IBM API Connect Reviews

My company used to work with IBM API Connect for a customer in Greece to run a public sector company from whom we developed a new architecture based on API management last year for the logistics or transportation domains. For the aforementioned project, my company designed a solution based on IBM API Management for the logistics sector of a company all over Greece.

The most valuable feature of the solution stems from its ability in the area of message transformation, meaning it is very easy when you have to transform a message to XML or transfer it automatically from JSON and vice versa. The solution is very scalable. The solution works very well even if you have a small number of users. Our company also tested its use with a large number of users, consisting of more than 2,000 users, and it was very nice to use. The tool is very robust.

The administration of the user interface and the technical documentation are areas of concern in the solution where improvements are required. The solution's technical documentation should be a little bit easier to understand, and it is a traditional problem with all IBM products. The technical documentation is a bit too difficult to understand, and it is also not easy to read.

I have been using IBM API Connect for three years. I operate as an independent consultant.

Stability-wise, I rate the solution an eight out of ten.

It is a very scalable solution.

The meaning of the size of the companies in Greece is very different from what it is in other parts of the world, like the UK or Germany. The tool has around 2,000 users. I don't know if 2,000 users are found in small, medium, or large enterprises, but in the UK, it is a number to describe a small business, while in Greece, it is considered a large-sized company.

I rate the technical support a six out of ten.

Neutral

I rate the product's initial setup phase a five on a scale of one to ten, where one is a difficult process, and ten is an easy phase.

The solution is deployed on an on-premises model. The client with whom I work operates only on an on-premises infrastructure. My client is very demanding when it comes to operating on an on-premises infrastructure. My client is adamant on having on-premises infrastructure owing to security concerns.

I rate the product price a seven on a scale of one to ten, where one is a low price, and ten is a high price.

I rate the overall tool a seven out of ten.

I use IBM API Connect to make migrations with different systems. 

We have used the cloud and on-premise deployments of the solution.

The most valuable features of IBM API Connect are its performance and user-friendliness. 

Improving the documentation would be beneficial as it currently presents navigation challenges. Incorporating a step-by-step guide could facilitate the integration or migration of various systems, including databases. The existing documentation only comprises plain text, hence incorporating more interactive instructions could enhance its usefulness.

I have used IBM API Connect within the last 12 months.

We are having some issues with the stability of the solution.

I rate the stability of IBM API Connect a seven out of ten.

We have approximately four people who use this solution in my organization.

I rate the scalability of IBM API Connect an eight out of ten.

The support from IBM API Connect is good.

I rate the support from IBM API Connect an eight out of ten.

Positive

I have no prior experience using a solution similar to IBM API Connect.

The initial installation was not simple. We had some issues with the deployment but we managed step by step. It took approximately two months to complete the implementation.

We use a team from IBM that assisted us with the implementation.

I rate IBM API Connect a seven out of ten.

We are a regulation entity dealing with many sensitive services. We carry out supervision and regulation for FinTech companies and other financial institutions. We are partners with IBM and I'm the project delivery director.

In general, this is a powerful system. We're currently only using one or two functionalities from API Connect. One of them is consulting WSRR to get the endpoints which is a powerful component. Each API management has a Gateway located on the DMZ that can be exposed to external networks and does the authentication, authorization, some security functionality as filtering, checking the security aspects such as decrypting, encrypting or service transformation and other functions. The development portal is good and can be used by external developers who can develop it at their site.

One issue we have with this solution is its complexity. In addition, it doesn't handle large volumes of traffic very well. 

I've been using this solution for several months. 

The stability is good. 

Scalability is reasonable but not great. 

Customer service takes a while to respond. They also want a lot of information and this adds to the time involved in getting a response. 

The initial setup is not easy, similar to other IBM products. It's quite complex even with a system integrator and the deployment took some time. We have around 15-20 users on the development side. We plan to increase that in the future. 

All IBM products are expensive and API Connect is no exception. The license includes everything such as a per BVU charge along with other integration components plus OpenShift for microservices and DevOps and others. You can purchase a better BVU and then you can use any features or components under this license. They have the Cloud Pak for Automation package which includes BAW Business Automation. They also have something called Aspera for file transfers. 

We evaluated API Connect and Apigee. API is designed to be a comprehensive solution for building and managing API with features for designing, development, and distinct publishing APIs, as well as for managing the life cycle of API and enforcing security. Apigee on the other hand is designed primarily as an API management platform while focused on securing and scaling APIs for use by extended developers. Ultimately, the best platform will be the one suited to your specific needs and use cases. 

API Connect is a standalone platform, which means it may require additional integration with other tools in order to support the range of API developments. API Connect is designed to support the management of large numbers of APIs but may struggle to handle large volumes of traffic or very complex APIs.

