The magic in software design, engineering, development, customer interfacing, and digital experience is in the System Integration.  The integration points are where heterogeneous systems interface with new, existing, or isolated/desperate platforms to expose endpoints to be consumed to achieve system homogeneity for the benefits of both the integrated systems and users.  Software integration provides that seamless digital experience, especially where new platforms are limited in data kind, type, and the number of records for full transactions to be complete.  Since many platforms may not have or hold all the needed datasets, it’s prudent to connect with the already existing systems like the government bodies, legalized authorities, and/or private outfits that hold such data which would be a single source of truth as performing unnecessary data collection and cleaning will be re-inventing the wheel. As Ngamia, we are collaborating with different outfits within our ecosystem to support our platform at different stages of system performance.  Some of the organizations in play are: –

1. TrueCaller: – The company provides SDK  for developers to help them verify mobile numbers for their users and drive growth. With more than 250+ million mobile number verified active users globally, verification via Truecaller enables you to convert more users by reducing drops in lesser steps while onboarding them and hence offers hassle-free verification for the users in your mobile app and web-based product/s. Thus, it helps all the users who have a Truecaller app on their mobile devices to quickly verify themselves on 3rd party apps by associating their Truecaller verified identity.  This functionality allows integrated systems to quickly verify/ sign-up/ login users based on their mobile number – without the need for any SMS based OTP.

2. Speachnel: – An insurance technology powerhouse with modern and sophisticated technology that allows insurers, agents, brokers, and digital businesses to rapidly innovate products and sell them on the fly through a fully secured, flexible, and ready to integrate insurance solutions into an existing platform through APIs.

 

3. Firebase: – This is a platform developed by Google to support developers in the mobile and web development space. It has various functionalities for developers to access Real-Time Databases, Cloud Firestore, Cloud Messaging, Analytics, Crushlytics, and many more with mind-boggling endless options.

 

4. M-PESA API: – Is a Safaricom product recently introduced dubbed ‘The Daraja API’ (Daraja in Swahili means bridge) to try and bridge the mobile transaction gap for developers. The API which is REST-based can be accessed over the public internet a step up from the G2 API which required a VPN connection. This was to try and alleviate the pain of the developers whose Apps use the REST protocol but had to find a way to accommodate M-Pesa’s SOAP. Daraja API not only had the old services from G2 API (C2B, B2C, and reversal) but also exposed new M-Pesa services (B2B, Transaction status, Account balance, and Lipa-Na-M-Pesa online)

  In order to bring a greater customer experience, Ngamia has used the above-mentioned technologies and tools and is still working towards connecting to Integrated Population Registration Services (IPRS) as the single source of truth for the population of all Kenyan and foreign residents in Kenya.  Integration plays a big part as technology grows and systems should be able to share data freely for consistency and accuracy.  Other platforms that use Blockchain, Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, Robotic Process Automation, and Big Data Analytics will most likely rely on the ability to integrate to function properly.