Have worked across industries to streamline API lifecycle and integration with strong support experience
What is our primary use case?
I have experience with both Apigee and Kong API Gateway. I have migrated from Apigee to Kong Konnect for organizations.
I am working currently with Kong Konnect SaaS Enterprise, which is the SaaS version of Kong. I have also worked on Kong Gateway Enterprise.
With Kong Konnect, AWS is the provider by default. However, the gateway runtime can be installed anywhere, the Kong Gatewa runtime also called the Kong Data Plane is platform agnostic. It does not have to be in AWS. It can be in Azure or on-prem as well.
What is most valuable?
Kong has been working on their documentation. They have developed a separate portal for the documentation. They are trying to improve that.
Their tech support is excellent. When I raise an incident or a support ticket, it got answered in four hours.
What needs improvement?
When comparing documentation, Kong's documentation is not on par with Google, Amazon, or other cloud providers. If a new person joins a team and wants to start using Kong's product and their associated tools, they would find it difficult initially compared to Google, Amazon, or Microsoft products, or even Azure from the deployment perspective. Kong has been working on their documentation and has developed a separate portal for the documentation. They are trying to improve that area.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using both Kong Konnect and Kong Gateway Enterprise for three years at the level of API Technical Architect.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Kong Konnect includes managed and self-hosted runtimes, allowing different business units to independently control their gateways while maintaining central governance, security, and logging policies.
How are customer service and support?
Their tech support is excellent. When I raise an incident or a support ticket, it gets answered in four hours.
How would you rate customer service and support?
What about the implementation team?
One thing to keep in mind is Kong Konnect has professional services which often gets involved in the initial phases of implementation. Their professional services are very expensive. That is one reason why a client should hire an API technical architect to get things done because I am much more cost-effective than the professional services team.
What was our ROI?
Significant improvement in the performance of APIs.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
It is more suitable to purchase Kong license from Kong vendors, not from the cloud marketplace because the cloud marketplace has a limitation on the number of API services it supports. If the customer has many APIs, it is always better to go through the vendor route to purchase the license.
What other advice do I have?
I would rate Kong Konnect 8.5 out of 10.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Public Cloud
If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?
Amazon Web Services (AWS)
Deploy and manage API solutions efficiently with centralized hybrid systems
What is our primary use case?
I use
Kong Konnect as an API Gateway or API management solution. I have several use cases, including securing internal APIs within Siemens network by deploying Kong Gateway on
Amazon EKS. This acts as an API management layer to expose other internal services such as logging and
Jira APIs. Additionally, I utilize it for external use cases by deploying an API Gateway for consumers accessing services from the internet. My aim is to create a federated API management platform where various business units can still use their preferred choice of gateways while maintaining a central federation layer to control security and logging policies.
What is most valuable?
Kong Konnect is a SaaS version of Kong Gateway, and it offers a hybrid deployment. The configuration can be controlled centrally via the SaaS offering, and each team can manage their own gateway or runtime part. It is lightweight, suitable for smaller use cases without heavy initial costs, and comes in various flavors such as open source and enterprise. The documentation is excellent, and it includes a developer portal, which helps create a common distribution channel for APIs within and outside the enterprise.
What needs improvement?
Kong Konnect's RBAC needs to evolve more, as they currently offer only one or two levels of RBAC in terms of organization and teams. Additionally, the licensing model could be simplified, especially in how they charge and track usage. There are also some technical restrictions around exposing GRPC APIs, but I have not explored this yet.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been working with Kong Konnect for the last six or seven months.
What was my experience with deployment of the solution?
The deployment is straightforward because it's a hybrid model. The control plane is a SaaS offering, so there's not much difficulty there.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
The solution is stable.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
The platform is fully scalable, providing various ways to manage data planes or runtimes. They offer managed runtimes, but it's preferred that consumers manage their own runtime, which can be deployed in a containerized manner.
How are customer service and support?
The technical support from Kong is satisfactory.
How would you rate customer service and support?
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
I was previously using
Azure Logic Apps but moved to Kong API Gateway. This decision was influenced by the need to create a service around Kong API Gateway with a federated API management platform.
How was the initial setup?
The initial setup is very straightforward due to its hybrid deployment model, with the configuration and control plane managed as a SaaS offering.
What was our ROI?
I have not yet seen a return on investment because the project is still in its early stages.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
While the pricing model isn't very clear on how usage is tracked, the initial cost and setup for using Kong Konnect are reasonable.
What other advice do I have?
The knowledge base provided by Kong is excellent, offering various learning paths not just for the technical aspects of Kong Konnect, but also for innovation within the application. It's a highly customizable platform. I would rate Kong Konnect an eight overall.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Hybrid Cloud
If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?