It's helpful to have a suitable in-house team and to work hand-in-hand with the system integrator. You also need powerful infrastructure and hardware. If you're exposed externally, you have to apply security standards either on the Gateway or F5, or the Load Balancer. It requires the capabilities for good enterprise or solution architecture and sufficient experience on the integration side in order to have the right solution design and system architecture.

I rate this solution eight out of 10. 

Our use cases for IBM API Connect include the banking sector, where they use the solution to integrate with third parties, so all of the third-party connectivity for the banks happen through IBM API Connect.

We also built the government service website, for example, e-Government services, and the government published all services between the government entities and the businesses, so there are two connections: government to government and government to business. All the services and entities were published and consumed through the IBM API Connect gateway.

What's best about IBM API Connect is the excellent administration. The development tool that builds the API is also very simple, and user-friendly, and it doesn't consume too much time.

Another valuable feature in IBM API Connect is its good reporting feature, particularly for operations, but the most valuable feature of the solution for the customer is security. IBM API Connect provides a DMZ and a security gateway between the external and internal environment, so you can publish your API safely.

IBM API Connect can also integrate with any tool or middleware that works on open standards without the need for development or coding, so integration with the solution is easier.

Technically, I haven't faced any issues or areas for improvement in IBM API Connect. There wasn't any concern that the customer asked that we couldn't resolve or achieve. I'll need to check with the technical team if there was any issue with the solution, but from the top of my head, I haven't faced anything that the customer requested or anything that needs enhancement in IBM API Connect.

The implementation of IBM API Connect is complex, as it's an enterprise solution with many components that require more than one person. It's not a single product that you work on, and this is an area for improvement, but normally, it's good.

Having a more structured model for IBM API Connect support is also room for improvement that would help customers better.

I've been working with IBM API Connect for the last five years.

IBM API Connect is a stable solution. It's used in government services, and my team barely receives calls about the solution. IBM API Connect is also used in major banks here in Jordan, and it's stable. There are no complaints about it.

IBM API Connect is a scalable solution. It's deployed based on the Hybrid Entitlement model in IBM which gives the customers five million API calls per month, and if the customers need more, it's just a matter of buying an additional license to make it ten million API calls per month, so customers can build any environment that meets requirements and do production HADR tests without paying a lot more for the license.

As IBM API Connect is subscription-based, it's good, and it allows customers to scale as much as needed without exceeding the number of API calls. Most of the customers do not reach that limit anyway. If a customer needs to go beyond the limit, he can get a CPU-based license, but at the moment, I haven't had any customer who needs a CPU-based implementation of IBM API Connect.

The technical support for IBM, in general, isn't the best. You'll need to understand the internal setup of IBM or you need to have a partner who understands the IBM setup to get the best support from IBM. There's a program that IBM offers, the AVP, where a consultant is set aside for you or the customer, and that consultant will provide support to you.

For the technical support focused specifically on IBM API Connect, the team is good. The team of engineers is responsive and knowledgeable.

We haven't worked with other solutions similar to IBM API Connect, but we're considering another alternative from Open Source, though we haven't decided which product we want to work with.

The initial setup for IBM API Connect wasn't complex, but for the new model or the containerized model, the setup for the three nodes or containerization wasn't as easy as the normal on-premise setup or the traditional way of implementation, so the first time my company implemented the new model, it was complex. The complexity wasn't because of IBM API Connect, but it was because of the RedHat OpenShift platform beneath it, though after my team did it once, the next implementation became easier and simpler.

The price for IBM API Connect is reasonable. It's $20,000 to $30,000 yearly for a subscription, and the pricing could vary around $40,000 per year, per subscription. Its price is reasonable for customers who have around sixty million API calls yearly for unlimited environments.

I haven't evaluated other options, but I've heard about Apigee and that it's a good solution. I've heard that Apigee is technically better than IBM API Connect, but I don't have the facts on why it's better. What I heard from the customer is that Apigee is more costly than IBM, and that customer paid hundreds of thousands of dollars in Jordan. The customer contacted my company for a POC for IBM API Connect, so it seems that the customer didn't get value from Apigee based on the money he paid.

There's also MuleSoft, but I didn't see a real implementation in Jordan where there's anything extra or different from what IBM API Connect provides, and I have no idea about MuleSoft pricing.

The Jordan government accepted IBM API Connect because of the security and stability of the solution, and in terms of project implementation, it was the best project implemented that's based on DataPower and API Connect.

I'm still working with IBM API Connect.

I'm an implementer, system integrator, and reseller of the solution.

