Software as a service (SaaS) platforms typically host three types of applications: official platform apps, independent software vendor (ISV) apps, and enterprise-developed apps. These applications need to exchange data across different organizations and runtime environments, but point-to-point integrations between them are difficult to build and maintain. EventBridge provides a centralized event bus that enables cross-product, cross-organization, and cross-cloud communication based on the CloudEvents specification.
How it works
A SaaS platform integrated with EventBridge gives every application on the platform -- whether built by the platform vendor, an ISV, or an enterprise -- a standard way to publish and consume events. Instead of building point-to-point integrations between each pair of applications, all events flow through the EventBridge event bus.
This architecture shows how a SaaS platform uses EventBridge and CloudEvents to establish a standard event bus, accelerating ecosystem development in two ways:
For ISVs: Build event-driven serverless applications using EventBridge and Function Compute. Receive events from platform apps without managing custom integrations. For a hands-on example, see Best practices for building DingTalk connectors.
For enterprises: Subscribe to events from ISV and platform applications to trigger internal workflows, sync data to enterprise systems, or automate business processes.
Key concepts
| Term | Definition |
|---|---|
| Event bus | A channel that receives, filters, and routes events from event sources to event targets. |
| Custom event bus | An event bus that you create for a specific use case, such as routing events from a SaaS platform. |
| Event source | The application or service that publishes events to an event bus. |
| Event target | The downstream service that receives and processes events from the event bus, such as Function Compute, Message Queue, or an HTTP endpoint. |
| Event rule | A filter that matches incoming events and routes them to one or more targets. |
| CloudEvents | A CNCF specification that defines a standard event format for interoperability across services and platforms. |
Use cases
EventBridge supports building event buses on two Alibaba SaaS platforms: DingTalk and Cloud Tmall.
DingTalk
DingTalk is a collaboration platform where official apps, ISV apps (also called DingTalk third-party applications, provided by DingTalk service providers), and enterprise-developed apps coexist. A DingTalk connector bridges these applications, and EventBridge routes events between them.
EventBridge handles three common event-driven scenarios on DingTalk:
Official app to ISV app
A customer relationship management (CRM) platform provided by a Chinese enterprise, such as Xbangbang, detects a new customer record. EventBridge routes the event to a DingTalk chatbot, which posts a notification to a DingTalk group. The sales team sees the update without switching between applications.
ISV app to ISV app
An enterprise purchases both a CRM app and a financial management app from the DingTalk marketplace. When a new deal closes in the CRM app, EventBridge forwards the event to the financial app. Revenue data stays synchronized with customer records -- eliminating the disconnect between financial decision-making and business development.
Official app to enterprise-developed app
A CRM platform provided by a Chinese enterprise, such as jzsoft, adds a new customer. EventBridge routes the event to an enterprise resource planning (ERP) system, automatically syncing client and order data. The enterprise avoids manual data entry across systems.
Cloud Tmall
Cloud Tmall is a core part of Alibaba's e-commerce ecosystem. Merchants on Taobao and Tmall use Cloud Tmall data for operations and analytics, and the platform supports a large number of ISVs that build applications for these merchants.
With EventBridge integrated into Cloud Tmall, ISVs subscribe to e-commerce data using standard methods provided by EventBridge to create business value for the merchants.
What's next
EventBridge overview -- Learn about EventBridge capabilities, supported event sources, and event targets.
Create a custom event bus -- Set up an event bus for your SaaS platform integration.
Best practices for building DingTalk connectors -- Build serverless event-driven programs with Function Compute and DingTalk.