Lendi, an Australian mortgage broker with over $12 billion AUD in home loan settlements, was facing a significant challenge in its data management. The company's business model, which involves offering customers a choice of over 2,000 loan products from more than 40 lenders, relies heavily on delivering the right experience to the right person at the right time on the right digital platform. This requires accurate insights into borrowers' needs and preferences, which in turn requires tapping into behavioral data on third-party engagement platforms such as Facebook, Google, and Bing. However, the data from these platforms were siloed and did not integrate easily. Even when the data could be brought into the same repository, the data structure was often inconsistent, necessitating data cleaning before it could be used. The responsibility of ensuring that stakeholders across the company could analyze and create actionable insights from this third-party data fell to Lendi’s Data Architect, Daniel Deng.

Eurocell, the UK’s leading manufacturer, distributor, and recycler of UPVC window, door, conservatory, and roofline systems, faced a challenge in harnessing their vast amounts of data to provide customers with an unrivaled customer experience. They aimed to fully personalize every single customer touchpoint, improving their understanding of their customers and how they communicate with them through their digital channels and branch teams. This need intensified during the COVID-19 pandemic as their e-commerce sales rapidly increased. They recognized that artificial intelligence (AI) could empower them to deliver on their strategic goal, but needed help distinguishing between their diverse customer-base in their SAP data, and understanding how their data could be used to create AI models.

Salesforce DMP, a leading data management platform, is embedded within every digital interaction between its clients and their consumers. It collects, stores, and makes every piece of audience data continuously available to its clients, managing more than 10 petabytes of on-demand data. This comprehensive data collection approach provides clients with greater accuracy and sophisticated segmentation for targeting and analytics. However, this approach puts enormous demands on the Salesforce DMP system to quickly and efficiently process massive quantities of data. Fast performance and unlimited scaling capacity are crucial to deliver both real-time personalized experiences to consumers and data-driven insights to clients. Salesforce DMP needed tools to ensure it could deliver high return on investment to its clients while continuously developing and bringing new platform features to market.

Transport Scotland was seeking to improve its real-time traffic information and network management capabilities. The agency was interested in third-party big data sources but found that many providers only offered access to the data without a user-friendly interface for extracting value from it. The challenge was to find a solution that not only provided access to comprehensive traffic data but also offered an easy-to-use platform for analyzing this data. The agency was also looking to reduce its reliance on roadside infrastructure for traffic monitoring, which was concentrated in densely populated areas and lacked coverage in more remote parts of the country.

While Argyle Diamond Mine had an existing delay accounting system that was developed in-house, the challenges of a legacy system were exasperated by the departure of the in-house developer. As a result, the company struggled to remain up-to-date with the changes in the mining process along with advances in software capabilities.Due to changes in mining operations, a large number of equipment events were recorded as text data. This made it difficult to search for trends since the system was dependent on user input, which was not consistent across each user.The challenge for Argyle Diamonds was to determine which delay accounting system would be the best to implement given a limited budget and a well-defined set of needs: something scalable, capturing all delays at the plant level, with the ability to classify and search delay events.

Sprinklr, a tech platform designed to assist large brands in creating and managing social campaigns, was facing significant challenges with their testing processes. The existing test suite, developed by another company, was unstable and unreliable. Each test run resulted in a different number of randomly failed tests, making it impossible for the team to rely on the tests for release decisions. The tests were time-consuming, often taking several hours to complete. The architecture of the test suite was not scalable and was difficult to maintain for a large number of tests. Furthermore, the tests could not be integrated with other testing and DevOps tools. The challenge was to build a formal QA process, stabilize automated tests, increase their speed, redesign the architecture to support integration with third-party tools, and keep test documentation up to date.

Serverless comes with its own set of challenges. Cold start times* — the several hundred milliseconds of latency required to execute an inactive serverless function — cause delays in the user experience that too often have a major impact on conversion rates. Add in limited observability and resource contention, as well as emerging security concerns about side-channel attacks, and it becomes clear why organizations hesitate to move business-critical workloads to serverless. What’s needed is a different approach to serverless that’s highly performant, developer friendly, and secure.

