Verizon Cloud

Business objective

On-board enterprise developers to Verizon Cloud with a free developer portal that enables them to rapidly prototype and then run mobile, web, and IoT applications with Verizon Cloud. Shift developer perception of IaaS as a deployment solution for finished applications to an all-inclusive "cloud first" development platform that provides robust RESTful access to data sources at the start of application development projects.

Technical challenge

Develop and provision a flexible IaaS workspace to give enterprise developers a fast and easy way to get robust REST APIs for a wide range of data sources, including legacy enterprise backend resources; and then fast track this RESTful backend from the developer portal to production—all on the Verizon Cloud.

The solution

By teaming with DreamFactory, Verizon combined its enterprise-grade cloud services with an open source RESTful backend integration platform to provide developers with a way to quickly get REST APIs to any data source for their applications. The service scales from initial developer sandboxes through to testing and production deployment, fast tracking the development lifecycle entirely within the Verizon Cloud. Packaged as a turnkey developer portal, DreamFactory provides a free trial service for developers and a great way to introduce users to the benefits of the Verizon Cloud.

Turned Verizon Cloud into turnkey developer portal providing RESTful backend services for mobile, web, and IoT application workloads

1. Free dev-and-test sandboxes with all-inclusive RESTful backend services to any data source
‍
2. Quick, secure access within the sandbox to new and legacy data sources via auto-generated REST APIs
‍
3. Wide range of external service integration capabilities (database, web services, custom APIs)

4. Smooth progression to fast track private cloud instances for development into test and production

Verizon Cloud enables the creation of modern applications that address business needs

1. Tailors cloud deployments to a range of applications, service levels and security policies
‍
2. Reduces the risk of strategic IT projects while developing, testing, deploying, and maintaining applications
‍
3. Manage all technology assets—network, security, compute, storage—via a single pane of
glass interface

Verizon expands the scope of IaaS to include "mobile-ready" REST services

As businesses adapt to a more connected world, RESTful architectures have emerged as one of the most efficient means for mobile, web, and IoT applications to store and access data. At the same time, development mindshare is shifting to the front-end client as modern developers focus on richer, more intuitive user experiences that are powered by data from both cloud and on-premise systems.
‍
The challenge: recent industry research suggests as much as two-thirds of the cost of enterprise mobile application development projects lies in backend integration work—slowing mobile application development efforts and driving up costs.
‍
"Today's developers need reliable, on-tap services to access data for their applications. Without these foundational services, extra costs and delays are incurred as developers must work with server-side teams to get the APIs they need to build their applications," said Bob Bratcher, Sr. Product Manager of Verizon. "We wanted to change that by empowering front-end developers to quickly and securely access backend services from within the Verizon Cloud."

Verizon Cloud stands out with a "cloud first" RESTful backend for today's developers

A Verizon-hosted enterprise development portal for mobile, web, and IoT workloads is a natural extension to Verizon Cloud. By working with DreamFactory, this new portal expands Verizon's enterprise-grade IaaS to provide a comprehensive set of RESTful backend services, providing developers instant REST API access to the data sources they need for next-generation business applications.
‍
Users simply sign into the free developer portal, connect to their data sources, set up user access permissions, and start development with a full palette of secure, reliable, documented REST APIs to virtually any SQL, NoSQL, file storage, or external web service.

Once developers have tried DreamFactory on Verizon Cloud and want to move the workload to private instances for production, Verizon offers a smooth on-boarding process to sign into an existing Verizon account or to create a new account.

"Verizon is distinguished by its deep mobile experience, and offers very robust and secure enterprise cloud services," said Bill Appleton, CEO of DreamFactory. "Combining Verizons' reliable cloud with the DreamFactory REST API platform enables an end-to-end 'cloud first' development solution that brings tremendous value to the enterprise. We are pleased to team with Verizon to help enable the developer portal."

Significant project savings and a fast time to market

The DreamFactory REST API provides both of the two new applications efficient and easily maintainable access to the Maxwell Lucas high-availability MySQL database. Additionally, this same interface provides a persistent connection so that alerts and notifications can be sent to Concur, a third-party web service. This level of technical sophistication was developed by a single developer with minimal experience in backend integration, and eliminated the need to hire technical assistance.
‍
"Before we considered DreamFactory, we had explored outsourcing some of the integration work. We were looking at quotes of at least £70,000 (more than $100,000) to create an API for our backend, and this API would not have provided the same high level of functionality that DreamFactory provides, right out of the box," says Smith. "Also, a major consideration is that outsourcing would have taken at least six months, whereas I was able to complete the work in a few weeks. DreamFactory enabled me to take on a tough technical challenge and develop a modern, long-term solution that our clients really like."

DreamFactory is low-code & built for developers

a brown and white icon of a stack of coins

Front-end Developers

  • Focus on front-end development rather than working on (or waiting on) server-side software
  • Connect to new data sources in minutes with just a few clicks
  • Access multiple data sources with RESTful ease and automatic security
  • Faster, less costly projects with instant, robust REST APIs
a brown and white icon of a stack of coins

Back-end/API Developers

  • Automatically generate and document secure, reliable, and reusable REST APIs
  • Customize auto-generated APIs with pre- and post-processing scripting logic
  • Integrate with existing security controls like OAuth, LDAP, and Active Directory, so you don’t have to re-implement and test for each API
  • Easily move applications between clouds or between your cloud and data center
a brown and white icon of a stack of coins

Enterprise Architects

  • Govern security with your own data access platform running in the cloud or on-premises
  • Accelerate innovation with secure, scalable, reusable REST APIs to enterprise data sources
  • Enable a standard, unified API abstraction layer for modern apps that need to connect to legacy data sources that can't be readily changed
  • Improve application reliability and security enterprise-wide with managed REST services
Results

Why engineering leaders work with DreamFactory

Calculate API Savings

$201, 783

Dev Cost Saved per year

19 Months

Boost Time to Market

$45, 719

Saved Per API

348%

Cost of Ownership Savings