Tackling integration obstacles: how to alleviate challenges to ensure long-term success

Andrew Doublesin, Chief Product Officer at Flows, addresses the numerous challenges with innovating from the ground up, how to tackle difficulties with integration and what developments the company has on the radar.

SBC News: Thanks for joining us today. Could you start by explaining what system integrations are and why they are important for businesses?

Andrew Doublesin: System integrations refer to the process of connecting different software systems and applications to enable them to work together seamlessly and share data efficiently. They play a vital role in modern businesses by optimising processes, improving collaboration, and enabling innovation.

SBCN: Building on that, can you describe how system integrations are typically implemented? What are the different types of integrations available, and what unique benefits does each type offer?

AD: System integrations can be implemented using various techniques and technologies depending on the requirements and systems involved.  Some of the most common approaches include:

Point-to-Point Integration: In this approach, systems are connected directly to each other using custom code or APIs without an intermediary.

Hub-and-Spoke Integration:

In this model, a central integration hub (middleware) is used to connect multiple systems. Each system only needs to integrate with the hub rather than directly with each other.

• Benefits:
  • Simplifies integration management by centralising connections and standardising data formats.
  • Provides scalability as new systems can be easily added to the hub.
  • Offers better visibility and control over data flows

Batch Processing:

• In batch processing, data is collected and processed in batches at scheduled intervals. This approach is suitable for scenarios where real-time data exchange is not required. 
• Benefits:
  • Reduces the load on systems by processing data in bulk.
  • Enables efficient utilisation of resources, especially in environments with limited bandwidth or processing power.

SBCN: Integration processes can be complex and fraught with challenges. What are some common obstacles companies face during these integrations?

AD: Integration processes can be complex and present various challenges for companies. Some common obstacles include:

1. Lack of Compatibility: Integrating systems that use different technologies, data formats, or protocols can be challenging. Compatibility issues may arise, requiring extensive customisation or development efforts to ensure seamless communication between systems.
2. Data Quality Issues: Inconsistent or poor-quality data across systems can hinder integration efforts. Data may need to be cleaned, standardised, or transformed to ensure accuracy and consistency, which can be time-consuming and resource-intensive.
3. Security Concerns: Integrating systems involves sharing sensitive data between applications, which raises security concerns. Ensuring data confidentiality, integrity, and compliance with regulatory requirements (e.g., GDPR) is essential but can pose challenges, especially in highly regulated industries.
4. Complexity of Legacy Systems: Many organisations still rely on legacy systems that were not designed for modern integration requirements. These systems may lack APIs or support for standard integration protocols, making it difficult to integrate them with newer applications or platforms.
5. Scalability and Performance: As integration requirements grow, scalability and performance become critical concerns. Integrations need to be able to handle increasing volumes of data and transactions without compromising performance or causing bottlenecks.
6. Dependency on Third Parties: Integrations often rely on third-party systems, APIs, or services. Any disruptions or changes to these dependencies can impact the entire integration ecosystem, leading to downtime or degraded functionality.
7. Organisational Silos: Siloed organisational structures can impede integration efforts by creating barriers between departments or teams responsible for different systems. Lack of collaboration and communication can result in disjointed integration strategies and duplicated efforts.
8. Maintenance and Support: Integration is not a one-time effort but an ongoing process that requires regular maintenance, monitoring, and support. Ensuring the long-term stability and reliability of integrations can be challenging, especially as systems and requirements evolve over time.

Addressing these challenges requires careful planning, collaboration across departments, clear communication, and a robust integration strategy tailored to the organisation’s unique needs and goals.

SBCN: Considering the challenges you just mentioned, how does Flows specifically address and mitigate these issues to ensure successful integrations?

AD: Flows works on a Hub-And-Spoke model for integration in which data from a source is configured once.  Once data starts being streamed into Flows, different integrations can then be easily set up with 3rd party systems.

One of the key advantages with Flows is that it utilises a loosely coupled data ingestion model.  Through this strategy, Flows allows products to send in data in their data structures and formats and Flows will learn the shape of the client’s data.  This makes integration into flows very easy and avoids the need to spend vast amounts of time on analysis and development across teams.

Furthermore, this also plays an important role in the ongoing maintenance of the main integration.  As new data points are added, Flows will automatically pick up on those data points and make them available to configure and use from within the Flow system.

Flows aims to empower everyone (not just developers) to build Flows, which allows much better collaboration across several departments. This allows different teams to manage integrations (or parts of integrations) based on their needs, further allowing for a much more scalable model whereby integration Flows can be updated as needed by different teams. 

SBCN:  How does Flows work to continuously improve the integration process and ensure long-term efficiency and effectiveness for your clients?

AD: Flows has an ever-growing integrated 3rd party ecosystem through its App store, allowing data coming in to be forwarded to 3rd party systems through easy-to-use Apps that handle the technical communication with 3rd parties seamlessly.

Flows has an easy to use workflow management tool allowing data coming in to easily be validated and transformed without the need to code.  Users from various departments can take ownership of the flow of data without having to go through development teams

SBCN. What are the latest trends and innovations in system integration that businesses should be aware of? How is Flows leveraging these advancements?

AD: Event-Driven Architecture:

Event-driven architecture is becoming more prevalent for real-time integration and event processing. By decoupling components and systems and allowing them to react to events asynchronously, it enables more responsive and scalable integration solutions.

AI-Powered Integration:

Artificial intelligence is being integrated into integration platforms to automate tasks, optimise processes, and provide better insights into data flows and patterns. AI-powered integration solutions can enhance data mapping, transformation, and validation, as well as improve decision-making and predictive analytics capabilities.

Low-Code/No-Code Integration:

Low-code and no-code integration platforms are gaining traction as businesses seek to accelerate integration projects and empower citizen developers to create integrations without extensive coding expertise. No code platforms, such as Flows, offer visual, drag-and-drop interfaces and pre-built connectors to simplify the development and deployment of integrations.

SBCN: Looking forward, what are some of the upcoming developments or new features in Flows that could further enhance system integration for businesses?

AD: Our future plans will focus on enhancing our platform’s capability to understand and contextualise incoming data. This will not only enable an easier experience for end users creating flows but will also further enhance our AI system and enable the creation of more intelligent workflows with unprecedented efficiency and accuracy. 

By employing advanced natural language processing algorithms and machine learning models, our platform will interpret data streams and discern patterns, trends, and relationships within the data, facilitating a more seamless integration across wider applications.