The past months, our WSO2 experts finalized a whole new version of our managed WSO2 integration Platform as a Service (iPaaS): Connext Platform 2.0. Not only an upgrade of the WSO2 products was done, Connext 2.0 comes with a whole new set of functionalities further enabling customers to become integration agile.
What is Connext?
Connext is a plug and play, scalable, fully automated, Integration Platform as a Service (iPaaS) which is offered as a cloud-based service, based on the WSO2 open source integration technology. Connext is a WSO2 Managed Service solution, 24/7 managed and operated by Yenlo’s platform and integration experts. Connext is out-of-the-box and integrates tools for API Management, Enterprise Integration (ESB and micro ESB), Message queuing, Identity Management (IAM, SSO and federated authentication) and advanced real-time data analysis with Elasticsearch and Kibana (ELK).
The key business benefits of Connext
Connext is an affordable, scalable and effective alternative to classic system integration. It makes integrating databases, applications, services and processes much easier, with positive results on the ROI.
The four main key business benefits of Connext are:
- Short time-to-market due to high level automation
Within a couple hours you are up-and-running with a full flexible, enterprise level, integration platform. All key topics like scalability, high-availability, security, automated deployments, auto-healing and monitoring, are implemented by default. Our Connext Platform is extremely secure (zero-trust setup approach), validated and certified on a yearly basis. - Business flexibility due to separation between data, services and connections
Our Connext Platform solution is based on an API-first architectural approach. By separating APIs, services and data, your business gains maximum agility. If your business solution, product or go-to-market strategy changes, the Connext Platform changes with you. For example, would you like to monetize your APIs (services or underlying data) to generate a new revenue stream for your company? No, worries, the Connext Platform comes with a plug-in for API-monetization. - One centralized approach for all your integrations
By centralizing all your integrations, whether it is an application to application pattern or (data) services as APIs to your external business partners, webstore, web portal, mobile app and so on, you are able to monitor the usage, monitor the performance and control access to your most valuable company assets: your data and your business processes. With just a few steps you are able to watch and control ‘who’s doing what’ in your enterprise applications. - Affordable due to embedded software licenses and fixed resource budget
We understand that normally flexibility and agility bring unpredictable investment. So, we came with the Connext Platform solution whereby all software licenses, support services and compute power are embedded in the yearly recurring subscription. Based on our long-lasting experience, we optimized the integration platform in a best practice high-available multi-zones architecture with by default 25% bursting capacity, all included in one very affordable yearly fixed price. No surprises, no worries there.
The Connext Platform is, among others, Hanseatic Bank’s (part of Société Générale) solution to the PSD2, Open Banking and generic API requirements. They are now fully compliant with EU bank regulations, and this platform enables them to implement new business models while being sure that all their services and data are carefully protected.
What’s new in Connext Platform 2.0?
The new Connext Platform 2.0 is available in different product settings, leveraging various combinations of the WSO2 integration products:
- WSO2 Enterprise Integrator 6.6;
- WSO2 API Manager 3.0;
- WSO2 Identity Server 5.9.
With supporting applications in Connext Platform 2.0:
- Apache ActiveMQ 5.15.12;
- Elasticsearch Stack version 7.6.
On top of the updated WSO2 product versions, Connext Platform 2.0 comes with a completely revised set of features:
- Connext Customer Portal: a brand-new web portal where our Connext customers can manage many functions of the Connext Platform solution and which brings self-service capabilities for user management, KPI reporting and monitoring;
- Centralized User Management: access to the Connext Platform products and Connext Customer Portal is now managed via our centralized Identity Management. This centralized Identity Management provides a Single Sign-On (SSO) experience for all underlaying platform products like the WSO2 Carbon Consoles, the WSO2 API Publisher, the ActiveMQ web console and so on;
- Enhanced monitoring dashboards: we replaced the WSO2 analytics dashboard with a dedicated Elasticsearch stack. This brings our Connext customers more freedom to add and adjust dashboards and it brings more flexibility in log files analyzing. To do so, all log files and previous WSO2 analytics dashboards, resource monitoring are now available in a single Kibana interface. This not only enhances the transparency of the Connext Platform, but mostly enables our customers to build custom functional visualizations using a very well-supported and documented set of tools;
- Customer build pipelines: we enhanced customer customization pipelines, allowing our customer to manage and version control custom configurations and artefacts automated deployment for their specific Connext Platform needs;
- New Service Desk: we optimized our Service Desk by implementing the Jira Service Desk feature. This better integrates both operational- and development support processes, brings faster responds to support tickets and improves overall transparency. Next to that, the new Service Desk comes with direct FAQ answers to your support inquiries, that saves time and delivers a high level of service quality at your fingertips.
More information or any suggestions?
Please contact us if you want to know more about our Connext Platform solution and the technology underneath that will improve your business. Do you have suggestions around features to put on our Connext Platform roadmap? You are more than welcome to join the discussion.
