Case Study

Migrating from legacy to modern integration

A major retailer modernized its legacy integration platform, migrating from Microsoft BizTalk to a custom solution. The upgrade boosted efficiency, reducing processes from 1 hour to 10 minutes, and created a more scalable, resilient architecture.
Case Studies
About the Project

A major retailer embarked on a critical digital transformation project to modernize its legacy integration platform, transitioning from Microsoft BizTalk to a future-proof and custom-built solution. This migration, driven by the need for greater resilience, transparency, and performance, has set the foundation for a more scalable and maintainable architecture. The project presented numerous challenges but resulted in a state-of-the-art solution that empowers the retailer to handle complex integration processes more seamlessly. One of the most impactful outcomes has been the dramatic improvement in efficiency, where processes that used to take an hour now take just 10 minutes.

The Challenge

The retailer’s legacy integration platform, Microsoft BizTalk, had become a significant bottleneck in their operations, presenting several non-functional challenges:

  • Lack of maintainability: Troubleshooting and maintaining BizTalk required highly specialized skills, which created dependency on a few experts and slowed down operations.
  • Poor resilience and transparency: Errors within BizTalk were difficult to diagnose, leading to frequent disruptions.
  • High costs: BizTalk’s licensing model made it an unsustainable solution for long-term use.

With the need for improved transparency, scalability, and modernized infrastructure, the company turned to Create IT for a seamless migration to a custom-built solution, which could replace BizTalk while maintaining existing integration functionalities.

"This project was filled with significant hurdles, from the lack of documentation and the need for constant investigation to navigate through old workflows, to the uncertainty of the issues we encountered along the way. With tight deadlines and many unknowns, we had to be agile, adapt quickly, and problem-solve on the go." says David Botelho, Solutions Architect at Create IT.

 

The Solution

Create IT partnered with the retailer to design and implement a modern, tailored-made integration platform. The solution aimed to replace BizTalk's functionality while addressing its key weaknesses.

  • Cloud-native architecture: The new solution leverages RabbitMQ for message queuing, adopting a publish-subscribe model for integration flows. This architecture ensures efficient communication between systems and significantly enhances the platform's resilience.
  • Modular workers in .NET: The new system utilizes .NET workers as consumers and publishers, providing flexibility and better control over integration processes. These workers are deployed in Docker containers on a Linux environment, enhancing portability and scalability.
  • Improved monitoring and visibility: BizTalk’s difficult monitoring was replaced by a combination of New Relic for real-time visibility into system performance and issues, and Hangfire for scheduling and managing background jobs. This provided a major leap forward in troubleshooting capabilities and overall system transparency.
  • Generic coding approach: Create IT developed a foundation layer - Base Worker - that consolidates integration logic into reusable components. This generic approach improves the maintainability of the system, allowing for quicker onboarding of new developers, reducing the system’s overall complexity and implementing new and faster business workflows.
  • Seamless integration with cloud services: The new solution integrates with several Azure services, including Blob storage and File Shares, while also utilizing SQL for database operations. This ensures that data is securely stored and easily accessible.

"This project allowed us to introduce several key innovations, including being the first at the client to implement RabbitMQ as the backbone of the integration architecture. Additionally, the generic Base Worker, as a reusable, versatile and modular solution, allows the client to streamline message processing not only within our solution, but across different workflows. We’ve definitely set a new standard for any integration needs." explains José Coelho, Software Developer at Create IT

 

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The Results

The migration resulted in several key benefits for the retailer:
Increased transparency and monitoring:

Unlike BizTalk, which often failed without clear explanations, the new solution provides detailed insights into system performance, with all logs and performance metrics easily accessible via New Relic. This has greatly reduced troubleshooting times and improved overall system stability.

Improved resilience and scalability:

The new solution’s architecture, built on RabbitMQ and cloud-native principles, is far more resilient. The system handles errors more predictably, with built-in mechanisms for retry and recovery, thus minimizing downtime.

Faster processing times:

The new solution has significantly improved performance. For example, processes that previously took an hour to handle now take only 10 minutes.

Future-proof and flexible:

This is not just a replacement for BizTalk, the new solution has become a foundational integration platform for the retailer. The solution is flexible and can be adapted for future integration needs, opening up opportunities for continued innovation.

We have now a future-proof integration solution that is already providing more speed, flexibility, and reliability than ever. We are extremely proud of what we have been doing side by side with this long-standing client and looking forward for what’s next.

—
Pedro ValaCTO at Create IT

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