This month’s news round-up has a new name, because what we do at Axway goes beyond APIs: we believe the best digital experiences will be built on open API platforms, as well as API-fueled MFT and B2B/EDI solutions, which make participation in an ever-expanding ecosystem frictionless
Here are op-eds and company news you may have missed in May, along with top API and digital transformation stories from around the web.
Top API Stories
An essential part of the vision to ‘Open Everything’ is speaking a common language, which helps ensure exchanges are standardized. In North America, where open Banking has been more market-driven as opposed to Europe’s regulatory PSD2 push, that gap has lately been filled by FDX, a non-profit standards body.
This month, Axway and Cloudentity were proud to offer the first production release to support the latest FDX API 5.0, offering financial-grade consumer data security for open banking implementations in North America. Learn more about the release and how Axway Open Banking helps customers securely extend their reach to new markets and capitalize on embedded finance, on PYMNTS.com.
“Through our support of FDX, Axway is helping drive the establishment of common, open, shared standards for the secure exchange of financial data, leading the charge to bring open banking to North America,” says Axway Head of Open Banking Eyal Sivan.
He also demonstrated the solution at FinovateSpring in San Francisco:
“Featuring an intuitive developer portal, pre-built open banking APIs and a robust core focused on security, identity & consent, all running on top of our industry-leading Enterprise gateway, Axway Open Banking gives your organization everything you need to adopt, embrace and succeed at open banking.”
Watch a live recording of Sivan’s demo of Axway Open Banking at FinovateSpring here.
89% of global cloud decision-makers and users have a multi-cloud strategy in place, according to Flexera’s 2022 State of the Cloud Report. It’s safe to say this trend is here to stay.
With a multi-cloud infrastructure, businesses have an easier way to meet data residency requirements as they have access to CSPs in select regions and zones. But that’s not the only reason to make the transition: discover six reasons for adopting a multi-cloud strategy from Axway’s Arun Dorairajan.
Wondering if you’re doing enough to secure data? Axway Chief Catalyst Brian Pagano says in an Integration Developer News article that enterprise IT and business users should take a harder look at their data collection policies.
“Instead of placing all the focus on tighter configuration and product-level security, what about looking at the data which passes through your system (data-in-motion) and the data which gets saved (data-at-rest),” says Pagano. “No hacker can steal data which you haven’t collected. The best way to protect your users’ data is not to collect it at all.”
Read what Pagano believes is the most effective action a company can take, here.
French insurance leader Covéa continues its transformation, leveraging SAP & Axway to deploy its new Finance IT architecture. Learn more about Axway’s role in supporting the group’s drive for operational excellence here.
Axway CTIO Vince Padua says B2B integration and collaboration will accelerate its digital transformation built on the backs of APIs and the cloud.
“Because cloud-native and API-first approaches have matured to an open-everything architecture, the time and cost to innovation through partnerships and collaboration has significantly decreased,” Padua explains.
Read more about how DevOps can support continuous architecture on InfoWorld.
APIs are transforming how we work, communicate, and do business. In an article in New Technology Era, Axway Head of Open Banking Eyal Sivan points out that big data is revolutionizing the way financial service providers operate – but also many others:
“Open banking is evolving not just vertically into open finance, but also horizontally into open data. Australia was prophetic in their understanding of this progression, as evidenced by their Consumer Data Right (CDR ) standard, the only open banking specification that is in no way specific to banking, supporting multiple verticals across the economy right out of the gate,” says Sivan.
The Business of APIs
In a profile on Authority Magazine, Axway CEO Patrick Donovan discusses data-driven work cultures and why data regarding customer transactions is gold.
“Data that speaks to market trends is invaluable for your product teams to analyze and use for decisions regarding where products need to go to meet the market needs in several years,” says Donovan. “Without this data, we would be guessing about future demand instead of making informed decisions. This data comes from both high-level market data collectors and from customers themselves.”
Does your organization have an API vision, but get stuck on the execution? Axway Catalyst Erik Wilde says it’s a common pattern he sees, and he calls it the Execution Gap.
“There is a vision that talks about Digital Transformation and sometimes even about APIs, but when you dig a little deeper how that vision is executed, there is a gap. This gap hurts many organizations today and fixing it can create a lot of value for organizations.”
