How OData APIs Ensures Your Trusted Data Products are Consumable Everywhere

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We’ve always known that the true value of data doesn’t come from the raw data artifacts, but rather from the refined, trusted Data Products that organizations use to make decisions. Unfortunately, many of these governed data assets remain locked behind proprietary APIs or custom connectors, making data consumption a frustrating scavenger hunt. We’ve done our best at Qlik to make access easy within our own ecosystem, but what if you need data products to flow securely and seamlessly to other BI solutions, productivity applications, and, increasingly important, every autonomous AI agent across your organization? We have the answer!

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Today, we’re excited to introduce OData-compliant API access for Qlik Data Products. Every Qlik Talend Cloud data product published to the data marketplace with this newly released capability can now be securely accessed through an OData API endpoint, making it easier than ever to consume trusted data across your entire ecosystem.

Quick OData Protocol Refresher

The Open Data Protocol (OData) was conceived at Microsoft around 2007 as a novel way to bring uniformity and power to the then-emerging landscape of RESTful APIs. Its goal was to create a standard, HTTP-based protocol for creating and consuming queryable web services, much like JDBC or ODBC provided standardized access to databases. After its initial versions (1.0 through 3.0), Microsoft turned the technology over to the OASIS (Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards) consortium. This transition led to its adoption and formal standardization as OData Version 4.0 in 2014, and it has since been approved as an ISO/IEC International Standard, cementing its status as a platform-independent, globally recognized best practice for data integration across a vast ecosystem of applications and platforms.

Turning Data Products into VALUE with APIs

Data and analytics teams can activate OData API access for one or more datasets in a data product. This creates API endpoints that can be consumed programmatically in BI tools like Microsoft Power BI, Tableau, or Excel, enterprise apps such as Salesforce, or even integrated into custom workflows and agentic AI experiences.

API Endpoint Activation

For example, take a Logistics & Shipping data product that contains datasets on orders, deliveries, suppliers, and shippers. When this data product is made available through an OData API, it delivers three key benefits - 

Seamless Integration
Business teams can integrate the data product directly into their business workflow tools to track delivery KPIs, or into non-Qlik dashboards for enhanced supply chain visibility — all without any additional custom connectors.

Inspect the API endpoints that are activated

Obtain the GET endpoint to access the table within the data product
Faster time to insights

With OData API endpoints, analysts and developers can query and filter data products directly — but the impact is even greater when combined with tools like Qlik Automate using the API Key connector.

Configure the API Connector in Qlik Automate to leverage the OData API
For example, in a Logistics & Shipping data product, delivery details can be fetched via the FACT_DELIVERY GET API and used to auto-trigger workflows like customer alerts or ops notifications.

Run the automation and see the listed results

Secure and governed access
API endpoints respect the same data governance, access controls policies, and permissions applied to the data products, ensuring the logistics data remains consistent and compliant across every touchpoint — from BI dashboards and custom business workflows to operational AI agents monitoring delivery anomalies.

Conclusion

OData APIs broaden the reach of trusted data products beyond the native Qlik platform. Now, trusted data products can be securely consumed using third-party tools, enterprise apps, and AI agents — without extra connectors. This means seamless integration, faster time to insights, and governance at scale — turning what was once a scavenger hunt into effortless access. It’s a leap forward in our vision: making trusted data products instantly consumable anywhere, by anyone, in the tool of their choice.

To learn more, check out our documentation and grow the consumption of your data product with an OData API endpoint.