Solving the Problems That Accompany API Sprawl With AI  ## Document Notes ## Highlights - **APIs Power Core Business Processes** - APIs run core enterprise business processes and require automated discovery, observability, and governance. - API sprawl plus hybrid/multi-cloud deployments magnify security and management challenges. Transcript: Neeraj Nargund Ah, so if you talk about enterprises and if you talk about their core business process, I mean, APIs run the core business process. You want to scale and when you scale across the enterprise with so many different business functionality, processes, etc. You want to have automated discovery. You want to have observability, you want to have governance. There's so much sprawl of the APIs. So very important from an enterprise perspective. Now with sprawl will come security threats. So everything that we talked about security back in the days is still relevant. Like you have zero trust, OAuth, OIDC, runtime anomaly. So many, everything become very critical at the API gateway level, at the API level. And you will see a lot of news around security around the api other key element why it is important is a hybrid hybrid and multi-cloud and edge right that enterprises just don't use one Hyperscale they use multiple hyperscalers. They have so many different SaaS services that you use. They run on the edge. They run on-prem. ([Time 0:02:40](https://share.snipd.com/snip/22f8f151-2b85-463f-bb12-c79b347fc18b)) - **What Makes An API 'Smart'** - Smart APIs are APIs infused with AI that are context- and event-aware across their lifecycle. - They interpret and act on data, enabling agent workflows and adaptive behavior. Transcript: Neeraj Nargund I would say an API which is infused with AI. Often there's an event or a context awareness around that API. You can easily adapt, assist across its lifecycle. There's an AI-assisted governance design when you're building. There's a context-aware behavior. That's what makes it smart. I mean, especially with the agent framework and machine agents and everything. So the state and context that are used for the agent workflows and the eventual API integration around that becomes very critical. That's where quote unquote smart comes in. If I have to sum it up earlier, we used to say APIs move data, right? Go get, fetch, what have you. And now smart APIs help interpret and act on it. ([Time 0:05:10](https://share.snipd.com/snip/4d20780d-9b24-4824-92d1-7878bde0c0e5)) - **Use AI To Automate Governance And Delivery** - Implement AI-assisted governance, automated documentation, and test generation to reduce developer toil. - Use event-ready APIs to connect streaming data, real-time apps, and AI agents for responsiveness. Transcript: Neeraj Nargund We talked earlier about sprawl and you mentioned building. So, yeah, I mean, you need better governance, right? You need governance at scale. I mean, what are the end points are there shadow apis remediations that's thousands of apis that you build you need a better governance at scale over there now with generative assistant And Gen AI, which create automated documentation and test generation, etc., you need faster delivery, right? You want to reduce the toil. So obviously this is capability that you need. Then anybody who talks about API will talk about monetization and productization of the APIs. How do you package the data and the insights and how do you help curate price and segment usage? All these become capabilities that you need. Then I talked about earlier when you asked about smart, event awareness, et cetera. You need to be able to bridge your APIs with streaming and real-time apps and AI agents. So there has to be sort of like an event readiness, driven readiness around your smart APIs in large organizations. I mean, I would say large and medium organizations as well, but very relevant in large organizations. ([Time 0:06:34](https://share.snipd.com/snip/5478e520-7d36-448e-98b2-6e7a904fe029)) - **Productize And Monetize API Data** - Productize and monetize APIs by packaging data, pricing, and segmenting usage metrics. - Design APIs as products with clear usage analytics to capture revenue and value. Transcript: Neeraj Nargund Then anybody who talks about API will talk about monetization and productization of the APIs. How do you package the data and the insights and how do you help curate price and segment usage? All these become capabilities that you need. Then I talked about earlier when you asked about smart, event awareness, et cetera. You need to be able to bridge your APIs with streaming and real-time apps and AI agents. ([Time 0:07:22](https://share.snipd.com/snip/ff027e01-59d9-42ee-a1fc-5be813caefa5)) - **AI Embedded Across API Connect** - IBM embeds AI across the API Connect lifecycle including AI gateways, VS Code agents, and nano gateways. - The platform aims to be unified and AI-ready for edge, hybrid, and full lifecycle automation. Transcript: Neeraj Nargund If you look at API Connect and if you look at where IBM is at, we are embedding API into the entire lifecycle of API Connect, right? Into the AI gateway, there's a WatsonX.AI It's a guided wizard, I would say, to create AI-aware APIs, enforce the access, et cetera. We have a VS Code agent that translates natural language into