Microservices testing firm UP9 Inc. said today it’s boosting its test automation capabilities with the acquisition of U.K.-based MockLab Ltd., creator of the open-source application programming interface mocking tool WireMock.

UP9 sells tools for monitoring and testing cloud-native systems. The tools enable microservices developers to ensure their APIs perform reliably and securely and are production-ready. It works by combining machine learning with deep API traffic analysis to enable developers to identify any problems with their APIs, as well as the root cause of those issues.

APIs are software intermediaries that allow two applications to talk to each other. They’re widely used today by almost every kind of application. Every time someone uses Facebook, sends an instant message via WhatsApp, or checks the weather on their phone, an API is used to facilitate that interaction.

Because they’re used so often, the security and performance of APIs is critical to any organization that relies on software for its business. API regressions and security vulnerabilities can cause a lot of harm to businesses if they’re not identified before they go into production. With UP9’s tools developers can unpack API protocols such as Kafka, REST, gRPC, Redis and RabbitMQ and continuously monitor API payloads to detect vulnerabilities that drift into production.

Today’s acquisition adds a significant new capability to UP9’s API testing platform. WireMock can be used to create a mock API that simulates the interface to an external system to support testing, troubleshooting and prototyping without having to rely on the real thing.

UP9 says API mocks are essential in cases where a newly developed service that’s part of a distributed system depends on other internal or external services to perform reliably. API mocking has proven to be especially important in cloud-native environments, UP9 says, because it allows developers to integrate functional and performance testing into their workflows.

WireMock was first developed in 2011 and has grown to become one of the most essential tools for API developers, with more than 1.6 million monthly downloads.

UP9 co-founder and Chief Executive Alon Girmonsky said the number of APIs in use today is growing exponentially and that developers need all the help they can get to ensure they are reliable and secure. “WireMock is a significant player in the API economy, and by combining it with UP9’s existing API monitoring and traffic analysis capabilities, modern cloud-native developers can now develop faster and find problems quicker,” he said.

As part of today’s acquisition, WireMock creator Tom Akehurst will join UP9 as its new chief technology officer.

“UP9 is setting the standard for what it means to be a developer-first company with a clear focus on productivity and ease,” Akehurst said. “It was a natural move to become part of this work.”

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