Astera Use Case: Using Automated

API Integration to Cut Down on

Manual, Repetitive Tasks

Introducing Atlantis Financials

Atlantis Financials offers accounting, auditing, tax, and consultation services to various private companies
and partners all over the US. They boast a diverse clientele, serving across a vast array of industries,
including advertising, textile, retail, hospitality, and more.

The financial firm uses an online application software, Avaza, to keep track of their customer relation-
ships, services offered, project statuses, and internal project management. The company gets its custom-
er data through file attachments in emails, but they were unable to establish connectivity between their
email server and other enterprise systems.

Therefore, they had to enter data manually, compromising data integrity. Plus, with their customer base
expanding rapidly across the globe, Atlantis experienced a substantial increase in their incoming data
volume. That prompted a need for an automated and scalable API integration solution that could inte-
grate their backend systems with an internal project management app without any coding efforts.

The Manual Process

Manual Data Extraction and Logging
Among other services offered by Atlantis to its vast clientele, one of them is accounting. Through Avaza,
the project manager assigns tasks internally so the relevant resources can file records within the deadline.
To maintain consistency, Atlantis requires information pertaining to 9 fields, including a tax number and
tax filing status. Based on the current filing status, the project manager creates tasks in Avaza, such as
filing accounts for customers with the status of no accounts filed, scheduling meetings, and setting
deadlines.

New customer details are emailed through file attachments, which could be in Excel, .CSV or XML format.
So far, Atlantis used to rely on an executive to:

• Manually download the file from email.

• Check for errors or missing information in the source file, such as special characters, misplaced phone
number, by going through all the records one by one.

• Filter out the companies with the no accounts filed tax filing status by sifting through all the records,
and manually log in the company names and other details in Avaza.

• Another option is to import files in the software directly, even though the manual screening process
stays the same even after importing files. However, Avaza only allows importing of .CSV files. Therefore,
for other incoming file formats, the extraction and filtering processes have to be implemented, as
mentioned above.
To sum it up, the entire process can be broken down into a few key steps:

• Extraction
• Cleansing
• Filtering
• Loading (via REST API)

It generally takes around 2-3 minutes for an employee to carry out the entire process and input one
record into the online software. This process has been serving Atlantis well as long as their customer base
was small, and they needed to process customer data occasionally. But the firm is expanding fast and
onboarding clients from all over the world. This has led to an exponential increase in their incoming data
volume, and the manual process became error-prone and time-intensive as they scaled.

Download Check for Identify Filter records Manually

files from discrepancies missing fields with relevant enter data in
emails in records tax filing Avaza
status

Atlantis needed a solution that can integrate their email server with the online application, and cut down
manual efforts from the processing cycle.
The Problem
• With growing data volume and disparity in incoming file formats, executives were having a hard time
keeping track of the incoming data. Sometimes, the files would overlap, and the executive would
enter company information twice, only to realize later the duplication of records. Executing these
repetitive but mandatory tasks in a fast-paced environment becomes challenging for the resources
handling the data.

• Working with disparate applications and file formats simultaneously was draining employee
productivity. Moving data between these systems manually also increased the error probability,
which if left unchecked, could result in incorrect records and missed deadlines.

• Inconsistencies and missing values in incoming data had to be identified by manually skimming
through the source files, which increases the probability of human error.

• Only companies that have account filing status ‘no accounts filed’ are to be forwarded to the online
software. To filter out these companies, executives would have to open every file and check the
status before logging data of the companies that qualify.

• As the majority of internal operations are handled through Avaza, Atlantis needed an integration
platform that could connect to online applications without writing any code, and empower business
users to execute the process.

To increase operational efficiency and streamline internal business processes, Atlantis had two options
to scale up:

1. They could either hire more data entry specialists, where one resource’s salary averages 28,000/
year, and there is no predicting how many resources they will need down the lane. Not to mention,
the risk of human error will always be there.

2. The other option was to adopt a code-free, automated API integration solution that could connect
their enterprise systems, and automate the entire process from data extraction to loading. This
solution not only accounts for their data volume growth but any additional system integration and
transformation requirements they might have in the future.
Atlantis opted for the latter solution.
What Atlantis Financials Wants in a Solution
To Solve API Connectivity and Data Integration Challenges

• A solution that enables connectivity to heterogeneous data sources, especially online web applications
(via REST APIs), to cater to their growing enterprise needs.

• To create repeatable processes that can massage data according to pre-defined rules before it is
forwarded to the destination, i.e. Avaza.

• An automatic filtering process, which categorizes data based on the specified criteria.

• The ability to POST data to an online application, from where the project manager can assign tasks
to their subordinates.

• Process automation capability that enables automatic downloading of files attached in emails to a
local folder.

• A software that schedules the integration jobs and runs the flow automatically based on triggers.

Automating API Integration - Slashing Manual,

Repetitive Tasks for Improved Productivity
Astera Centerprise is an end-to-end integration software that offers pre-defined transformations, out-of-
box connectivity, and automation features to simplify REST API integration.

With the ability to integrate heterogeneous source data, ranging from files and databases to REST APIs
and emails, Centerprise addresses the pain points of Atlantis Financial. Furthermore, the solution’s
powerful ETL engine can process high volume data efficiently, reducing manual efforts and improving
operational efficiency and employee productivity.

