Case Study: ParkMobile Builds for Scale with Kubernetes, Gloo and AWS Cloud

ParkMobile is the leading provider of parking solutions in the US with a mission to power smart mobility for every driver and vehicle, everywhere. Located in 7 cities across the country, ParkMobile helps their 16M+ customers park smarter every year.


Join the discussion with the ParkMobile team on how they are building for scale by going cloud-native with Kubernetes, Gloo, Service Mesh, GitOps and more.

This session will cover:
* Technical challenges and needs to address ParkMobile’s growth over the last decade
* The evaluation criteria, process and results leading to new platform technology
* Lessons learned (surprises too!), how they adjusted and what’s next

Blog
https://www.solo.io/blog/webinar-recap-parkmobile-builds-for-scale-with-kubernetes-gloo-and-aws-cloud/

Learn more:
https://solo.io
https://parkmobile.io

Transcript

1. 1 | Copyright © 2020 ParkMobile Case Study Positioning for Scale with Gloo, Kubernetes and Cloud
2. 2 | Copyright © 2020 Betty Junod Solo.io VP Marketing Chris Salomon ParkMobile Director, Software and Reliability Engineering Rafael Ramirez ParkMobile Lead, Site Reliability Engineer Anthony Mallica ParkMobile Senior, Site Reliability Engineer Matt Ball ParkMobile CTO
3. 3 | Copyright © 2020 3 | Copyright © 2020 Q: Who is ParkMobile?
4. 4 | Copyright © 2020 Our mission is to power smart mobility for every driver and vehicle, everywhere. We do this by creating innovative solutions that connect parking and mobility ecosystems, thereby eliminating friction and maximizing convenience and efficiency.
5. 5 | Copyright © 2020 The ParkMobile Network 30% of ParkMobile members use our app as they travel across markets ParkMobile connects consumers to the largest network of municipal, private, airport, transit and venue parking inventory in the U.S. Our mission is to power smart mobility for every driver and vehicle, everywhere. Our Products & Services • On & Off Street Mobile Payments • Prepaid Parking & Reservations • Charging Stations • Fleets Programs • Mobile Payment for Gated Parking • Event & Venue-based Parking • Validations • Transit On-Demand Reservations Both
6. 6 | Copyright © 2020 About ParkMobile 400+ CITIES & MUNICIPALITIES 125+ UNIVERSITIES 20+ AIRPORTS 9 Million+ MONTHLY TRANSACTIONS 41 OF THE TOP 100 CITIES • Ranked #3 in the Navigation category only behind Waze and Google Maps • Adopted by over 1 in 15 U.S. drivers • 173% increase in new clients over the last 5 years • Over 5 million new users joined the ParkMobile network in the last 12 months • We processed 20 million more transactions in 2019 compared to 2018 17 Million+ USERS NATIONWIDE
7. 7 | Copyright © 2020 ParkMobile as a Platform ParkMobile has developed the most capable platform in the industry. Our technology provides: • consumers with the most innovative experience in the market, • our clients with the most robust, self-service portal for their back-office, and • our partners / developers with secure, online access to our APIs and supporting artifacts. PM360 ParkMobile.IO Developer Portal
8. 8 | Copyright © 2020 8 | Copyright © 2020 Q: What was the technology challenge at ParkMobile?
9. 9 | Copyright © 2020 The ParkMobile Ecosystem (100+ Integrations)
10. 10 | Copyright © 2020 Our Engineering Vision Availability Access Codes Rates & Policy Payments Locations Reporting User Notifications Enforcement Loyalty User Management Supplier Inventory Back-End Domain Services North:South API Gateway Services Channels Mobile East:West Service Mesh Web API § Cloud infrastructure for scale and elasticity § Domain / microservices architecture § Cloud-native design patterns § High performing, reliable products & services
11. 11 | Copyright © 2020 Our Approach to New Partner Solutions Evolving Architecture Support Old and New FLEXIBLE MODERN SCALE Innovative and Proven Kubernetes Native Exponential Scale Secure at Scale VALUE PARTNERSHIP Investment Value Exceeds Cost Client-Centric
12. 12 | Copyright © 2020 Challenges in Growth 1. Enabling and Empowering Developers 2. Cost Drivers of New Infrastructure 3. New Traffic Patterns (North/South and East/West) 4. Decomposing Monoliths 5. Security 6. Increasing Stack Complexity
13. 13 | Copyright © 2020 Our Evolving Technology Stack – Mix of Old and New Web Backend Platforms
14. 14 | Copyright © 2020 14 | Copyright © 2020 Technology Infrastructure: Our API Gateway Search
15. 15 | Copyright © 2020 Some Challenges Faced with Other Solutions • Large and heavily utilized but outdated in terms of implementation details • Security issues that should not be there • Expensive - Some required us to stand up a dedicated team • Expensive - Large up-front cost compared to value • Inflexible - Lack of support for evolution between old and new applications
16. 16 | Copyright © 2020 Why We Chose Gloo @ParkMobile • Ease of Implementation & Support − Super easy to learn • Kubernetes Native − Installs directly onto Kubernetes cluster − Uses Kubernetes API and CRDs for configuration − Convert virtual services to Helm and include with existing app Helm charts − Kubernetes worker nodes live in same VPC as apps (both in and out of Kubernetes cluster) − Access to all local network resources without excessive amount of load balancers • Infrastructure as Code − Dev teams manage own projects' API endpoints and configurations through GitOps − Takes the concept of treating infrastructure as cattle to the next level FLEXIBLE MODERN
17. 17 | Copyright © 2020 Why We Chose Gloo @ParkMobile • Scalable − The ability to scale seamlessly with the application (based on app needs) − Minimum scale and performance requirements • 100k Request Per Minute Minimum • Gateway overhead did not add more than 50ms. − Seven Gateway proxies are using < 1/10th of a core and < 400MB memory − Eleven Worker nodes running M5a.4xLarge • Security at Scale − Native Kubernetes integration allows for namespacing developers − Each team’s virtual services are isolated from others − Ability to utilize Kubernetes RBAC • Value − Installs on existing Kubernetes cluster (No additional infrastructure costs for Gloo) − High performance and throughput with minimal footprint (proxies) SCALE VALUE PARTNERSHIP
18. 18 | Copyright © 2020 18 | Copyright © 2020 Q: Where are you now?
19. 19 | Copyright © 2020 Lessons Learned § Utilize solutions that treat Kubernetes as a first-class citizen § Integration with Kubernetes § Proprietary cloud provider solutions are convenient but not always the best § Product should be flexible to the needs of the consumer § Automatability and testability should always be considered when deciding on solution
20. 20 | Copyright © 2020 Service Mesh Knative Applications Deployment Implement service mesh for east-west traffic Leverage serverless Continue breaking down monoliths Multi-cluster Multi-region What’s Next for ParkMobile
21. 21 | Copyright © 2020 Thank You! Learn More SOLO.IO/GLOO Community SLACK.SOLO.IO Follow Us @SOLOIO_INC Learn More PARKMOBILE.IO Follow Us @PARKMOBILE