apidays Munich 2025 - Federated API Management and Governance, Vince Baker (DICOS)

Scaling with Control: Federated API Management and Governance
Vince Baker, Senior Consultant & API Product Owner at DICOS

apidays Munich 2025 - Accelerate AI Use Cases with APIs
July 2 & 3, 2025

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Transcript

1. 1 © DICOS 2025 © DICOS 2025 Scaling with Control: Federated API Management and Governance apidays Munich 2025 / Vince Baker, DICOS
2. 2 © DICOS 2025 The Challenge: AI Evolution
3. 3 © DICOS 2025 ‣ Organisations grow and APIs multiply rapidly across teams, regions and tech stacks ‣ IDC Report*: 42% - Multiple APIM Solutions 40% - Multiple Gateways ‣ Company Mergers and Aquisitions ‣ Centralised APIM solutions cause bottlenecks due to single team governance * Analyst-Report-APIM-IDC-Conquer-API-Sprawl-AI.pdf The Challenge: API Sprawl & Bottlenecks
4. 4 © DICOS 2025 ‣ A decentralized approach where API management responsibilities are distributed. ‣ It's about empowering individual teams to manage their APIs. ‣ Crucially, it's not a free-for-all; there is still overarching consistency and policy enforcement. What is Federated API Management?
5. 5 © DICOS 2025 ‣ Autonomy: Teams own their API lifecycle (design, development, deployment, operation). Reduces reliance on a central team. ‣ Distribution: Tools and processes are pushed closer to the API developers, embodying the "shift left" principle. ‣ Consistency: Despite distribution, a common set of policies, standards, and guidelines ensures alignment. Core Principles of Federation
6. 6 © DICOS 2025 ‣ Increased Agility: Faster API delivery cycles, quicker response to market demands. ‣ Fosters Innovation: Teams are free to experiment and iterate without central bottlenecks. ‣ Empowers Teams: Developers feel more ownership and accountability, leading to higher quality APIs and more engaged teams. ‣ Improved Scalability: The model scales naturally with organizational growth and the increasing demands of AI-driven applications. The Benefits: Agility, Innovation, Empowerment
7. 7 © DICOS 2025 ‣ Policy Guidance: Automated tools, frameworks, templates. ‣ Security: Centralized security policies and scanning, but decentralized implementation. ‣ Compliance: Ensuring APIs adhere to regulatory requirements through framework use and automated checks. ‣ Discoverability & Inventory: A central API catalog/developer portal. Maintaining Control: Governance in a Federated World
8. 8 © DICOS 2025 ‣ Identify "Zombie" and "Shadow" APIs: ‣ The IDC report states: "About 30% of organizational APIs are unmanaged.“ ‣ Zombie APIs: These are APIs that have been deprecated or abandoned. Typically not subscribed to for while. ‣ Shadow APIs: These are undocumented APIs which are actively being used. * Analyst-Report-APIM-IDC-Conquer-API-Sprawl-AI.pdf Maintaining Control: Governance in a Federated World
9. 9 © DICOS 2025 Key Enablers & Considerations for Implementation Tooling: Gateways, vendor- agnostic Developer portals, Service Management frameworks. Standards & Guidelines: Clear, well-documented API design guidelines, security best practices. Metrics & Monitoring: Centralized visibility into API health, usage, and performance across the ecosystem, especially crucial for AI agent interactions. AI-Powered: Enhance observability, detect suspicious activity, generate documentation, check compliance during development. Cultural Shift: "permission- based" to "principle-based."
10. 10 © DICOS 2025 ‣ Empowerment leads to speed ‣ Refinement and adaptation Striking the Balance: Freedom & Control
11. 11 © DICOS 2025 Key Takeaways ‣ AI is here! Pave a secure path. ‣ Centralized API management creates bottlenecks at scale and struggles with organizational shifts, leading to API Sprawl. ‣ Federated models empower teams, accelerate innovation, and are essential for scaling in an AI-driven world. ‣ Strong, distributed governance ensures consistency, security, and discoverability, helping identify and manage 'zombie' and 'unmanaged' APIs. ‣ Prepare yourself for AI and AI based agents.
12. 12 © DICOS 2025 © DICOS 2025 Vince Baker Thank you for listening. DICOS GmbH Kommunikationssysteme Alsfelder Straße 11, 64289 Darmstadt, Germany dicos.de Senior Consultant +372 5197 0359 v.baker@dicos.de https://www.linkedin.com /in/vincentbaker/