The magnitude and complexity of the Infosys attack surface are significant; encompassing hundreds of thousands of endpoints spanning the entire globe, a highly mobile workforce, and huge data centers. Tasked with protecting the entire infrastructure, Salvi and his team have created a highly detailed framework that is used to model their environment: It utilizes a one-to-five scoring system to reflect the risk and readiness of each element across a selection of individual security-related functions.The magnitude and complexity of the Infosys attack surface are significant; encompassing hundreds of thousands of endpoints spanning the entire globe, a highly mobile workforce, and huge data centers. Tasked with protecting the entire infrastructure, Salvi and his team have created a highly detailed framework that is used to model their environment: It utilizes a one-to-five scoring system to reflect the risk and readiness of each element across a selection of individual security-related functions.In 2016, a review of the company’s infrastructure revealed a need to enhance protection against advanced persistent threats (APTs).

Ubisoft, a leading producer, publisher, and distributor of interactive entertainment products worldwide, faced a significant challenge in managing its game development process. The company operates with each game development run as a separate entity, with teams ranging from 15 to over 150 developers. Each team is responsible for its tools and engine and has its own Helix Core server. The company's aim was to share tools and game engines across a range of game platforms, minimizing platform-specific changes needed in the final versions of production data. However, one of the main challenges was improving the sharing of tools between the development teams and enhancing productivity with new tools and processes.

Elektro-Material AG, a leading supplier of electrical components to Switzerland’s construction industry, faced a significant challenge with their EM order app. The app, which was a significant source of business revenue, had an open source scanning solution that customers used to scan barcodes from a catalogue or print barcode labels for products that did not have barcodes. However, customers found the scanning process slow, often taking several seconds to scan a single barcode. This delay resulted in a poor user experience and led customers to prefer reordering over the phone or at an Elektro-Material branch, especially for large orders. Additionally, some products only had serial numbers, which could not be captured by the open source scanning component of the EM app. These performance issues negatively impacted the customer’s purchase experience and reduced the number of orders originating through the app. Elektro-Material wanted to improve the app’s performance and increase customer stickiness.

Datadog is a monitoring and security platform service for cloud applications. Thousands of customers rely on Datadog to see metrics and events from software across their DevOps stack, such as cloud and security monitoring, alerts, logs, and more. Founded in 2010, the company rapidly scaled to serve its global customers by embracing the value of modern engineering and architecture practices.As the organization continued to grow, Datadog’s security team knew that their homegrown application security tools would not scale at the rate required to support a rapidly growing customer base. Adopting a WAF was the next move, but Datadog required one that provided flexibility in modern cloud architectures, supported a rapid CI/CD pipeline’s code changes and deployments without extensive tuning, and didn’t unnecessarily consume resources across security, SRE, and development teams.

Simplitium, a UK company delivering ModEx, a catastrophe risk modeling platform for the (re)insurance industry, faced a significant challenge. The industry had been relying on outdated technology for the better part of three decades, using resource-heavy, legacy in-house hosting systems. These systems were used to analyze risks and potential damage of events such as natural catastrophes, helping (re)insurers calculate the financial implications to ensure they have enough capital to pay the claims and remain solvent. However, as cloud and hosted environments developed significantly, these legacy systems became increasingly inefficient and costly. Simplitium needed a reliable colocation partner with a strong presence in the insurance sector to help grow its customer base. They required a solution that would offer clients faster roll outs, lower costs, and zero downtime.

Advent Health Partners, part of the Powered Health group, was facing a significant challenge due to rapid changes in healthcare regulations in the United States. The re-introduction of the Recovery Audit Contractor (RAC) program and the move to Electronic Medical Records (EMRs) had left many hospitals struggling to keep pace. This resulted in inefficiencies in the healthcare revenue cycle, with billions of dollars tied up in insurance claims denials. The situation was further complicated by the fact that hospital data, both structured and non-structured, was generally stored in siloes, with a lack of communication between different departments. Some processes were still heavily reliant on paper records. With claims-related data scattered across different locations and stored in multiple formats, it was very difficult for analysts to bring together all the information required to review a denied claim and decide whether there was a case for appealing the decision.

