Building a Data Platform That Scales with Demand
Overview
Synogize partnered with a fast-growing business bank to modernise its data platform and ensure it could keep pace with rapid growth. As part of a broader Modern Data Platform initiative, the bank needed to migrate to Snowflake and consolidate its bespoke data solutions, including its credit risk engine, onto a single, scalable platform.
About the Client
Our client is a branchless, relationship-focused bank lending to small and medium businesses. Since launching as a start-up, it has grown rapidly into a significant leader, with its data platform underpinning both analytics and critical business functions.
The Challenge
The systems built to launch the bank as a start-up were not designed for the scale it has since reached. Its data platform was under increasing pressure from rising transaction volumes. Processing times were nearing the limits set in its service level agreements.
The bank also needed a platform that could onboard new data sources without custom development each time, reduce the effort spent on database administration, and make regulatory compliance reporting easier to support.
Our Approach
Synogize worked alongside the bank’s data team to build a platform that could absorb change quickly, scale with demand, and make data easily accessible to both teams and systems. At its core is a data automation framework that keeps the bank’s data and business rules separate from the technology underneath. This means new data sources can be added quickly, and individual tools can be replaced without disrupting the rest of the platform.
Snowflake was selected for its scale, ease of use, and cost. Data was organised using a Data Vault model, with Power BI used for reporting. The bank’s bespoke data solutions, including its credit risk engine, were consolidated onto the new platform. Moving to Snowflake also simplified day-to-day administration, giving the team more time to focus on data engineering and insights.
Results
The modernised platform delivered:
- Faster onboarding: New data sources can be added quickly through the metadata-driven automation framework, rather than requiring custom development each time.
- Reduced amin burden: Moving to Snowflake cut time spent on database administration, capacity planning, backup and recovery.
- Built to scale: The platform can handle the bank’s growing transaction volumes without breaching service level agreements.
- Simplified compliance: Built-in data lineage and quality checks reduce the effort and cost of regulatory compliance reporting.