actions. So it's an API agent, AI assistant. Then we have the data power nano gateway, the API studio, the API connect. These are some latest announcements. It's like a unified AI ready platform for your edge gateways, which is lightweight, again, nano, and AI-powered API studio for full lifecycle automation that I talked about earlier, That AI-aware API, so ability to create that. Smart APIs, again, where we are heading. AI-assisted design and governance, again, relevant. AI-aware routing, relevant. If you're talking about enforcement, enforcement at Edge, Nano, very important. Then if you talk about agents and agent tooling, that's where the API all integrated together using our WatsonX platform. ([Time 0:08:31](https://share.snipd.com/snip/db5d4ccc-dc38-43f2-998a-d2ade358ded9)) - **Scale AI With Measurable Enterprise Impact** - Move AI beyond pilots by redesigning workflows and embedding AI into systems of record for enterprise impact. - Measure ROI with clear metrics like reduced cycle time, conversion lift, and risk mitigation. Transcript: Neeraj Nargund So you talked about ability to scale versus the pilots, right? We hear a lot of pilots happening and we want to scale beyond that. Surveys that we have seen, the enterprise-level impact is not even. It's an uneven enterprise-level impact on these pilots. Ability to when you redesign your workflows or embed ai into the systems of record so you need to ensure that for you if you want to scale it out move beyond the pilot you need to have an enterprise Level impact for that if it's a small pilot somewhere happening some place, I mean, it's good to start out with, but to ROI is you need to identify those where you have an enterprise level Impact. Obviously that means you need to have a measurable returns, right? How do you measure the ROI of an AI project? So that means given you have so many agents and APIs, to have a discipline integration path. So you need to have a proper API, create a proper governance around it. You need to measure the specific metrics, tabulate that together. So that is important. That's where we see companies moving slowly over there. But yeah, there's some, if you want to move from capability to advantage, you'll have to identify these enterprise level flows where we can have a measurable impact. So it has to be visible, right? ([Time 0:10:40](https://share.snipd.com/snip/75c31e4a-c364-4de9-96cf-876906d32200)) - **APIs Meet Real-Time Streaming** - Confluent would bring real-time streaming and 'trustworthy in motion' data to IBM's smart data platform. - Convergence of APIs and events enables agents and AI to consume live signals for real-time use cases. Transcript: Neeraj Nargund I mean, my information is whatever is in the public domain, right? We want to create a smart data platform for enterprise AI, ability for real-time governed data access across the hybrid environments. Confluent provides a huge up for us of course provided we get the regulatory approvals and etc for for the acquisition so what that means is there's a convergence of apis and events right That's real-time event information that's's where conference comes in. The AI agents that you're building need live data streams, live signals. That's where conference will be very helpful. So trustworthy in motion data, very important. And I think conference capabilities to support HNDKI use cases becomes very relevant. ([Time 0:13:27](https://share.snipd.com/snip/3fcc982e-362b-48fc-9e5a-c72710d60efc)) - **WHI Demonstrates Hybrid Integration In Practice** - WHI (Web Methods Hybrid Integration) is IBM's AI-infused offering for hybrid integration available on AWS Marketplace. - It combines MFT, event gateway, and API management with a single hybrid control plane for visibility across deployments. Transcript: Neeraj Nargund WHI is IBM Web Methods Hybrid Integration. That is our premier offering for hybrid integration, but it provides multiple capabilities it is it's available on the AWS marketplace it provides it's an AI infused hybrid integration Platform it provides MFT capabilities, event gateway capabilities, API management capabilities, all together on a single AI-infused platform. The key part of it is it provides a hybrid control plane. So using a single control plane, you can look at multiple deployments of this or usage of this API across your environment. That's a very powerful tool. And that is something that IBM and the integration team is heavily betting on. And we have extremely great success stories. ([Time 0:14:50](https://share.snipd.com/snip/90ddb47d-1053-4a2b-ad32-677e8bc1e0c6)) - **Prioritize Gateways And Unified Control Planes** - Build agent, edge, and nano gateways and unify APIs with events for AI-aware routing and analytics. - Prioritize security, governance, and unified control planes across hybrid deployments. Transcript: Neeraj Nargund I mean, in general, if you want to talk about that, we talk about agent gateways, we talked about edge gateways, nano gateways, AI gateways, infusing us AI in these capabilities. When we talked about security and governance integration, very relevant given the sprawl that is there. Unified APIs and events, AI, routing and usage analytics. ([Time 0:17:35](https://share.snipd.com/snip/9a5f0c27-17bd-4f5e-b2b8-a58d432fb518))