Mostly I have mid-size and enterprise customers for IBM API Connect, though I also have small-sized customers. My customers use the solution.

Most of the customers here in Jordan prefer an on-premise deployment for IBM API Connect, but my company also has cloud implementation, one public and one private, then the rest is on-premises.

My advice to people who want to start implementing IBM API Connect is to always start small. You need to understand the value you want to gain from implementing the solution, focus on business values and achieve those, then start to grow bigger later. Don't start with a big environment when implementing IBM API Connect that wouldn't result in any business value. Starting small with real business values that will touch on business needs is good advice for anyone who wants to implement IBM API Connect.

My rating for IBM API Connect is nine out of ten because it's a good IBM product. It's one of the products you can easily sell.

We deploy APIs to expose the BFFs of mobile apps, and this is mainly in the cloud. All mobile apps consume the APIs of your BFF. On-premise, we have APIs that expose services and mainly functionalities, such as the balance of the client or the customers or the products.

One of the most valuable features is the easy-to-use web interface.

Documentation for the CLI is not very complete. Also, the support could be improved, and we have had several problems with backing up and restoring the product.

We have been using the solution for two or three years.

The stability of the solution is good.

The scalability of the solution is good.

IBM support is not available in Chile, so we must go through other countries to get a response from customer support.

I would rate the setup as a medium in difficulty. 

The solution was first set up with the help of IBM, but when we moved to another environment, we followed the initial instructions given by IBM and implemented it ourselves. 

We used Bamboo as a pipeline for automatic deployment of the API. The deployment took four hours.

The product is easy to use, but the installation is not easy. We have a team of three architects who maintain the product. I would rate this solution as an eight out of ten. 

I primarily use API Connect as a front end for any station, through which you can expose services to external or internal customers.

API Connect's best features are its data gateway, one of the strongest in the market, and its API manager, which has the local assembly transformation UI, which helps transform services from Maximal to JSON or vice versa.

API Connect's analytics subsystem could be improved to make it easier to render content from the analytics system and offload it to an external database.

I've been using API Connect for over eight years.

There are some issues with API Connect's stability, with parts going down abruptly sometimes. Its stability doesn't compare well to Epigee or Kong API, and I would only rate it seven out of ten.

API Connect is easy to scale, I would rate it nine out of ten.

IBM's technical support is terrible - they're incompetent and slow to respond, even sometimes not responding at all until they have every bit of information.

Negative

I previously used Epigee, Kong API, and 3scale.

The initial setup was a bit tricky and required a lot of installation and system administration skills. I would rate the setup two out of ten. The deployment took around two minutes and could be automated.

API Connect is expensive - I'd rate their pricing five out of ten.

I wouldn't recommend choosing API Connect unless you have a big budget and need an enterprise solution. I would give API Connect a rating of seven out of ten.

We use this solution for rest-based, micro services to complete authentication. We are able to gather statistics and audit and throttle traffic. It also has a developer portal that allows users to browse their APIs and develop applications on them. It has solid features compared to some of the API services management services out there.

This solution is ready to scale and already supports our agile CICD.

The integration of cloud-based services is where we're looking for improvement in this platform.

We have been using this solution for four years. 

This is a stable solution. 

This is a scalable solution but scalability would come at a higher price. This solution supports our organization of 50,000 people.

The initial setup is reasonably straightforward.

We consciously decided to go with microservices to enable us to move quickly and to building the flexibility and capabilities in our applications. Whether the business is able to translate those investments into profits and returns is too early to tell.

I would rate this solution a seven out of ten. 

We use IBM API Connect for external communication with outside partners and external companies doing business with our company. 

This solution is deployed on-premises. We are currently using Version 5.0, but we are upgrading to version 10.0, which is a cloud-based solution. 

One of the most valuable features of this solution is that it protects our backend system. We are exposing services to external parties and using this solution to protect the backend system, and to have a navigation in between. 

The installation process could use improvement. I hope that in the next release, the installation process is easier. 

My company has used this solution for at least four years. 

There have been some internal issues within the product that have caused instability.

This solution is scalable. 

API Connect is not straightforward to install. If you don't have a lot of dependencies in your organization, it will take a short amount of time. In our case, we took at least a month because of dependencies to other departments in the company. 

For our technical team, we have approximately 10 people, a combination of managers, admins, and engineers. 

We provide this solution to customers. 

There aren't any additional costs for the consumer solution. There is no cost for the consumers to use the services because we don't monetize the services. 

We have plans to upgrade from this solution. We are upgrading to ensure that we have a supported version late next year, in November or December, and are evaluating alternative solutions in the market. 

I rate API Connect a seven out of ten. This solution is stable, but maybe not the most modern product on the market.