Having embarked on a project to establish a dedicated Forex trading division within their business, the client partnered with BBD to design and implement a cutting-edge, cloud-native solution utilising serverless services such as AWS Lambda, CloudFront, and Amazon Aurora.
The primary objective was to build a robust, highly available, and scalable cloud-hosted platform that remains lightweight and cost-effective.
Objectives
- Custom solution development: Build a bespoke application tailored to Shyft’s functional and technical requirements
- Comprehensive operational support: Deliver robust monitoring and management to ensure seamless application performance
- Optimised cloud infrastructure: Implement and maintain a multi-account AWS environment prioritising scalability, cost-efficiency, and security
Key Benefits
- Cost efficiency: Leveraged ongoing analysis and FinOps practices to optimise resource usage, including right-sizing instances, implementing Reserved Instances, and using EC2 Savings Plans
- Enhanced performance: Improved platform reliability and performance through robust observability frameworks, enabling rapid issue resolution and minimising downtime. Regular environment reviews ensured workloads operated at peak efficiency
- Proactive security measures: Strengthened security and compliance through advanced monitoring tools like GuardDuty and SecurityHub, ensuring threat mitigation, data protection, and regulatory adherence
- Collaborative optimisation: Facilitated structured service offerings, including monthly SLA meetings, to review performance, identify cost trends, and align infrastructure strategies with business objectives
- Seamless operations: Delivered continuous monitoring and operational support, enabling the client to focus on expanding their Forex trading division confidently
Solution Overview
BBD collaborated closely with the client to design and implement a robust, scalable multi-account architecture using AWS Control Tower from the outset. This approach enabled the creation of a well-structured Landing Zone with pre-configured guardrails and Service Control Policies (SCPs), ensuring compliance with stringent security, governance, and operational standards.
The custom application was built on this secure architecture, fully utilising a range of AWS services to meet the client’s needs for high performance, scalability, and reliability. Services such as AWS Config, CloudTrail, GuardDuty, and SecurityHub were integrated to provide continuous governance, security monitoring, and compliance across the entire environment. These tools offered deep visibility into resource configurations, logs, and security threats, helping to detect and mitigate any risks proactively.
The architecture also incorporated several networking and management tools, including Amazon Route 53 for DNS management, AWS Transit Gateway for seamless inter-VPC connectivity, and Amazon Certificate Manager to handle SSL/TLS certificates. For compute and storage needs, Amazon EC2 and S3 were used for flexible, scalable resource management, while Amazon RDS and Aurora powered the database layer, ensuring high availability and fault tolerance.
Once deployed, BBD took full ownership of managing both the application and its underlying infrastructure, ensuring continuous operational efficiency. Monitoring and issue resolution became a priority, and proactive management ensured that potential concerns were addressed promptly. A combination of services like Amazon CloudWatch, Grafana, Loki, and Prometheus was used to monitor application and infrastructure performance, to maintain high availability.
To optimise costs, BBD used Amazon Cost Explorer to track usage patterns and identify opportunities for savings. Reserved Instances and EC2 Savings Plans were employed to reduce compute costs and ensure cost efficiency at scale.
Approach
BBD began by carefully assessing the client’s specific requirements to design a secure, scalable platform capable of supporting high-performance Forex trading workloads. Using AWS Control Tower, the team established a compliant multi-account architecture with pre-configured Service Control Policies (SCPs) and guardrails to ensure continuous security and regulatory compliance. AWS services such as Config, CloudTrail, GuardDuty, and SecurityHub were integrated to provide comprehensive monitoring, compliance enforcement, and threat detection.
To optimise networking and secure communication, BBD implemented Amazon Route 53 for DNS management, AWS Transit Gateway for efficient inter-VPC communication, and Amazon Certificate Manager for SSL/TLS certificates. Compute and storage capabilities were powered by Amazon EC2, S3, and RDS/Aurora, ensuring high availability and flexibility to handle the demands of dynamic trading workloads.
For application monitoring, the team utilised Loki to aggregate logs, Prometheus to capture detailed metrics, and Sentry for distributed tracing, enabling rapid troubleshooting and continuous optimisation of application performance. On the infrastructure side, Amazon CloudWatch provided real-time monitoring of system health, while Grafana consolidated performance data into centralised dashboards for easy visualisation and analysis.
BBD also focused on cost optimisation by leveraging Amazon Cost Explorer to analyse usage patterns and identify savings opportunities. Reserved Instances and EC2 Savings Plans were implemented strategically to reduce compute costs, ensuring scalability without unnecessary overhead.
This comprehensive approach delivered a secure, compliant, and high-performing platform tailored to the client’s unique needs. By combining robust architecture, advanced monitoring, and proactive cost management, BBD ensured operational efficiency and a scalable solution that evolves with the client’s business objectives.
Impact of BBD's Managed Services
BBD played a pivotal role in enabling the client to operate efficiently in the cloud by creating production-ready environments optimised for performance and cost-efficiency, all while adhering to AWS best practices. From the initial implementation to ongoing operations, BBD provided continuous operational support, empowering the client to remain focused on achieving their core business objectives.
