Cloud Migration and DevOps Transformation for the NBA's Atlanta Hawks

Cloud Migration and DevOps Transformation for the Atlanta Hawks

Project Overview

The Atlanta Hawks needed to modernize their digital infrastructure while reducing operational costs. Our team led a comprehensive cloud migration and DevOps transformation, leveraging Google Cloud Platform (GCP) and Kubernetes to achieve these goals.

Technical Challenges

• Legacy infrastructure with high maintenance costs
• Manual deployment processes leading to inconsistencies
• Limited scalability during peak game times
• No standardized development workflow

Our Solution

Infrastructure as Code with Terraform

We implemented a robust Terraform codebase following best practices:

• Modular Design: Reusable modules for common infrastructure patterns
• State Management: Remote state stored in Cloud Storage with state locking
• Workspaces: Separate workspaces for dev/staging/prod environments
• Variables: Hierarchical variable structure with tfvars files
• Provider Configuration: Separate provider configurations per environment

GCP Architecture Best Practices

Our GCP implementation followed Google's recommended practices:

• Project Structure:

  • Separate projects for dev/staging/prod
  • Dedicated projects for shared services
  • Hierarchical IAM with least privilege

• Networking:

  • Shared VPC for centralized network management
  • Cloud NAT for secure outbound connectivity
  • VPC Service Controls for data exfiltration prevention
  • Cloud Armor for DDoS protection and WAF

• Security:

  • Organization policies for governance
  • Cloud KMS for secrets management
  • Workload Identity for service authentication
  • VPC Service Controls for data boundaries

Resource Organization

Implemented GCP best practices for resource organization:

• Labels and Tags:
  • Consistent labeling strategy for cost allocation
  • Environment tags for resource identification
  • Team ownership labels for accountability
• Resource Hierarchy:
  • Folders by environment and function
  • Centralized logging and monitoring
  • Shared services at organization level

Cost Optimization

Leveraged GCP's cost optimization features:

• Committed Use Discounts: For predictable workloads
• Preemptible VMs: For batch processing jobs
• Rightsizing Recommendations: Regular resource optimization
• Budget Alerts: Proactive cost monitoring
• Cost Export: Detailed billing analysis in BigQuery

Monitoring and Operations

Implemented comprehensive observability:

• Cloud Operations Suite:

  • Custom dashboards for key metrics
  • Log-based metrics for application insights
  • Uptime checks for critical services
  • Error reporting with automatic grouping

• SLO Monitoring:

  • Defined SLIs/SLOs for key services
  • Burn rate alerts for SLO compliance
  • Latency monitoring with percentile tracking
  • Error budget policies

Disaster Recovery

Implemented robust DR strategy:

• Multi-Region Design:

  • Active-active configuration
  • Global load balancing
  • Cross-region backups
  • Automated failover testing

• Backup Strategy:

  • Automated snapshots with retention policies
  • Cross-region replication
  • Regular recovery testing
  • Point-in-time recovery capability