are established on the API Manager, which is the graphical interface responsible for API Management Platform control.

In other words, on the API Manager the user defines how the API Gateway will behave.?The separation between the two spheres of the API Management Platform (that is, the?control plane?and the?data plane) is essential for the whole ecosystem to be stable and scalable.

Figure 2 Control Plane and Data Plane (source: Sensedia)

Sensedia has a complete?Full Lifecyle API Management?solution. In order to achieve this, an API Management platform has several tools to support the operation management and complexity of the APIs:?

• API Studio Manager : it is development environment for designing and testing API.
• Developer Portal : it?facilitates the use of its APIs by the collaborating developers of your ecosystem, with easy access to documentation, test environment, and issue tracker.
• API Gateway : it supports features for creating, publishing, maintaining, monitoring, and securing APIs at any scale. It is the entry point for all clients and interacts with back-end services.
• Events Hub : allows you to manage an event distribution architecture from a low-code interface, in which event publishers and subscribers are registered and managed completely independently.
• Service Mesh : it is a solution for microservice management. It works as an infrastructure that abstracts network issues arising from the communication between microservices. Its management features are enabled through a low-code graphical interface that makes the job of your development and operations teams easier.

Figure 3 Sensedia API Management Platform (source: Sensedia)

The?API Gateway Security?module enables the processing of calls and application of security mechanisms. The?Lifecycle?module enables the processing of information such as the lifecycle of the APIs and versioning. In turn, the?Analytics?module presents aggregated metrics regarding the operation of the APIs.

The?Sensedia API Platform ?facilitates the exposure, consumption and management of resources and data through APIs to enable integration with partners and customers, app creation for digital and IoT experiences, and open innovation strategies. It is the first Brazilian company to be featured in the?Gartner Full Lifecycle API-Management Magic Quadrant ?and the?Forrester Wave API Management Solutions .

API Adoption Roadmap

In the API economy, a successful service can gain popularity and be utilized in ways unpredicted and often inconceivable by its original owners. The very flexible nature of the APIs opens many doors, including business collaborations, reuse in third-party products, or even conquering hardware barriers by reaching a spectrum of devices.

Delivering an API strategy is far from easy and requires relentless scrutiny in research, top-notch development, time, and money. An API roadmap must enhance the team’s ability to deliver operational reliability,?streamline governance, manage requirements across diverse customers, and increase API adoption.

These are the must-have aspects to consider in any API adoption roadmap:

• Embrace the Managed API
• Make APIs Easy for Developers to Access
• Participate in the API Economy
• Employ Governance
• Monitor API Use
• Build a Brand
• Take a Product Perspective

In Sensedia we've gathered the knowledge of our specialists over the years and have defined an API Adoption Roadmap (see Figure 4) as a guide to know what is needed to overcome barriers in architectural evolution, driving business to be ready for a digital, open, and connected world.

Figure 4. API Adoption Roadmap (source: Sensedia)

References

• "Digital Transformation: You’re Doing It Wrong If You’re Not Looking At APIs ", last accessed 04/21/2022
• "Digital Ecosystem ", last accessed 04/21/2022
• "What is the Platformization? Learn how to Compete in the Age of Digital Platforms ", last accessed 04/21/2022