Company-Wide API

In simple terms, an application programming interface (API) is a structured way for one software application to talk with another.

OpenView Venture Partners blogger Nick Petri recently posited the value of a “company-wide” API that enables companies to connect to their existing and future “eco-system” through an API. This is a concept that has real legs, and delivers tremendous value.

Much of my career has been dependent on APIs – in the ‘90s it was an API between phone systems and healthcare information systems (HIS); the early ‘00s it was a VoIP API for websites; now it is an API for Prolifiq. When we conceived our platform, we believed it was imperative that we connect with desktop and enterprise applications to leverage the “real estate” of their user-interfaces as well as the data/knowledge in their databases. This has been the most prescient move we have ever made.

In virtually every customer deployment, we are asked: “….can you connect your platform to our ______application?” In almost all instances (providing the application supports web services or APIs) the answer is: “yes.” This allows us to greatly enhance the functionality of our solution and leverage existing corporate assets. Most importantly, we deliver a “whole” that is “greater than the sum of the parts.”

The internet – and web services in particular – has clearly changed everything. Connectivity is key; connectivity is built on APIs. The most forward thinking companies embrace this fact and support APIs and have an ethos of connectivity built into their IT governance processes. Does yours?