Apps have become ubiquitous in just a few short years. It’s no surprise, then, that companies large and small want to be part of the app economy. For these companies, enabling internal and external app developers holds the promise of growing market reach, opening revenue streams and maximizing customer retention – all on the back of developer innovation.

For almost a decade, Layer 7 has been helping large organizations open their data and applications to outside partners, cloud services and developer communities. With APIfy, Layer 7 is now making these same capabilities available to smaller organizations and departments, straight from the cloud.

To small organizations looking to open their first APIs to outside developer communities, APIfy offers the core API Management, security and community features necessary to get started. And for users that end up wanting more advanced features, APIfy provides an easy entry point to the Layer 7 API Management Suite. With APIfy, we aim to create an API platform that can grow with our customers.

Over the next several months, we’ll be offering APIfy free on a limited-use beta program. We’re eager to get feedback, so we’re inviting you to sign up and work with us to make APIfy an industry-leading service for opening APIs to the app economy. Enjoy the trial and let us know how we can make things better!

But how do enterprises balance access control with the individual’s right to choose the apps they want? How do enterprises grant access to sensitive on-premise data via mobile devices without compromising security?

Enterprises need secure ways to surface internal information assets in mobile ready formats that can be easily consumed by both mobile developers and the apps they create. They need simplified ways to manage how enterprise applications and systems get exposed to mobile developers and apps.

Layer 7′s new SecureSpan Mobile Access Gateway does just that by streamlining the process of adapting internal data, application and security infrastructure for mobile use. Delivered as a policy pack extension to our SecureSpan API Proxy/SOA Gateway, the Mobile Access Gateway provides a centralized way to control security and management policies for information assets exposed via APIs to mobile developers and apps.

Contest: Win a $250 Amazon Gift Card
To celebrate the general availability of the SecureSpan Mobile Access Gateway, we’re having a Twitter contest and giving away a $250 Amazon gift card.

Here’s how to enter:

1. Retweet the following:

Win a $250 Amazon gift card from @layer7  http://ow.ly/cFj9i #L7MAG RT to enter!

Tweet This for a Chance to Win

2. Don’t have twitter and still want to enter? Just leave a comment on this post, telling us your favorite mobile app.

The contest ends Aug 8 at noon. The winner will be drawn at random. If you win, we’ll send you a direct message on Twitter to let you know.

That’s why the Layer 7 API Portal – which is designed to help organizations onboard, educate and manage developers – is one of the cornerstones of our API Management Suite.

The world of Web, mobile and cloud API publishing is growing and changing at an incredible rate right now, so we’re constantly working hard to expand and refine our line of API-focused products. With all that in mind – and hot on the heels of our SecureSpan Mobile Access Gateway – we’re very excited to announce version 2.1 of the Portal.

With the developer management needs of API publishers constantly evolving, we’ve added a range of new functionality to the Portal, including:

• Advanced analytic reports
• More granular privacy controls
• Enhanced lifecycle management features
• New customization options for the content management system

We’re exhibiting at Mobile+Web DevCon in San Francisco this week. If you’re at the show and you’d like to learn more about this new API Portal release, please stop by our booth.

Recently, we’ve added a number of industry experts to our full-time team, in order to deepen this expertise and expand our delivery. Services have become an increasingly important part of our business and we have just launched a new Services section on our Web site in order to provide details of our service offerings.

Training Services are always the right starting point for new clients and we have a number of courses we can tailor to meet any customer’s needs. Following training, we can customize IT Services to provide consulting, configuration and any implementation activity. Our Business Services help companies explore new opportunities through technology. The current focus is on the many possibilities offered by APIs and we’re very excited to have noted industry experts Mike Amundsen and Ronnie Mitra leading this practice.

Please have a look at all the services we offer and let us know if any of these would help your company out. No matter what phase of a project you’re in, we will be happy to be at your service!

Traditional middleware isn’t optimized for mobile. It can’t handle the conversion to mobile protocols or performance optimization for mobile connections. It also fails to provide policy controls for governing how apps interact with corporate-owned resources inside the enterprise and cloud. As for managing identity and access, traditional middleware fails to provide a bridge from SSO, SAML and legacy identity systems to mobile-friendly frameworks like OAuth, OpenID Connect and Java Web Tokens. That is why Layer 7 is introducing the SecureSpan Mobile Access Gateway.

The SecureSpan Mobile Access Gateway builds on the API security and connectivity of Layer 7′s industry-leading family of Gateways for the hybrid enterprise, with new mobile-specific features like support for streaming protocols, notification services, geofencing and social proxy. The Mobile Access Gateway gives enterprises a fast, secure and reliable way to allow mobile developers and mobile apps access to internal information while insulating them from network, application and identity mismatches.