The client, a global industry leader in tax services, was facing a significant challenge in managing transfer pricing compliance requirements. The process involved a substantial amount of tax calculations, which were being done manually, resulting in a time-consuming and costly process. The client was seeking a solution to automate these calculations to make them faster and more cost-efficient. Additionally, the client needed a system to monitor transactions between various business units and legal entities more effectively. The transaction rules, methods, and tax calculations were previously kept, applied, and completed manually in Excel, which incurred substantial time and resources.

Ubik, an outsourcing company that specializes in building tech teams, was facing a significant challenge in sourcing candidates quickly and efficiently. The company's CEO and founder, Mike Bysiek, who has a rich history of working with big names like Xerox, Johnson & Johnson, and American Express, realized the need for a tool that could expedite the process of finding suitable candidates. The challenge was not just about finding candidates, but finding the right ones that align with the business goals of the company. The traditional methods of sourcing were proving to be time-consuming and less efficient, which was a major hurdle in the smooth operation and growth of the company.

The client, a major distributor of office supplies and furniture operating in nearly half of all European countries, was facing challenges in managing product prices as their business expanded into new markets. Their existing monolithic solution was no longer efficient enough to meet the speed, accuracy, and efficiency requirements necessary for the company’s growth. The existing pricing management involved the use of several separate systems and Excel spreadsheets, as well as a significant amount of manual work. This required increasing time and effort from the client’s employees as the product inventory was expanding and the prices were changing frequently. The company needed to streamline the price management process and gain the ability to instantly handle pricing updates.

The client, a leading provider of a wide range of tax services to thousands of clients in nearly 100 countries worldwide, was facing a challenge with their property tax calculation services. These services were mostly completed manually with the help of Excel sheets. As their business grew and the number of customers increased, these calculations started to incur substantial amounts of time and effort. The manual process was not only time-consuming but also led to additional operational expenses. The company needed to automate this process to maintain their efficiency and keep up with the growth.

The client, one of the UK’s largest energy suppliers, was facing challenges in improving their business efficiency and streamlining cooperation with their affiliated company. They were using two separate back-office platforms to manage boiler insurance operations: one for their employees and another for their affiliated company. This led to inefficiencies and difficulties in managing operations. The client needed to build a unified platform that would include all necessary features and could be used by both companies. This would not only improve the efficiency of the cooperation with their affiliated company but also streamline operations for all employees. Additionally, the client aimed to enhance the accuracy, accessibility, and security of their data by combining and standardizing it in a single place.

PrettyLittleThing, a UK-based fashion retailer, was experiencing rapid business growth and expansion into new markets. This growth presented a challenge as the company needed to become more effective at matching the needs of their quickly increasing customer base. To achieve this, they needed to develop, scale, and improve several software solutions. The company aimed to scale existing software products, add new features, and ensure their solutions' high performance and security. This would help them effectively match the needs of the growing customer base, resulting in higher customer satisfaction, retention, and attraction.

The client, a global provider of managed cloud services, was facing challenges in generating monthly service reports for their clients. The process was not cost-effective due to the extensive manual work involved and the use of a paid third-party tool. The root cause of this issue was the lack of a centralized and unified approach to handle the vast amounts of data received from their equipment. The company’s data was managed on-premises, leading to significant costs and scalability issues. The scattered IT resources also caused problems with data accessibility, leading to inefficient data governance, storage, and organization. This inefficiency was particularly problematic when generating Monthly Service Reviews (MSRs) - equipment performance reports sent to clients every month.

The client, a leading global audio streaming platform with millions of active users, was facing challenges in improving the service quality of their platform. The platform, which provides a wide range of services including live radio stations, music streaming, podcasts, news coverage, and sports games broadcasting, needed to be more user-friendly across all supported connected devices such as Amazon Alexa, Google Assistant, etc. The client also wanted the platform to handle high volumes of requests simultaneously, especially during peak times. The platform was available across 200 connected devices, including web, mobile, voice assistants, home sound systems, smart TV, gaming consoles, and smartwatches. The growing customer base necessitated an improvement in platform usability and efficiency in handling high amounts of requests.

