Healthcare

Enhancing Data Processing Efficiency through Cloud-Based Solutions

Visualization of automated data ingestion and processing through cloud services

Focus Areas

Cloud Architecture

Data Engineering

Scalability & Performance Optimization

Dynamic resource scaling in a cloud environment, supporting efficient and cost-effective data processing.

Business Problem

A fast-growing media analytics firm was struggling with inefficient data processing pipelines and increasing infrastructure costs. Their on-premise systems couldn’t scale with the rising volume of streaming and social media data, leading to slow batch processing, delays in client deliverables, and resource bottlenecks. The company needed a modern cloud-based solution to improve processing speed, reduce costs, and support real-time data workflows.

Key challenges:

  • Performance Bottlenecks: On-premise data pipelines couldn’t meet SLAs for daily analytics reports and client dashboards.

  • Limited Scalability: Infrastructure could not scale elastically to handle peak workloads or expand to new data sources.

  • High Operational Overhead: Manual provisioning, maintenance, and patching consumed valuable engineering time.

  • Cost Inefficiency: Overprovisioned infrastructure and idle compute resources led to high fixed costs and low resource utilization.

  • Data Silos: Fragmented storage and processing environments hampered unified analytics and slowed experimentation.

The Approach

Curate partnered with the firm to design and deploy a fully managed, scalable cloud data platform that automated processing, optimized performance, and enabled real-time data access. The initiative streamlined ETL workflows, introduced modern orchestration, and reduced compute overhead—significantly improving time-to-insight.

Key components of the solution:

  1. Discovery and Requirements Gathering: Collaborated with data, engineering, and product teams to identify core inefficiencies and define success metrics. Key priorities included:

    • Modernize data pipeline architecture for cloud-native performance

    • Migrate legacy workloads to cost-effective cloud services

    • Enable parallel and real-time processing

    • Reduce infrastructure management overhead

  2. Cloud Data Platform Implementation:

    • Cloud Architecture Design: Built a modular architecture using AWS (S3, Lambda, EMR, Redshift) with Terraform for infrastructure-as-code.

    • Data Lake Creation: Centralized all structured and unstructured data in Amazon S3 with metadata tagging and lifecycle policies.

    • ETL Workflow Modernization: Replaced batch processing with serverless and container-based pipelines using AWS Glue and Fargate.

    • Real-Time Streaming: Integrated Amazon Kinesis for ingestion and transformation of high-velocity data sources.

    • Scalable Warehousing: Migrated data marts to Redshift and BigQuery for fast analytics queries and dashboarding.

    • Monitoring & Alerting: Enabled CloudWatch and Prometheus/Grafana dashboards to track job performance and optimize resource allocation.

  3. Process Optimization & Automation:

    • Workflow Orchestration: Implemented Apache Airflow to coordinate end-to-end pipelines and trigger downstream analytics jobs.

    • Auto-Scaling & Scheduling: Configured compute jobs to scale based on workload volume, reducing idle time and controlling spend.

    • Data Quality Checks: Added validation layers and anomaly detection for improved trust in downstream analytics.

    • Access & Governance: Integrated IAM roles and audit logs to ensure secure, role-based data access.

  4. Stakeholder Engagement & Change Management:

    • Cross-Functional Planning: Engaged data analysts, engineers, and business leads in sprint planning and prioritization.

    • Training Sessions: Delivered workshops to upskill staff on new tooling and best practices in cloud-native development.

    • Documentation & Support: Created detailed runbooks, cost dashboards, and support escalation paths to ensure adoption.

    • Performance Reviews: Conducted regular performance benchmarking and cost audits post-migration.

Business Outcomes

Faster Data Processing and Delivery


Report generation time was reduced from 8–10 hours to under 1 hour, significantly improving service delivery timelines.

Scalable Infrastructure


Elastic scaling enabled the platform to handle 5x data volume during peak campaigns without service degradation.

Cost Optimization


Pay-as-you-go compute and storage saved 37% in annual infrastructure costs compared to the previous setup.

Improved Data Accessibility


A unified cloud-based data platform allowed business teams to self-serve insights faster and reduced dependencies on engineering.

Sample KPIs

Here’s a quick summary of the kinds of KPI’s and goals teams were working towards**:

Metric Before After Improvement
Data pipeline processing time 8-10 hours 1 hour 90% reduction
Data scalability threshold 2 TB/day 10+ TB/day 5x increase
Monthly infrastructure cost $42,000 $26,500 37% savings
Job failure rate 12/month 2/month 83% reduction
Analyst access latency (avg.) 45 min 10 min 4.5x faster access
**Disclaimer: The set of KPI’s are for illustration only and do not reference any specific client data or actual results – they have been modified and anonymized to protect confidentiality and avoid disclosing client data.

Customer Value

Accelerated Time-to-Insight


Teams could access fresh data quickly to make real-time business decisions.

Operational Efficiency


Automated pipelines freed up engineers to focus on innovation rather than maintenance.

Sample Skills of Resources

  • Cloud Architects: Designed resilient, secure, and scalable infrastructure in AWS and GCP.

  • Data Engineers: Developed parallelized ETL workflows and optimized data lake performance.

  • DevOps Specialists: Automated infrastructure deployment and configured CI/CD for pipelines.

  • Analytics Engineers: Ensured data model integrity and performance of downstream reporting tools.

  • Training & Enablement Leads: Facilitated platform onboarding and adoption across teams.

Tools & Technologies

  • Cloud Platforms: AWS (S3, Glue, Lambda, EMR, Kinesis), GCP (BigQuery, Dataflow)

  • Workflow Orchestration: Apache Airflow, AWS Step Functions

  • ETL & Streaming: Python, Spark, dbt, Kafka, Fargate

  • Data Warehousing: Redshift, BigQuery

  • Monitoring & Governance: CloudWatch, Prometheus, IAM, Grafana

  • Collaboration & Knowledge Sharing: Confluence, Notion, Slack

Process illustration of secure data migration from on-premise servers to cloud infrastructure for enhanced processing efficiency.

Conclusion

Curate’s cloud-based data transformation strategy empowered the media analytics firm to dramatically improve processing efficiency, reduce operational costs, and deliver real-time insights at scale. By leveraging scalable infrastructure, modern orchestration, and secure data practices, the company shifted from slow, reactive reporting to fast, predictive decision-making—enabling both business growth and technical innovation.

All Case Studies

View recent studies below or our entire library of work

Let’s Build Your Success Story Together

Expert solutions. Specialized talent. Real impact.