Some of the benefits include:

• Identity: Extend enterprise LDAP & SSO to Mobile Access frameworks like OAuth, OpenID Connect and JSON Web Tokens
• Security: Protect mobile REST and OData APIs against attack, build custom geofencing policies and proxy mobile streaming protocols like WebSockets and XMPP
• Adaptation: Translate and orchestrate backend information services into mobile ready formats like JSON and REST
• Optimization: Aggregate, pre-fetch and cache data retrieval calls for improved performance
• Integration: Simplify integration with notification services and external cloud services

If you want to learn more or get a demonstration of the product, contact us at info@layer7.com.

It’s an all-day catered event, divided into two sessions (9am-12pm and 1-4:45pm, with lunch served in between). The morning session will focus on best practices for using Layer 7’s API Management, Mobile Access, SOA Governance and Cloud Integration products. The afternoon session will feature a workshop focusing on the topic of API Management.

For more information you can view the full agenda. Space is limited, so if you’re interested in attending, please don’t hesitate to register for the User Conference & Workshop.

Everything in technology goes through cycles. If you stick around long enough, you begin to see patterns emerge with an almost predictable regularity. I actually find this comforting; it suggests we’re on a path of refinement of fundamental truths that date back in a continuous line though Alan Kay to Turing and beyond.

The wrong way to react to technology cycles is with the defensive-and-crusty “this is nothing new kid—we did it back in ’99 when you were stuck in the womb.” Thanks for nothing, Grandpa. A better approach is to recognize the importance of new energy and momentum to make great things happen.

The cycle that really excites me now is the new rise of the developer. Trying my best not to be crusty, there is a palatable excitement and energy out there that really does feel like it did in 1999. After years of outsourcing, after years of commoditization, developers matter again. A lot. It’s like the world has rediscovered the critical importance of this fundamentally creative endeavor.

This is a golden age of technology and possibility, one that is being driven by new blood and newer technology. The catalyst is the achingly perfect collision of Cloud, mobility and social discovery with APIs, node.js, Git, NoSQL, HTML5, massive scalability… (I really could go on and on here).

Most of all, I’m excited by movements like Codecademy. This simple idea perfectly reflects the tenor of the time in which we live. People are no longer afraid of making things easy. The priesthood is gone; coding is now confident and mature.

I’ll be talking more about these topics – and the important role APIs play – in an upcoming webinar I will be delivering with James Governor, co-founder of RedMonk. This is the analyst firm that truly is at the heart of the new developer movement. I hope you can join us Thursday, April 19 at 9am Pacific. This one is going to be good.

Click here to register for the webinar: Developers, Deveopers, Developers - Why API Management Should be Important to You featuring RedMonk

Cloud and APIs figure prominently in enabling entertainment producers to deliver content anytime, anywhere. APIs allow producers to expose content and associated metadata to “apps” that can be delivered via any smart device, including a TV. Similarly, Cloud computing creates the promise of instant content delivery to any device, on-demand. But for the content producer, exposing content from the Cloud, over APIs, across the Internet, to a mixed universe of internally and externally-built apps that may live on TVs, PCs, tablets or smartphones creates challenges around security and management.

Layer 7 offers solutions for entertainment producers and distributors who need to secure and manage content delivered from the Cloud, over APIs, to apps. That’s why, this Friday, Layer 7 will be exhibiting at the Hollywood IT Summit. If you happen to be attending, stop by the booth or catch Layer 7’s Steve Loscialpo giving a talk called Simplifying Content Distribution Across Mobile & Cloud Using API Management. Here are the event details:

• Hollywood IT Summit – Friday, March 2, 2012
  Pepperdine University, Malibu Campus, Los Angeles – Register here

Of course, allowing enterprise data to be accessed from smart-phones and tablets (via public networks) creates a range of concerns around security and performance. The security risks are clear – perhaps less well understood is the fact that, for apps to perform efficiently, data will need to be filtered and transformed into formats and protocols suitable for mobile.

Layer 7’s new API Management for Mobile solution brief explains how our API Management Suite of products delivers everything enterprises need to address the data security and performance management concerns raised by integrating enterprise assets with mobile devices. To find out more download the solution brief now.

As the number and variety of API management products continues to grow, Layer 7’s goal is to continue providing the most comprehensive enterprise-level solution on the market. Our API Management Suite of products is uniquely placed to give enterprises everything they need in order to securely expose APIs, manage developers and leverage key technologies like OAuth.

Our new Layer 7 API Management Suite data sheet provides detailed information on our full range of API products, including the API Portal, SecureSpan API Proxy, Enterprise Service Manager and OAuth Toolkit. So, to find out how we’re responding to the challenge of enterprise-level API publishing, read the data sheet today.