Inflectiv: SaaS API Gateway and Monetization Engine

Built at Vanar as an Associate AI Engineer, this system forms the commercial backbone of Inflectiv, a platform that transforms unstructured documents, PDFs, spreadsheets, and institutional knowledge into structured, tokenized datasets queryable by AI agents. Engineered a robust public-facing API gateway with custom rate limiting logic and automated OpenAPI/Swagger documentation built for high availability. Developed a plan-based access engine that dynamically gates features across Free, Basic, and Pro tiers, optimizing resource allocation and driving user upselling. Designed and integrated a Stripe-powered credit system spanning internal and external APIs, with automated credit detection, real-time usage tracking, and a seamless top-up workflow. The billing infrastructure supports Inflectiv's per-query monetization model, where contributors earn value each time their dataset is accessed by an agent or downstream application.

Inflectiv operates as a decentralized data infrastructure platform backed by Vanar, enabling contributors to upload raw data, generate structured agent-ready datasets, and monetize them through tokenization or per-query usage. The credit system built here is the direct revenue layer enabling that economy: it meters every API call, enforces plan-based quotas, handles Stripe billing events, and keeps usage state consistent across internal and external surfaces. The gateway abstracts all scraping and data access behind a unified interface, ensuring downstream apps and AI agents interact with a single stable API regardless of the underlying data source or contributor

Inflectiv needed a monetization layer that could meter API usage at per-query granularity across a multi-tenant contributor ecosystem, enforce differentiated access for Free, Basic, and Pro subscribers, and handle real-time credit consumption without billing drift or quota bypass. A standard subscription model was insufficient because the platform's value compounds on reuse: the same dataset can be queried hundreds of times by different agents, and contributors need to be paid accurately for each access. On top of that, the API gateway had to be self-documenting, rate-resilient, and capable of isolating failures without cascading across tenants.

Built a layered API gateway in front of Inflectiv's data services with per-route rate limiting, plan-based feature gating enforced at the middleware level, and automated OpenAPI/Swagger documentation generated from route schemas. The Stripe credit system writes a transaction row per API call attributed to the project and plan, triggers automated top-up prompts when balances fall below thresholds, and handles webhook events for subscription upgrades, downgrades, and renewals. Credit state is the authoritative source for access decisions, so quota enforcement is structural rather than advisory. The Free, Basic, and Pro tiers gate not just volume but specific endpoint categories, enabling upsell paths tied directly to usage behavior.