Wilde says there is enormous potential just waiting to be captured, and he discusses what it takes to get there in his latest video:
“Having a vision is great but it is not enough,” Wilde explains. “It’s a starting point, but just by itself doesn’t change an organization. The vision must be turned into a strategy, which is a detailed and plausible plan how the vision can be turned into reality.”
Speaking of execution problems, Deloitte analysts say that 70% of transformation efforts fail, and it takes around three years for organizations to even begin competing in the digital market when they do get it right.
EasySend CEO Tal Daskal looks at digital transformation plans vs. reality, and some of the top reasons why organizations fail at digital transformation in Forbes.
To this end, Axway Rahim Bhatia points out that a better approach to API management is needed today and in the future.
“Like every business problem, the solution lies in examining what your customer or user needs to succeed and working backward to the technology solution,” Bhatia explains. “A business-led approach to APIs starts by identifying the end customer and the problem you are solving for them. Your API should be the product you are offering to meet this need.”
Read why Bhatia says your APIs should solve a pain point – not become one, here.
Axway Catalyst Emmanuel Méthivier points out that transitioning from simple digital assets to real digital products is what will allow truly disruptive evolutions. In a ZDNet article, he argues that moving toward a Digital Services Marketplace – transitioning APIs from a simple digital asset to a real digital product – is the key to ROI for your API program.
Read his thoughts on what it takes to make the transition here (in French).
May Events
Axway joined Cybersec Europe in Brussels on May 11th and 12th, presenting a workshop on how companies in strategic sectors (public, health, defense, and infrastructure) can open their information system to their ecosystem based on an ambitious API strategy.
You can read more about Noel Rocher’s thoughts on finding a balance between API security and opening up in his blog post.
May 19th brought the Matinale DSI, a workshop organized with BFM Business in Paris to discuss API governance and security. Eric Horesnyi SVP, API Platform EMEA and Emmanuel Methivier, Business Program Director and Axway Catalyst spoke about best practices to reach your growth objectives.
Read their advice to avoid “zombie APIs” and how APIs should offer security “by design” in this blog, and learn why API adoption is a major indicator of your API program’s success.
On May 21st, Axway SVP and General Manager EMEA Yves Lajouanie joined the 01 Business program with host Frédéric Simottel to discuss how companies can transform their business model with an API-based digital services marketplace.
Watch his segment on BFMTV here.
Axway also participated in a Brazilian event on Open Finance, “Unveiling the Open Finance Infrastructure.” On May 26th, Axway’s Claudio Maia presented the main challenges and lessons from Brazil’s Open Finance experiences so far, revealing the structure that has enabled the model.
“We have been following our clients closely, providing support since the implementation of the system, and supporting each update or challenge. We have reached a point where it is already possible to evaluate some of the main lessons from these experiences, always looking to the future,” says Maia.
Finally, we wrapped up the month with the Axway Partner Summit in sunny Sevilla, delighted to meet again in person with representatives from 40+ of our major partner companies in EMEA.
Participants discussed goals, the Axway strategy, and product innovations, as well as how to sell and market our joint products and services across Europe to help partners grow their businesses.
Learn more about Axway’s Partner program here.
Open Banking & Finance
A new open banking rule that could increase competition and make financial services more accessible to Americans is being held up by consumer data privacy concerns.
According to Reuters, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) is hesitant to move ahead with the new rule, given the way big tech companies have approached consumer data privacy issues in the past. The article notes that the CFPB will be conducting a small business panel review “by year’s end” to gather feedback about the potential new rule.
Peter Klein, co-founder and CTO of FinLync, writes in Forbes this month about the importance of investing in testing, and shares three keys to making sure your bank API is ready for launch:
“Banks invest a sizable amount of time and money into building their API services, but if that is followed up by offering a bare-bones sandbox, then they are doomed to be overwhelmed by production support requests from integrators and clients,” writes Klein. “In the end, both sides look bad and will likely lead to future skepticism within the industry about their technological capabilities. Bank API connectivity provides critical access to enhanced, enriched balance and transaction data, and the banks that truly invest in testing will be best positioned with technology that seamlessly delivers this critical service to corporate treasury teams.”
