understanding the api economy - how your business can benefit from apis

Understanding the API Economy: How Your Business Can Benefit From APIs

Presenters:

Randy HeffnerForrester Research

Adam DuVanderSendGrid

Date: 12/11/13

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Company Overview

• Founded July 2009

• TechStars graduate(Boulder, CO)

• 180 employees across 4 offices– Boulder & Denver CO– Anaheim, CA – Romania

$27M venture capital raisedSeries B closed Jan 2012

Angel investors include:-Scott Petry (Founder, Postini)-Matt Mullenweg (Founder, Wordpress)

3

Delivering Email at Scale

• Serving 100,000+ customers

• Sending over 10 billion emailsper month

• Transactional and marketing email solutions

4

Today’s Speakers

Randy HeffnerVice President and Principal Analyst, Forrester Research@BizTech21

Adam DuVanderDirector of Developer Communications, SendGrid@adamd

Understanding the API economy:How your business can benefit from APIs

Randy Heffner, Vice President & Principal AnalystDecember 11, 2013

© 2013 Forrester Research, Inc. Reproduction Prohibited 7

Amazon’s kick start for the API economy

The Big Switch:

• Amazon doesn’t choose its partners, its partners choose Amazon

AP

Is

© 2013 Forrester Research, Inc. Reproduction Prohibited 8

The social world gave APIs a name

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Forget Facebook, here’s who has an API now

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For providers, APIs reorient business design

Business

Customers

Channels Where design for external

integration begins

Efficiency

Partners

Business

Ecosystems

Relationships

Leverage

Connections

Traditional business Open business

© 2013 Forrester Research, Inc. Reproduction Prohibited 11

For consumers, APIs open new opportunities

© 2013 Forrester Research, Inc. Reproduction Prohibited 12

Four major categories of APIs

Open web APIs

Tech-savvy consumers

B2B APIs

Internal APIs

Product APIs

Value-add innovators

Digital disruptors SuppliersDistribution

partners

Digital experiences

(mobile, web, etc.)

Enterprise applications / core infrastructure(custom, off-the-shelf, cloud, on-premise)

Products(software,

physical products,services)

Enterprise customers

Web site developers

API provider Provider’s products

Tech-savvy consumers

Product ecosystem

Wide-open to innovation Optimized business Build product ecosystems

Enterprise customers

1 2

3

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Purpose and function drive API types

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Alternate API types fit special contexts

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APIs & SOA: The same, only different

› The same:• Both can use REST and SOAP • Both serve internal and external scenarios• Both need — and can share — strong service

platforms

› Different:• Open Web APIs create new requirements for external

integration• External APIs can be products in their own right• APIs expand the scope of functionality beyond SOA

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Source: May 2008, “Defining Your SOA Platform Strategy” Forrester report

Yesterday: An enterprise SOA platform

Business service interfaces

Service mediation

Service life-cycle mgt

Incoming business service requests

Service integration

Service implementation

Service management

Service creation and change

To enterprise IT &ID management

To developmentlife-cycle management

To enterprisedata & content platforms

© 2013 Forrester Research, Inc. Reproduction Prohibited 17

Today: An enterprise service platform

Service interfaces

Service mediation

Service life-cycle mgt

Incoming API and SOA service requests

Service integration

Service implementation

Service management

Service creation and change

To enterprise IT &ID management

To developmentlife-cycle management

To enterprisedata & content platforms

API management

DevelopersProduct

managers

© 2013 Forrester Research, Inc. Reproduction Prohibited 18

Selecting an API provider

Forrester’s recommendations

Drive API innovation – as consumer and provider• Don’t reinvent the wheel• Connect across your ecosystem• Crack your business wide open• Ride someone else’s success

Architect carefully for top-notch API operations

Enter the age of digital business

• Understand and design around latency and transactions• Monitor, manage, and be ready to scale

• Focus on business design and agility• Provision business capabilities with flexibility and speed

Thank youRandy Heffnerrheffner@forrester.com@BizTech21

Build Your Business on APIs

Adam DuVanderDeveloper Communications Director

@adamd

Your Typical Developer

Claire Thompson

Pareto Principle

“80% of the effects come from 20% of the causes”

Pareto-as-a-Service

APIs and Cloud Services

Pareto-as-a-Service

APIs and Cloud Services

What makes your app special

Infrastructure

Email as Infrastructure

Email

• Web API• SMTP API• Marketing Email API• Event Webhook• Inbound Parse Webhook

Email in Any Language

Hacking SMTP

“category”: [ “trial_users”, “daily_digest”]

“unique_args”: { “user_id”: “12345”, “order_num”: “67890”}

“sub”: {“%name%”:

[“Rick”, “Roll”]}

Email Marketing

Robust API for all features

Event Notifications Webhook

Event Storage

Inbound Parse Webhook

Including attachments

Inbound Use Cases

You Already Have an API

Is It Valuable to Others?

Other APIs and Cloud Services

Your app(s)

Your API(s)?

Learn MoreSendGrid’s Event Webhook Guide

Webcast: The Developer’s Toolbox: Free APIs Every Developer Needs To Know About

SendGrid.com/blog

Questions?