The Coming Web Revolution

And some of your software vendors might provide this integration layer. Expect that as you upgrade your operations software (e.g., applications for Web, contact center, warehouse, accounting) during the next few years, the software you buy may start offering Web APIs.

These APIs would allow you to permit trusted partners to access your back-end systems. It’ll take a few years for such APIs to arrive, and a few more for businesses to invent creative uses of them, but both will occur. APIs will bring you and your vendors closer together. Just as open content will change marketing communications, open apps will change merchandising and media buying.