News

Mendix Boosts Low-Code Dev Platform with IBM Cloud and Watson AI

• By David Ramel
• February 11, 2019

Mendix, one of the leading vendors in the enterprise low-code development space, has boosted its dev platform with new integration tapping into IBM Cloud services, including Watson AI cognitive services.

The Mendix on IBM Cloud initiative reportedly helps organizations deliver apps 10 times faster than traditional development approaches, shortening the time-to-value cycle for creating applications that leverage data by turning it into actionable insights that can drive business outcomes.

"The goal of the Mendix-IBM Alliance is to place the ease of drag-and-drop, low-code application development into the hands of the Enterprise cloud market, leverage Watson's AI capabilities for the largest number of users, and vastly accelerate the time-to-value deployment of business innovation," said exec Erno Rorive, who was tapped to introduce the pact at the IBM Think 2019 event tomorrow. "The integration of the Mendix platform with IBM Cloud and Watson represents a golden triangle of enterprise-ready solutions that will power the next wave of smart applications to focus the power of AI on vertical industry solutions."

The broader access to IBM Cloud services for developers using the Mendix platform will reportedly make it easier to experiment with and leverage AI capabilities provided by Watson, using resources such as Weather Channel content, App ID (authentication for Web and mobile apps) and App Launch (app and feature deployment). On a similar front, Mendix last June announced Mendix Assist, which also taps into AI technologies like machine learning to bolster platform capabilities.

Other enhancements for the IBM Cloud infrastructure listed by Mendix include:

• Full Support for Kubernetes. Integrated support for Kubernetes production-grade container orchestration is now part of Mendix's cloud-native architecture. The company said native Kubernetes support enables streamlined management and interoperable deployment across public, private and hybrid clouds.
• Single Sign-on Onboarding. The re-engineered platform integration creates a smoother user experience in all Mendix low-code applications with one-click, out-of-the box deployment to IBM Cloud's entire catalog of third-party vendors. "This enhancement allows enterprise customers to operate and monitor mission-critical applications in a single IBM-centric dashboard, eliminating the need for additional logins and passwords."
• Integrated Billing with IBM Cloud. A streamlined financial platform allows for single invoices for any purchased IBM Cloud service. "By adding the Mendix platform to IBM Cloud's catalog, customers can quickly begin to explore Mendix's enterprise-ready, low-code application development, allowing them to deliver commercial benefits at speed and for the lowest possible total cost of ownership, using their IBM Cloud Credits."

The company first announced its integration with the IBM Cloud more than a year ago. "The collaboration between IBM and Mendix will combine the ease of Mendix's low-code environment with the advanced services available on IBM Cloud, including AI, blockchain, data analytics, mobile and Internet of things (IoT) services," said IBM exec Don Boulia in a blog post in January 2018. "This significantly accelerates the speed at which developers from all backgrounds, from highly skilled coders to business users expanding their roles, are positioned to build and deploy cloud-native applications."

Mendix said anyone interested in more details on the alliance with IBM should contact it for more information.