INTERFACE, by apidays 2021 - It’s APIs all the way down June 30, July 1 & 2, 2021 Airline industry API standardization Yan Sun, Technology Standard Manager at IATA

1. Airline Industry
API Standardization
IATA Open Air program
Yan (Peter) Sun
Technology Standard Manager

2. What is IATA?
The International Air Transport
Association (IATA) is the trade
association for the world’s airlines.
Core roles:
• Advocacy
• Standards setting activities
• Aviation products and services
292
Member
Airlines
$ 449.8
Bn
Processed by
IATA Financial
Systems
53
Countries
presence
2

3. Industry - API development
3

4. 4
APIs make the travel
experience safe and efficient
70%* of airlines and airports
plan to provide Open APIs
*Source: IATA Survey, Summer 2017

5. API Growth and Standardization
Challenges from the Industry API growth:
• Interoperability
• Discoverability
• Design/implementation Consistency
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
Data format Data
definitions
Industry
directory
Connection
methods
Imp.
Guidance
Airlines Airports
Source: IATA Survey, Summer 2017
Source: State of API 2020 Report - SmartBear
Standardization
Versioning
Security
Authentication
Other
Discoverability
Scalability
Integration between tools
Composability/reuse
Standardization continues to rank
as the top challenge (58%) for
organizations as they attempt to
scale API development

6. Open Air Program
Industry Standards
REST API Standards and
Best Practices
2
3
Adoption
Certification of APIs
compliant with standards
API Ecosystem
API Ecosystem services to
allow airlines working with
many developers
• Advanced API Directory
• Identity Mgnt
• …
Vision
Open Air facilitates the development of an airline industry Open API
ecosystem through the industry standards and services using open
technology under industry governance
The Digital Transformation Advisory Council endorsed Open
Air as part of the industry restart plan in June 2020
The Architecture and Technology Strategy Board requires the
use of Open API (REST/JSON) as the technology of choice for
standard development moving forward
1
6

7. Standards
7

8. 30+
Airlines and
strategic
partners
Design
First
API Specification
Standardization
OAS
Based on
OpenAPI
Specification 3.0
Open Air Standards
Reuse data model from the Airline Industry Data Model (AIDM)
in the standard API specifications
8
1. Consistent message
processing across airlines
2. Consistent data definitions
across schemas within
a given airline
Standard
Schema2
Standard
Schema1
Airline
IT systems
Other
Airline /
Business
Partner
IT systems
Standard
Schema1
Standard
Schema2
Standard
Schema1
Standard
Schema2
Data Model
JSON
(of schema1)
JSON
(of schema1)
JSON
(of schema2)
JSON
(of schema2)
A
P
I
A
P
I

9. What we standardize?
Industry Standard API Provider Proprietary API
“As industry API provider, I
want to design my own APIs
following Open Air standards,
and apply for certification.”
“Under industry governance, I
want to collaborate with other
airlines and partners to design
a common industry standard
API specification.”

10. How it works – Proprietary API
Open Air Design
Governance tool **
OAS Spec
Editor
Collaborate##
Common
Model Repo
Compliance
Rule Set
Compliance
Checking
AIDM
Load
Provider API platform
API Design
Tool
Exchange
Spec
Common
model Repo
Lifecycle
Mgnt
……
Feed
Load
Use
Dev/SCM
Generate
Use
## : Collaboration for certification compliance checking
** : Open standard and API provider platform agnostic
++ : JSON library can be consumed in the API design
: Proprietary API is verified as Open Air Certified API
Open Air
team
Open Air
JSON
Library++
Industry API provider
Designer Developer PO
10

11. Data Model - JSON Library
11
How should developers consume the library:
1. Reuse the whole standard schema object
2. Reuse the subset of the standard schema elements
(e.g properties)
3. Apply more restrictions on schema object
4. Extend the schema object by adding more
elements, or change the content of schema object.
Extension or change must be marked as
“experimental content” in API spec.
Delivery plan:
1. Draft library available for evaluation
2. Pilot Library & Implementation Guide - (stay with
www.iata.org/open-air)
3. Full library delivery – end 2021 Only for the purpose of example

12. Certification
12

13. Exposure of
APIs to
potential
industry
consumers
Certification is
free of charge
Possibility to
gain new
business
partners
APIs from 12 Airlines, 1 strategic partner and 1 start up have already been
certified and published
Open Air API certification program validates the compliance of APIs against
Best Practices and the API Certification Compliance Checklist.
• Basic Certification – API is documented using Open API Spec 3.0
• Full Certification – Compliant with all Open Air standards
Open Air adoption so far
Certification framework revision is ongoing within Open Air Working Group
13

14. Ecosystem
14

15. Airline Industry API Ecosystem
Core
Service Advanced
Directory
Capability
Open Air
Certification
AIDM Security
Taxonomy
Methodology
/Tools
Scalability
Identity
Mgnt
API Provider
platforms
Connectivity
Publish API
info
Developer
Community
Interact
API Ecosystem – Conceptual Model
Discover
-ability
Monitoring/
Reporting
Open Air
Team
Consumer
Provider Consumer
Individual Dev
Integration
Provider
End User
Travel Agency
Airlines Aggregator Others Airport
Airport
Identity Mgnt
Verified Industry Entity
Pilot
15

16. • Apply for API Certification
• Evaluate draft Open Air JSON Library
• Join IATA Open Air Working group
Contact：openair@iata.org
16
Interested?

17. Resources
• IATAOpenAirprogram
• OpenAirStandard
• APIDirectory
• API Certification Compliance Checklist
• AirlineIndustryDataModel
• OpenAirFAQ