API-Centric Development Makes API Management Critical

Modern applications are composites that integrate numerous components. As such, there is a great focus on APIs. The use of APIs can improve the speed and ease of software development and speed integration by reducing the amount of new code that needs to be written to access and connect different applications, services, and data. Additionally, APIs help eliminate application development problems with crossing data silos and disparate systems, which is a critical aspect needed in any integration effort.

With APIs playing such a vital role, API management naturally becomes important. Why? “As enterprises adopt more APIs, they need to prepare for API volumes to go up. Additionally, APIs have life cycles and thus require life cycle management. The different API phases include planning and design, development (creation), testing, deployment and use, and retirement.

Not surprisingly, industry experts predict a strong market for API management solutions. One recent study predicts that the global API management market size will grow at a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 32.9% from 2022 To 2032.

See also: Are Industry-Specific APIs the New Norm?

The study notes: “The need to manage and secure an organization’s APIs is the driving factor for API management market. The overall growth of the market is driven by the growing need to protect corporate data and to increase the productivity of the developers or organizations through the usage of API management systems. The growth of this market is also influenced by the need to integrate new applications and devices.

A suitable API management solution should have some key characteristics and allow businesses to:

• Offer a self-service, fully customizable API developer portal
• Publish and manage secure APIs
• Manage APIs across multiple clouds and on-premises from a single API manager
• Use AI-powered automated API testing that is optimized based on a company’s operational data
• Provide governance and version control for APIs.

Additionally, since business applications frequently exist in multiple locations (on cloud and on-premises), a solution must be able to seamlessly sync data across applications no matter where it resides.

With such an API management solution in place, businesses will be able to use the power of APIs to improve the collection, collaboration, management, integration, and security of an organization’s digital portfolio.