APIs, Applications, and Microservices Integration: Three pillars to a Digital Transformation

The ongoing global crisis triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic has had a disruptive impact on the global industrial landscape where the Digital Renaissance is underway. The crisis has compelled many firms to rethink their IT architectural approach to build resilient and highly scalable applications that meet rapidly evolving business priorities.

As digital disruption is becoming the standard for success, organizations aren’t just going down the path to digital. Instead, they are strategically planning their transformation to provide distinguished offerings and to gain a competitive edge. Organizations are dismantling their cumbersome point-to-point connections and building more integrated, collaborative, and value-driven ecosystems that integrate new applications with existing ones.

Application Integration with APIs and Microservices: The relationship

An integrated, agile application architecture helps enterprises to scale quickly, generate new revenues, and reduce costs. It also provides them superior control over their applications, which facilitates faster and informed decision-making, with maximum efficiency. For many enterprises, the key to seamless application integration is a bundled solution that incorporates APIs, Hybrid Integrations, and Microservices integrations.

To create a highly connected IT environment that will accelerate Digital Transformation in a more expedient manner, many businesses see microservices and APIs as a much sought-after solution. They believe that microservices live alongside a holistic API strategy because a fractured application architecture cannot survive. Combining them together results in multiple benefits, including business agility, flexibility, speed, strong security capabilities, and scalability.

What are Microservices?

Microservices—an architecture model, is a huge advantage over traditional monolithic architectures for how it allows greater flexibility to change and develop new applications in the fastest time possible. Another advantage is how Microservices support a holistic transformation by deploying new applications that coexist and interact with the traditional and existing ones.

However, as exciting as it might sound, integrating applications using microservices isn’t easy and has its own set of complexities, which can result in growth casualties. This blog exposes the challenges of application integration using microservices and outlines what organizations can do to solve the need for faster, more scalable application integrations.

Why is Microservices integration a sore spot for digital enterprises?

In a world abounding with digital possibilities, agility is everything. While microservices sit at the forefront of the digital enterprise revolution, it has a few shortcomings, including cumbersome processes and a looming risk of redundancy. However, the biggest hurdle lies in securing microservices architectures across previously deployed architectural patterns, without compromising speed and flexibility.

Moreover, the rapid mainstreaming of microservices has triggered another big concern for digital enterprises. By embracing microservices, enterprises have successfully broken down cumbersome business systems into discrete components, but the problem of integrating these autonomous services and deriving their maximum value has thrown enterprises into disarray.

Fortunately, an API-led implementation methodology has been successful in reducing the integration issues. Application Integration is a laborious process with many highs and lows , which microservices alone can’t handle. This is where APIs shine. They bolster the power of microservices while limiting their drawbacks, leading to seamless application integration.

Streamlining integration: Microservices, APIs, and Platforms

APIs herald a significant step forward in the management of microservices architectures over rigid and disparate legacy systems.

Here is how APIs and microservices aid in seamless application integration:

1. With APIs, enterprises find it easier to synchronize microservices with traditional systems and facilitate them to coexist while meeting several operational and compliance requirements. Additionally, an API-led strategy helps companies expose the functionality of microservices as products, which results in both external and internal growth.
2. APIs bring significant cost benefits by eliminating the need for point-to-point integrations with legacy systems and SaaS applications. This allows organizations to quickly scale microservices up or down whenever the requirements shift.
3. APIs make it possible to reuse and discover microservices. If teams are creating microservices architectures, which are of greater interest to a particular audience, APIs will ensure that they are easily discoverable, facilitate a wider audience reach, and can be managed later as a reusable and scalable solution.

Moving from legacy architecture to Microservices with API Management Platform  

API Management plays a crucial role in navigating the complexities of migrating a monolithic architecture into a legacy system modernization using Microservices integration and APIs across highly integrated and complex IT systems. Typically, the migration process involves heavy code revamping. To scale microservices via APIs, the development team relies on the Strangler Pattern, which is an ideal option to deploy Monolith Modernization with APIs and Microservices. The Strangler Pattern acts as a proxy layer by strategically developing a "mesh" of microservices across the existing monolithic applications and making the transformation smoother by replacing a particular functionality.

Kellton as a strategic partner in the transformation

Kellton has been servicing the Software AG community since 1997. With over 250 successful implementations throughout the US and Canada, we are the most trusted and sought-after premier partner for Software AG products.

Our team specializes in implementing microservices and APIs for application integration while delivering the benefits of cost savings and shortened deployment times.

We have vetted expertise in streamlining application integration for our clients worldwide by utilizing Software AG’s high-performing product range, including WebMethods Integration Server, WebMethods DevOps Edition, WebMethods Cloudstreams, WebMethods Integration Cloud, and Universal Messaging.