Who builds APIs and who uses them?

The entity that creates an API and makes it available for others to use is known as an API producer. The API producer is responsible for designing, building, and maintaining the API.

API consumer refers to the entity that uses or consumes the API provided by the API producer. The API consumer can be a developer, an organization, or another system that accesses the API to retrieve or update data or perform other operations. API consumers use the API created by API producers. You will learn more about the different life cycles of the API consumer and API producer in later chapters.

APIs are typically built by software developers who work for a company or organization that wants to expose certain functionality or data to other systems or applications. These developers create the rules and protocols that define how the API works, and they also create the code that implements the API.

APIs can be used by a wide range of people and organizations, depending on the purpose of the API. The customers for an API, also known as API consumers, can be broadly categorized into the following groups:

• Internal developers: These are the developers within the same organization that built the API, who use the API to access the data and functionality within the organization’s systems. They may use the API to automate business processes, integrate systems, or access data for reporting and analysis.
• External developers: These are the developers outside of the organization who use the API to access the data and functionality provided by the organization. They may be third-party developers building applications that integrate with the organization’s systems, or they may be partners or customers who access the organization’s services through the API.
• Business users: These are the people within the organization who use the data and functionality exposed by the API to make decisions and run the business. They may use the data for reporting, analysis, and decision-making.
• End users: These are the users of the final product that uses the data and functionality exposed by the API.

APIs can be used by a wide range of people and organizations, depending on the purpose of the API. They can be used to automate business processes, integrate systems, access data, create new revenue streams, and improve the customer experience. APIs can also have different types of customers, such as developers, B2B customers, B2C customers, and so on, depending on the business model of the company providing the API.

The main goal of an API is to provide a way for different systems and applications to communicate and share data and functionality, and the customers of an API are the people and organizations that use that data and functionality to achieve their goals.

Now that you have developed an understanding of what API products are, their types, and the business models associated with them, we will take a look at some of the industry’s most prominent API products in the next section.