Conference recap: What’s the word in API World?

Our team of Axway API experts enjoyed some time immersed in the world of APIs in San Jose on October 8th-10th. The API World conference provided us with an opportunity to talk directly to a wide variety of people who have a thirst for knowledge about APIs. It was abundantly clear that there were many API newbies in attendance–people learning about the possibilities of what can be done with APIs to help their businesses grow. For us as API practitioners, an event like API World is a fantastic way to take the pulse of how API maturity is advancing and to find out what challenges organizations are facing.

API World conference

A great way to capture such a trending feeling is to take to the aisles of the expo hall. Our Senior Marketing Manager, Josh Molina and I had loads of fun terrorizing (ahem, I mean, interrogating) some lucky conference-goers about one approach we promote as trusted advisors to our global customers–Full Lifecycle API Management.

Axway has just been announced as a leader in Gartner’s 2019 Magic Quadrant for Full Life Cycle API Management.

To any organization embarking on an API strategy, addressing the full lifecycle of an API, from planning and designing through to publishing, building, running, monitoring and managing change is critical to success and getting value from APIs at scale.

It was fascinating to get peoples’ take on this and to see how familiar the concept is to the general API World public. Responses ranged from those who expounded on the full flow of the lifecycle to those who were not as acquainted with the notion but were very curious to learn more.

It also honored me to deliver an open talk on “Creating Customer Experiences in a Multiexperience World.” Sometimes, it’s easy to get tunnel-vision regarding APIs and lose sight of the business value of what API providers are working towards with the delivery and management of APIs to our consumers and partners. This was a chance for me to bring some context from the digital world into the arena and to introduce the notion of the omniexperience.

READ MORE: What’s omniexperience? Hint: It’s not about you!

It turns out that APIs, in how they provide both abstractions of your organization’s business capabilities and, provide access to the data needed to build great digital experiences and push them to where customers need them most. That is the essence of the revolution offered by the omniexperience, and one that today’s digital natives are expected by default. It’s different from the “build it and they will come” nature of the omnichannel strategies of the past. Flexibility in bundling and unbundling capabilities into new and engaging experiences is something that APIs excel at and the message resonated with the audience.

Once again, the API World conference exhibited the vibrancy and connected nature of the API community. A notable new breed of attendees was the API Product Manager. Yes, they are out there, and they will have a vital role to play in the adoption of APIs and to ensure that they realize the business value they unlock. It’s great to be a part of that world. It’s even more exciting to see more business and technology people making these events a fantastic learning experience. See you next year in 2020!