Requirements Overview
Enterprise deployments of LLM gateways demand rigorous requirements across multiple dimensions. Unlike development or small-scale deployments, enterprise systems must meet stringent security standards, compliance regulations, and operational excellence criteria while supporting high availability and massive scale.
47
Critical Requirements
99.99%
Uptime SLA
SOC 2
Compliance Type
24/7
Support Coverage
📋 Assessment Framework
Use this checklist to evaluate potential LLM gateway solutions or assess your current deployment readiness. Priorities are marked as Critical (must-have), Required (essential), and Recommended (nice-to-have).
Security Requirements
Authentication & Access Control
- Critical Enterprise SSO Integration: Support for SAML 2.0, OAuth 2.0, and OIDC protocols with major identity providers (Okta, Azure AD, Ping Identity)
- Critical Multi-Factor Authentication: Mandatory MFA for all administrative access and API key management operations
- Required Role-Based Access Control: Fine-grained permissions with custom roles, resource-level access, and delegation capabilities
- Required API Key Management: Centralized key lifecycle management, automatic rotation, scope limitations, and usage tracking
- Recommended Just-In-Time Access: Time-limited elevated permissions with approval workflows for sensitive operations
Data Protection
- Critical Encryption in Transit: TLS 1.3 minimum for all communications with perfect forward secrecy
- Critical Encryption at Rest: AES-256 encryption for all cached data, logs, and configuration stores
- Required Data Loss Prevention: Content inspection for sensitive data patterns (PII, financial data, healthcare info)
- Required Secret Management: Integration with enterprise vaults (HashiCorp Vault, AWS Secrets Manager)
Compliance Requirements
| Standard | Requirement | Gateway Support |
|---|---|---|
| SOC 2 Type II | Security controls audit | ✓ Required |
| GDPR | Data protection & privacy | ✓ Required |
| HIPAA | Healthcare data protection | ✓ If applicable |
| PCI DSS | Payment card security | ✓ If applicable |
| ISO 27001 | Information security | ✓ Recommended |
Audit & Logging
- Critical Comprehensive Audit Trail: Complete logging of all authentication events, API calls, configuration changes, and administrative actions
- Critical Immutable Logs: Tamper-proof log storage with cryptographic verification
- Required Log Retention: Minimum 1-year retention with configurable policies for extended storage
- Required SIEM Integration: Export to Splunk, Sumo Logic, or other enterprise security platforms
Scalability Requirements
Performance & Scale
- Critical Horizontal Scaling: Support for auto-scaling across multiple regions with load distribution
- Required High Availability: Multi-zone deployment with automatic failover and zero-downtime updates
- Required Performance SLAs: Sub-100ms latency for cached responses, sub-5s for first-token streaming
- Recommended Global Edge Deployment: CDN integration for worldwide low-latency access
Integration Requirements
Enterprise Integration
- Critical API Standards: OpenAI-compatible REST API for seamless application integration
- Required Service Mesh: Istio or Linkerd compatibility for microservices environments
- Required Kubernetes Native: Helm charts, operators, and CRDs for cloud-native deployment
- Recommended Terraform Provider: Infrastructure-as-code support for automated provisioning
Operational Requirements
🔗 Related Enterprise Resources
Continue assessment: Security & Rate Limiting | Load Balancing Strategies | Cost Optimization | Prompt Injection Prevention