Integration Philosophy

Packaged end. Destinations are vendor-curated. AEP's Destination framework provides pre-built integrations and a Destination SDK for custom ones — but the framework's quotas (constraint.aep-second-gen-export-1500kb) bound it.

Composable end. Reverse-ETL tools (Hightouch, Census, RudderStack) sit between the CDW and the activation systems. The customer manages the integrations, picks the tool, and is not subject to vendor-controlled destination quotas.

What it determines. Speed-to-launch for new destinations, governance posture, and which team is responsible for integration plumbing. Packaged ecosystems shift integration burden onto the vendor; composable approaches shift it onto the customer's data team.