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Integration has always been the unseen yet critical driver for any platform implementation. One truly is the loneliest number, especially when it comes to standalone SaaS platforms. Integrate 2, 3, 4 platforms to the mix and then you have something – a consolidated 360 degree view of your business.
As business units continue to expand their SaaS infrastructure without restraint; there is an increased risk of losing a consolidated view of the business. Greater visibility across systems leads to better decision-making. Age-old traditional integration challenges emerge – how can datasets of disparate systems be combined into a single view without a substantial investment?
Integration is no longer just the act of taking data from Oracle (or a 20-year-old AS/400) and lifting it into the cloud. It now involves a much broader landscape – the cloud ecosystem as a whole. From platforms like Salesforce, Twitter, Facebook, GoodData, Zuora, Quora the extensions of SaaS data silos have become overwhelming!
Integration 2.0 frees customers from the limits of traditional RDBMS platforms such as Oracle, SQL Server and MySQL. These platforms are ubiquitous in the enterprise integration landscape. Integration 2.0 focuses on something much broader and open: a vehicle for true Cloud-to-Cloud data disbursement through open cloud APIs.
Today’s innovative Integration 2.0 providers are focusing on open marketplaces to offer countless platform endpoints that integrate with existing platforms. Informatica’s Marketplace has 100’s of pre-built cloud solutions allowing customers to integrate anything from Salesforce to Twitter without requiring developers to become experts on either APIs.
SnapLogic has introduced “Snaps” – connectors enabling countless cloud integration options from Salesforce.com, Box.net, Twitter, Kiva.org. Yes – you could theoretically read a file from Box.Net containing micro-donations and drive these submissions to Kiva.org (a grant website) as needed via their point and click integration tool. The possibilities are nearly endless when it comes to bridging multiple cloud platforms.
Open marketplaces are driving community efforts to fully map the cloud ecosystem by way of abstracted integration – think LEGO building blocks. Pick and chose the blocks you need to build your integration solution. The emergence of these marketplaces defines Integration 2.0. Open community built connectors with a rapidly expanding list of cloud platforms. Developers would be hard pressed to keep up with the emerging number of new cloud platforms – Integration 2.0 solves these challenges ensuring that no cloud platform is left standing alone.
Hopefully this reveals some of the possibilities when it comes to cloud-to-cloud integrations. Costly custom development is no longer the only answer for bridging clouds. In future blog posts I will be exploring some of the exciting Integration 2.0 apps showing the speed at which an integrated view of the business can be achieved.