Let’s look at a step-by-step break down of the process adopted by Atlantis Financials to automate API
integration:
Creating a REST API Endpoint
One of the main requirements for Atlantis Financials is code-free connectivity to Avaza, where they
centralize management for all ongoing projects and services. The REST API Browser in Centerprise
enables that connection by importing Avaza’s REST API and making HTTP requests via just one-step
authentication.

Once imported, all the request methods in Avaza’s API are populated in the REST API Client, and the user
can drag-and-drop the required call method to read, write, or update records in the application software.

To accomplish this, we can create an integration project in Centerprise, where we imported Avaza’s API by
entering the URL in the API Browser. In addition to populating the HTTP request methods, the Browser
automatically creates a shared connection file that is used to configure authentication details.

Creating Integration Project in Astera Centerprise

 Importing Avaza’s API in the REST API Browser

Centerprise supports 4 authentication methods. For Avaza, we are using 'OAuth2, Implicit' that
generates request token based on Auth URL and Client ID. Configuring these details establishes a
connection with the application software.

Configuring Authentications Details

As a result, you can see all the API request methods in the Browser.

The Layout of Available Request Methods in Avaza

Since we are writing company data, we will drag-and-drop POST ‘Create a Company’ object from the
Browser on to the designer window.

Currently, the application does not contain company data, and that can be seen in the Contacts Tab.

Avaza’s Interface
Automating Email Extraction
As mentioned above, Atlantis Financials gets its source data through emails. To reduce manual efforts
and avoid delays, they want to automate email data extraction. Astera Centerprise makes this possible by
supporting email as a source and processing incoming attachments without any manual intervention.

Email Source Configuration

The email source object is configured in a workflow to download the file attachments containing
customer details in a local folder. Whether the file is in .CSV, XML/JSON, or Excel format, Centerprise
will retrieve data from the incoming files and process it.

Cleanse, Consolidate, and Filter Customer Data

In Astera Centerprise, the major ETL tasks are executed in dataflows that create mapping between
different objects to process raw data. Here, we take the data received in email attachments, run it
through different quality checks to remove redundancies, combine it with other sources, and filter the
required fields before transferring it to Avaza. This cuts down the manual effort in preparing data and
reduces the probability of human error, consequently speeding up the entire process.

In the screenshot below, you can see the dataflow Atlantis Financials used to streamline their internal
operations. Here, we are processing records contained in .CSV and XML files. However, the dataflow can
easily be configured for any other file format as well.
 Dataflow for Atlantis Financials

After data retrieval, we apply the Data Cleanse transformation to the incoming company data.
This built-in transformation removes duplicates, null values, redundant digits or letters, and more.
However, Atlantis’s requirement is to remove special characters and redundancies from the Company
Name field, which can be a time-intensive process if handled manually. Factor in the continually
increasing number of files, and the process becomes resource-intensive as well, with a high probability
of error.

The screenshot below shows the cleansing criteria set in this dataflow.

Specifying Cleansing Criteria

 Result of Data Cleansing Transformation

Next, the clean data coming from two different sources is consolidated using the Union transformation to
generate a unified view of the customer data. Now Atlantis Financial wanted to transfer data of only those
companies that have the tax filing status ‘accounts not filed’. By transferring selected records in Avaza,
Atlantis ensures easy management of their online records, free of background noise.

Filtering Data Based on Account Filing Status

The consolidated data is further run through quality checks to identify records with no phone numbers
to keep track of missing information and rectify that when required, without any manual intervention.

Applying Data Quality Rules

Writing Data In Avaza
As mentioned above, we have already configured the Company field’s POST request method in Avaza. The
next step is to map the relevant fields with the destination object and run the dataflow. The screenshot
below shows the preview of the transferred data.

POSTing Data in Avaza

The customer data can now be viewed online in Avaza in the Contacts tab.

Integrated Data Visible in Avaza

Automating the API Integration Process
To make this an automated, repeatable process, Atlantis leverages Centerprise’s Job Scheduler feature.
It schedules the dataflow to run every time a new file is dropped in the folder. Automating the process
enables Atlantis to improve employee productivity and remove redundant, manual tasks when dealing
with high data volume.

Configuring Job Scheduler

 Email
Automation

Download Customer Data

Workflow

Download Email File Attachments

in Local Directory

Job
Scheduler

Dataflow is Scheduled to Run Whenever

a New File is Dropped in the Folder

Dataflow

Cleanse, Consolidate,
and Filter Data

REST API
Connectivity

Connect and POST Data

on Avaza
How Atlantis Financials
Benefits From Automating
API Integration
• Adding Astera Centerprise to the equation enables Atlantis Financials to streamline and fast-track their
internal business processes.

• Using the REST API Browser, they can connect their online project management application with the
email server to ensure smooth communication between two crucial enterprise systems.

• The process orchestration capability and built-in transformations cut down on the manual efforts and
improve efficiency.

• By combining powerful data preparation and ETL features with REST API connectivity,
Astera Centerprise offers a unified platform for Atlantis’s integration needs.