There has been a lot of buzz around the increasing need for APIs, especially around “free” and “open” APIs.

As Dion Hinchcliffe writes in his latest blog on ebizQ, (Open APIs Mature Into a Next-Generation Business Model and Is the Future of SOA Open Source?), APIs (or the lack thereof) are the biggest obstacle for developing next-generation business applications and SOA interoperability.

Why?  First, the APIs have to be available, but they also need to be simpler (for example using REST) and easier to consume by BI tools, agile application environments and mashup builders.

Dion describes how more and more companies are providing open or free APIs to their data as an important part of their business model. These APIs are supplemented by a new line of companies, like StrikeIron and Xignite, who provide APIs to other’s data through an easy data-as-a-service (DaaS) model (check out this article in WSJ, The New Information Goldmine).

This is well aligned with the Open Government Initiative and the new US government data site data.gov where more and more government data will become available. You can read more about this initiative in this article about Digital Democracy.

But can we realistically wait for all relevant data to become “API enabled”?

With more than 5 billion websites today, there is a vast amount of growing, relevant data that is not going to have an API any time soon – if ever. Add to this data locked internally in legacy applications and at your business partners and you can see how unrealistic it is to have APIs for all this data.

This is where Web Data Services and a product like the Kapow Web Data Server become critical.

Web Data Services allow business analysts and agile application developers to instantly create APIs where none exist. The only prerequisite is that you can navigate to and see the data in a normal web browser like FireFox, IE or Safari. This even includes data behind secure, password protected sites, and data on very complex websites powered by AJAX and Flash.

With the powerful combination of open APIs, free government data and the ability to rapidly turn any web application into an API on-demand, we finally have access to any data we need.

This lays the foundation to a new way of working, where business analysts and other decision makers can spend their time building better algorithms, better data visualization, and better analysis because the most critical ingredient behind any business decision today, the data, has become so easily accessible.

By:  Stefan Andreasen

Today, the founding of the Open Mashup Alliance (OMA) was officially announced to promote the interoperability and adoption of Enterprise Mashup Solutions.

This is an important step towards growing the understanding in the market of the value of Enterprise Mashups, as evidenced by the quality of companies supporting the Alliance: Adobe, Bank of America, Capgemini, Hinchcliffe & Company, HP, Intel, JackBe, Kapow Technologies, ProgrammableWeb, Synteractive, and Xignite.

Dion Hinchcliffe has written several excellent articles on the OMA and Mashups in the Enterprise over on his blog at ZDNet that would be well worth your time to check out.  In addition, consider this article by John Waters on Application Development Trends.

Dion sheds light on the origin of mashups and quite possibly the reason why many view them as lightweight consumer applications:  “In decades past, the new ideas in computing originated in the enterprise world and trickled down to the consumer world….  However in the Web 2.0 era… new ideas and approaches are germinating more on the consumer Web…  Mashups are example of this kind of hacker-style creation that emerged from the laboratory of the Web…  From an enterprise perspective, it gave a lot of people pause to see how easy it could be done (Paul Rademacher’s HousingMaps.com being the original example), compared to the methods used by formal and costly enterprise application integration and service-oriented architecture projects.”

The potential for Mashups in the Enterprise are bounded only by your imagination.  If you’re interested in learning more, please check out this webinar on solving real-world business problems to give your workers a competitive advantage with Enterprise Mashups.  Also, here is a demo on how to mashup data from multiple websites like Linkedin or Jigsaw to build a sales dashboard that enables sales executives to harvest relevant, valuable web data about existing and potential clients.  And lastly, learn more about how Cisco uses Mashups in the Enterprise.

If that’s not enough to whet your appetite for Enterprise Mashups, Business Insights just released their report, The Future of Enterprise Mashups: Demand, challenges and vendor opportunities, where they predict the mashup market will grow from $161M in 2008 to $1.74B by 2013. That’s a ten-fold increase in 5 years!

Alliances like OMA will certainly help to accelerate this to where Mashups will soon be mainstream.

By:  Stefan Andreasen

We thought our readers might like to know what industry blogs the Kapow Technologies team reads and considers to be the most insightful and informative.  We also encourage your recommendations on others we should check out as well. In no particular order, here they are:

BriefingsDirect, Dana Gardner
Dana is an independent analyst and forward thinking blogger who writes about software productivity trends and new IT business growth opportunities. Dana is president and principal analyst at Interarbor Solutions and also a founding member and a weekly contributor to the Gillmor Gang podcast.

OnStrategies Perspectives, Tony Baer
Currently an analyst with Ovum, Tony has been following the IT industry for nearly two decades. His blog focuses on macro-level trends and events influencing innovation in the areas of SOA and Web Services, BPM, BI, Cloud Computing, SaaS, and software development.

RealWorldSOA, Dave Linthicum
Dave is undeniably one of the world’s foremost authorities on SOA. His blog offers insightful and pitchy commentary on where SOA collides with cloud computing and other hot enterprise IT trends.

The Keene View, Chris Keene
In this colorful blog, Chris Keene, entrepreneur and CEO of WaveMaker Software, riffs on rich internet applications, business and culture.

Service Oriented, Joe McKendrick
Joe tracks the impact of IT on management and markets in his Service Oriented blog. His higher level commentary frequently draws on the musings of his fellow SOA bloggers, including Gardner, Linthicum, Baer and Michelson.

Enterprise 2.0, Dion Hinchcliffe
A prolific blogger and Enterprise 2.0 trend spotter, Dion’s ZDNet blog covers the intersection of Web 2.0 technologies and enterprise IT. As an IT strategy consultant, he also understands how these different technologies can be used to drive real world business benefits inside Fortune 500 companies.

Business Intelligence, Howard Dresner
Howard is a veteran analyst and thought leader on all things BI and Enterprise Performance Management (EPM).

Column2.0, Sandy Kemsley
Sandy is an independent analyst and systems architect who blogs about BPM, Enterprise 2.0 and technology trends in business.

ElementalLinks, Brenda Michelson
Brenda’s blog is a must read for enterprise architects and senior IT professionals. She is an IT strategist and hands-on practitioner, previously having served as the Chief Enterprise Architect for L.L. Bean.

In Context, Doug Henschen
Doug is the editor in chief for Intelligent Enterprise. In his blog for the publication he covers the convergence of business intelligence, performance management, business process management and rules management technologies within enterprise applications and architectures.

Forrester Blog for Information & Knowledge Management
Forrester Analysts tackle a range of topics and trends related to the Information and Knowledge Management professional, including data discovery and integration, content management, BI, and enterprise collaboration.

CMS Watch Blog
In this blog CMS Watch analysts track the latest content-oriented technologies and trends, including innovation in the areas of web content management, enterprise portals, and enterprise search.