Integration as a Service (IaaS) is a cloud-based delivery model that focuses on migrating infrastructure, services, and/or platforms to the cloud. To understand Integration-as-a-Service we must first understand the cloud.
The benefit of the cloud is known, and businesses across all industries have implemented and at a minimum, evaluated this change. The cloud enables businesses to be flexible and scalable, all while driving down costs and improving business continuity.
Every business has its own reasons to move to the cloud and very few can argue against it. The transition across all industries to migrate their infrastructure and services to the cloud has always been challenging. There is no doubt about it that cloud migrations are a large undertaking for all businesses. Businesses have a variety of applications and systems and connecting all of those into one coherent cloud solution requires expertise. That is where Integration as a Service (IaaS) comes into the picture.
1. Simplification
The strategy varies for each cloud migration use case. Integration-as-a-Service vendors are experienced in a wide variety of use cases and know what solution fits the bill. Integration-as-a-Service vendors can simplify the strategy of reaching the end goal having utilized methodologies and have dedicated resources to assist in these implementations. Most Integration-as-a-Service vendors also have their own products that can fit a solution to make the migration seamless to end-users and maintain a positive customer experience. An example would be a solution that allows the legacy system to stay in sync with the new cloud solution while the applications are migrated. Another positive here is that these products are often temporary, as once the migration is complete, they are no longer needed.
Some customers require specialized use cases like SOC 2, HIPAA, etc for Integration-as-a-Service. Building and managing specialized environments is an expensive and complicated process, so more customers are opting for Integration-as-a-Service vendors for productivity, expediency, compliance, and cost reasons.
As cloud services are expected to grow at a rapid pace, keeping teams retooled on modern technologies is a challenge. They risk losing customers if not kept in step with growing technologies and demands of the business. This is also one of the reasons specialized Integration-as-a-Service are growing at a CAGR 30% from from $3.7 B (2021) to $13.7 B(2026).
2. Cost
An Integration-as-a-Service vendor can provide significant cost reduction in your cloud infrastructure. Integration-as-a-Service drives more automated and efficient processes across your organization which significantly reduces the time it takes to manage these systems. Automations can be put in place which reduce the amount of interaction your employees need to have when managing the internal systems. An example here would be employee onboarding. There are many applications and systems that need to be synchronized when a new employee comes onboard. In a legacy environment it would require a dedicated resource to manually enter the new employee’s information in all these systems. In a cloud environment, these systems can talk to each other and pass all the necessary information automatically via provisioning, significantly reducing cost and time. The result is an improved onboarding experience, that also improves the bottom line.
More customers are opting for managed integration services so their employees spend time in its core business, thus saving time and cost.
3. Scaling
Every leadership team has the intention to continue to grow in all aspects of their business. If that innovation is limited by technology, that is a burden that no business wants to bear. Having a flexible Integration-as-a-Service managed solution allows you to adapt to change and continue to be flexible in your growth. In a legacy environment, this would require racking and stacking of new infrastructure in a physical location. To get the infrastructure securely stood up, connected, and maintained can be very expensive and time consuming. The cloud can provide infrastructure in a matter of minutes at a far reduced cost.
At the end of the day, businesses want to focus on what they do best. Integration as a service allows the customer to do just that. The burden of maintenance, availability, privacy, compatibility, scalability, security, throughput, and performance of the technology is put into the hands of the Integration-as-a-Service vendor. This is what the Integration-as-a-Service vendors do best, which in most cases leads to a great partnership.