In an op ed in AltFi, Eyal Sivan writes that in order to overcome the challenges of PSD2, big banks need a mindset change to navigate a new era of compliance.
“Historically, most banks expected that each customer would have all of their banking and financial services needs addressed by their institution. In doing so, they would stay in that bank’s ecosystem as much as possible, and competition would focus on wallet share or product-per-customer targets.
The problem with this approach is that it assumes that each bank can fully meet all of an individual’s specific financial services requirements with the best products. However, this is increasingly at odds with today’s digital societies, where diverse customer requirements mean it’s simply not practical for a single institution to provide its customers with everything they could possibly want or need.”
Another piece in AltFi looks at how Open Banking presents “endless” possibilities for green lending according to an Oplo executive: the platform has lent hundreds of millions to people looking to invest in carbon-free heat pumps and solar panels for their homes, and they are devising a green score for customers to build a “green marketplace.”
Axway customer Commerzbank, a leading German private and corporate bank, has also leveraged the green revolution in banking: you can read about their journey to sustainability here, and our new video shows how the bank is creating innovative business models with Axway’s Amplify API Management platform.
Finally, Axway’s own Mr. Open Banking, Eyal Sivan, was featured in a new documentary on the rise of open banking, entitled “Open Revolution, the Open Finance Challenge.” Envisioned by Guga Stocco, a force on the Brazilian innovation scene and recent guest on the Transform it Forward podcast, the documentary focuses on the Open Finance journey in Brazil and is narrated and presented by Stocco.
“With a language as powerful as cinema, our intention with the documentary was to bring the hot topics of this financial market, both for the information of the business and banking world, and for the common viewer, who may have heard of open banking, but doesn’t know exactly how much the concept can affect his or her life,” says Steven Phil, filmmaker and partner at Fpass, the project’s financing platform.
The documentary was premiered last month in São Paulo; stayed tuned as it will soon be available on streaming platforms with English subtitles. Learn more about the project here (in Portuguese).
What we’re listening to
The third season of Mr. Open Banking has arrived. To kick it off, Eyal Sivan chats with the CEO of Moneyhub, Samantha Seaton.
“Open banking has now taken hold, in some shape or form, all over the world. Today we see open banking standards already being expanded to address more financial instruments, like insurance, mortgages and investments, leading to early versions of open finance. Beyond the horizon, the standards spread further, to other sectors of the economy, as we move towards the world of open data. To find their place in this new world, banks must rethink three fundamental tenets of banking: value, risk and trust.
As Open Banking Expo‘s 2021 Pioneer of the Year and founder of an award winning fintech, Sam knows a thing or two about helping banks understand open banking. No surprise that she often stresses putting the customer’s needs first, but doing so in an open ecosystem demands a change of perspective.”
Seaton and Sivan discuss how banks and fintechs view risk, whether customers trust their banks, and the importance of creating a fair value exchange.
Listen to the episode here, or anywhere you get your podcasts.
Brian Pagano appeared on the Tech Talks Daily podcast to offer tips, best practices, and expert analysis for organization leaders tackling privacy issues.
He tells host Neil Hughes that there isn’t a single solution for optimized data privacy – and you can tell if an IT department is not evolving if you are required to frequently change your password (this practice has been shown to decrease security and has largely been abandoned). Keeping data private involves data-at-rest and data-in-motion, mostly ensuring that whoever is trying to access the info has the proper entitlements to that data.
Listen to the episode here to learn why he believes we should abandon the old faith in passwords.
And of course, don’t miss the latest episodes of the Transform It Forward podcast with Axway EVP & CMO Paul French:
- Bridging the tech gap in the recreational and outdoor power equipment markets with Jason Guss, co-founder and CEO of Octane, a fintech company that’s revolutionizing the buying experience for major recreational and equipment purchases.
- Shaping the future of America’s cities with macro trends in mind, with Alon Marcovici, Managing Director at CityAge, a global platform where leaders meet to build the future of our urban planet.
That about covers it for our May News Round-up – you can always find the latest Axway news in our Newsroom, and stay tuned for more API and digital transformation headlines next month!
Join us at an upcoming event: June 14th in Paris for France API, or in Chicago June 23rd-24th for the Open Finance, APIs, and Partnerships event – and many more.