GCP – Next OnAir: Business application platform sessions to accelerate digital transformation

In 2020, digital transformation journeys have been forced to accelerate and what would normally have taken years is now happening in a matter of months. From the proliferation of telehealth services to the growing primacy of online retail to the rise of digital management, forecasting, and contingency-planning, enterprises face more pressure than ever to digitally transform, faster. 

Google Cloud Next OnAir’s Business Application Platform week aims to help organizations navigate these journeys. Throughout the week, we will demonstrate how enterprises can take digital innovation beyond just the IT organization, and accelerate their ability to transform the business. We will talk about how Google Cloud customers are leveraging the power of APIs, no-code application development, and automation to democratize the space of application design and development. 

Don’t miss our keynote, Powering Business Applications with APIs, Microservices, AI, and No-Code App Development, with Google Cloud VP & GM of Platforms, Amit Zavery. Amit will discuss how we are developing a unified platform to empower both traditional developers and business or “citizen” developers to create and extend applications, build and automate business workflows, and connect and modernize applications. Hidden Forces: What’s Next in Enterprise IT with Urs Hölzle, Google Cloud SVP and a primary architect of Google’s infrastructure, is another can’t-miss presentation. It will be available to view Tuesday, with Urs holding a live follow-up Q&A on Wednesday, September 9 at 10:30am PT. 

The rest of Business Application Platform week dives into our latest product announcements, and specific ways API management, no-code application development, and automation can help enterprises accelerate their digital transformation efforts. More than 20 sessions will launch this week, so there will be something for everyone, no matter where your organization is in its transformation journey. Below are some of the highlights. Sessions will be available starting Tuesday, September 8 at 9am PT, and available on-demand afterward. 

AI and ML 

From Siloed ML to ML Service Mesh Using API Management: Many companies are generating features from raw data and extracting business insights with ML models, but it remains challenging for different teams to share the digital assets and microservices that underpin these efforts. This session explores how API management is the missing link. 

Powering API Operations with AI and ML: Most business-critical applications today are powered by APIs, so any downtime or performance degradation can lead to significant losses in revenue, customers, and brand value. In this session, which includes a live demo from T-Mobile, you will learn how Google Cloud’s Apigee API management platform uses AI and ML technologies to simplify operations and help ensure APIs are always available, secure, and performing as expected. 

Developer engagement

Digital Transformation via Developer Engagement: In this session, HP Inc. will talk about developer engagement as a central theme of their digital transformation strategy, including the practical implications of pursuing a prescriptive company-wide approach, rethinking IT and business processes, and publishing APIs for developers both inside and outside the enterprise. 

GraphQL: Building a Consistent Approach for the API Consumer: View this session to examine the advantages and disadvantages of interacting with APIs via REST versus with GraphQL, including how Google Cloud, with Apigee API management, supports the growing community of GraphQL developers.

New business opportunities, improved operations, and richer customer experiences

Delivering New Customer Experiences Using APIs: Today’s successful enterprises use APIs to deliver new digital experiences to customers, open new business opportunities by creating platforms for partners, and increase innovation within the enterprise by making data and functionality reusable and accessible. View this session to learn why API management is essential to providing the control, visibility, and insights that these API-driven initiatives require.

How To Unlock the Power of Your Existing Data Through APIs: The average business has a lot of valuable data locked away in databases or trapped in legacy and on-premises systems that can be hard to connect to. In this session Australian Energy Market Operator will share how they are using APIs to connect data-generating sources and leverage them for building new products, partnerships, and revenue sources.

Security 

OAuth, JWT, HMAC, Oh My! API Security For Your Enterprise: APIs are at the heart of almost every digital interaction, so securing them is crucial—but doing so isn’t always easy. Should you use OAuth? OpenID Connect? JWT? SAML? Opaque tokens? Signatures? HMAC? This session will explore how API management can help enterprises wrangle these issues and many others that enterprises must consider to keep their APIs secure and available.

APIs and the cloud: microservices, serverless, service mesh, hybrid cloud, and multi-cloud 

Building and Managing APIs for Serverless with Google Cloud: Learn how serverless APIs enable developers and enterprises to scale data and services without the burden of managing infrastructure. 

How to Build and Manage Secure APIs for Anthos Workloads: Enterprises are increasingly adopting microservices, APIs, hybrid cloud, and multi-cloud strategies to modernize existing applications, build new ones, and run them anywhere. This session will cover how you can use Apigee API management for workloads built on Anthos, Google Cloud’s open platform for modernizing existing applications and building cloud-native apps. 

T-Mobile’s Strategy for APIs, Microservices, and Service Mesh: Learn how API management and a service mesh work together as part of moving to or building new modern cloud-native architectures. T-Mobile will discuss their journey and demo their architecture combining API management and a service mesh. The session will also explore how to navigate multi-cloud and hybrid environments with Apigee SaaS, Apigee Hybrid, and Anthos.

No-code application development 

Build AI-Powered Apps – Turn Business Employees Into Developers with AppSheet: Most developer resources are focused on a limited set of projects, but many other mission-critical processes still need attention. This session will explain how enterprises can use AppSheet, Google Cloud’s no-code development platform, to empower non-technical users to build apps and workflows—all without writing a line of code. 

Digitize Your Deskless Workforce Without Coding Using AppSheet: The next stage of digital transformation requires organizations to enable deskless employees, and this session will demonstrate how teams can quickly create applications and automated workflows for this essential part of the workforce, all without coding. 

This is just a taste of what Business Application Platform week has to offer. Check out the full list of sessions, and if you haven’t registered yet, you can do so for free on the Next OnAir website.