The client, a global enterprise and one of the world's largest companies delivering IoT devices and services, faced a significant challenge. They needed to modernize and expand the functionality of their legacy IoT device and asset-tracking SaaS platform. The existing system was an on-premise architecture that was inefficient and incurred significant costs. The client aimed to improve the platform's efficiency and user experience, optimize costs, and accelerate time-to-market. The platform, a hub for IoT devices supporting industrial protocols, manages connected devices and transmits their data to third-party services like SAP and Salesforce. The need for modernization and migration to the cloud was crucial to meet the client's objectives.

The client, a leading global technology company offering a creative platform for selling and purchasing high-quality editorial and media resources, was facing challenges due to rapid business growth. The increase in new platform users, asset downloads, and corporate clients put a strain on their legacy systems used for tasks such as user management, customer service, and handling media purchases. These systems significantly slowed down the client’s operations and hindered their ability to effectively keep up with the business growth. The client needed to conduct a comprehensive modernization and optimization of a wide range of systems and applications.

The client, an Australian company with a long history of building intelligent parking solutions, was faced with the challenge of modernizing their existing embedded solutions to improve efficiency and user experience. The primary solution that required modernization was the solar-powered parking meter. The client aimed to make it more energy-efficient and enhance its usability by enabling it to use a touch screen. The second solution was a legacy safe cabinet that also needed to be made compatible with a touch screen. The client required deep embedded engineering expertise to find new approaches to solving the challenges they faced during modernization, such as with the UI, and make the process as efficient as possible.

The client, a rapidly expanding European tech company with over 2,000 tech experts, was grappling with the challenge of managing over 400 active job vacancies. The hiring process was labor-intensive, requiring significant manual work for communication, monitoring, analyzing, and prioritizing job postings. The company used the CATS applicant tracking system, JIRA, and Google services to manage their vacancies and post them on an external job search platform. However, these systems were disjointed, leading to manual job posting and updating. This disjointed and manual process was slowing down the hiring process and reducing its effectiveness in finding the right experts. The client needed a solution that would connect all systems and reduce the amount of manual work required.

The client, a leading global provider of integrated connectivity solutions for public transport, wanted to expand their services by creating a web-based CCTV solution for transport surveillance. This was aimed at giving them a competitive edge over rivals who mostly used desktop or hybrid solutions. However, the client faced challenges in validating the feasibility, budget, and timelines of the project. They needed to define these aspects for the existing infrastructure before proceeding with the development of the web-based CCTV solution.

The client, a developer, manufacturer, and installer of high-tech communication systems for niche markets, was facing a challenge in boosting the speed and efficiency of their customized solutions for railway communication and control. As the popularity of their solution grew, so did their customer base. This led to an increased need for efficiency in customizing their solution to an increasing number of railway transports. The client wanted to improve service quality and better match the specific needs of each customer, which included features such as passenger information systems, video surveillance, seat reservation, ad management, and more.

The client, a leading global fashion retailer, was in the midst of a digital transformation journey. The challenge was to improve their existing legacy systems and develop new tools to accelerate this transformation. The legacy promotion management system, a desktop application used to manage promotions, lacked flexibility and could not keep up with the company's needs. It involved the use of several programs, and the client needed a unified app that would allow them to create an end-to-end promotion process. Additionally, the client required the development of a proposal management system for buyers. The buyers used excel tables and manually entered data to create proposals of goods they needed in their shops, including their quantity and the time when they needed them. The client wanted to reduce the amount of manual work and automate this process.

The client, a leading energy technology company with over 8,000 employees and serving millions of customers globally, was facing challenges in streamlining its internal digital marketing processes and improving the user experience and scalability of its products. The company relied heavily on third parties to create offers and gift cards for customers and prospects, which caused difficulties in making changes to customer journeys and launching new campaigns. The client needed to develop an internal marketing system, build an end-to-end signup flow for smart heaters, improve the efficiency of the Customer Management System (CMS) and internal user processing engines, and modernize the website by boosting its performance and improving user experience.

The client, a leading car dealership company in the UK, was facing challenges in streamlining the work of their business managers. The company represents prestigious car manufacturers and provides both new and used cars as well as after-sales services. However, the business managers had to use four different systems for the business management flow and continuously switch between them. This was causing inefficiencies and slowing down business processes. The client had recently acquired a leading car supermarket, further increasing the need for a unified system to speed up all business processes.