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Cloud Computing

Data platform and Google Cloud: Telepass’s digital journey

Go Reply supports Telepass in its data-driven transformation based on Google Cloud

Extracting value from big data

To maximise the value of the information constantly being gathered by markets, information systems and customers, it is critical that every company defines a big data strategy capable of keeping pace with the exponential growth in the amount of data generated.

After years of research in its quest for a robust and functional solution, Telepass – a leading Italian mobile services provider - decided to build a new Google Cloud-based data management platform as part of the company’s broader digital transformation project. Go Reply, a Google Cloud Premier Partner specialising in big data, rose to the challenge put forward by Telepass by devising a scalable, secure and flexible cloud-native solution.

Starting with a well-defined cloud strategy, Go Reply supported the company in integrating several legacy and data source systems to ensure full interoperability with the services provided by the cloud platform created.

As well as providing strategic consulting on cloud-related matters, Go Reply focused on migrating the company’s data streams to Google Cloud for the purpose of generating insights and analytics. It is also feeding data into AI models with the ultimate aim of migrating all the client’s data streams to cloud-managed services.

Go Reply’s cloud adoption framework

Go Reply applied the cloud adoption framework it had developed to kick-start Telepass’s digital transformation, while defining the relevant priorities and focus areas, identifying the key goals involved in accelerating market growth, and considering business requirements.

The first phase was aimed at defining a target solution that would take into account the most innovative cloud technologies available and the best practices for designing enterprise data platforms. At this stage, Google - as the cloud provider - also played an active part in the process in order to maintain an overview of a roadmap that could facilitate the necessary architecture-related decisions. Alongside the initial involvement of Google Cloud, Go Reply also used its in-house expertise to propose highly specialised third-party products that would meet Telepass’s specific needs.

Having determined the goal, Go Reply brought together a dedicated team of experts (comprising a cloud architect, data engineer, security expert and network specialist) to define and plan the activities involved in building the data platform. The solution, which focuses on breaking down the barriers and data silos that hinder the extraction of value from the company’s data, centralises information and defines a dedicated enterprise data model.

Ensuring flexibility while centralising data on a single platform is an ambitious task. To achieve this, Go Reply focused on implementing multi-purpose processes that enabled an 'ingestion framework’ to be developed. This model - the first element of the management chain and data centralisation process - allows new streams and new data sources to be incorporated by means of an agile, zero-effort, no-code approach, using simple configuration files. In this way, the customer’s business units can also play an active role in adding new data to the platform while extending it to other business systems that have not yet been integrated.

The end result was a scalable data platform that fulfils privacy-related goals and corporates security policies while collecting enterprise data that was previously dispersed across a variety of databases. The integrated Google Cloud tools also support requirements associated with reporting, dashboards, data logging, analytics and data discovery, as well as facilitate data governance and data democratisation.

The benefits: data quality and usability

The data platform has significantly reduced both service interruptions and incident resolution times. Go Reply has thereby helped to improve the overall quality of the data being managed and its usability, while tackling capacity-related challenges and reducing the number of queries involved.

The Google data platform that has been developed represents the first step in the process of the sharing and collaboration between company teams, in that all data is now freely accessible from a single source and no longer has to be cleaned up and enriched by means of time-consuming pre-processing. Thanks to the quality and usability of the data made available by the data platform, Telepass will be able to implement increasingly focused measures aimed at expanding and enhancing the innovative services it provides to its customers.

“At Telepass, we collect a lot of data related to our customers’ mobility patterns. As a company, we have decided not to monetise that data but to utilise it instead, to provide ever-better and more personalised services to the existing customers of Telepass. Firstly, to take full advantage of the value of the data involved, a new data lake architecture had to be designed with the involvement of a partner, such as Go Reply, with expertise in big data. Secondly, the ultimate success of the project also required knowledge of Google Cloud managed services and the continuous updating of the platform with the latest technologies and tools, within an ecosystem that would need to constantly evolve.”

Rocco Volpe, CIO of Telepass

The Telepass Group was founded in 2017 with the aim of creating an integrated system of mobility services for both urban and rural areas. As a pioneer in electronic toll services, Telepass now offers an integrated mobility ecosystem for individuals and companies, thanks to its development of data-driven technology services that can be accessed via a single app: the MaaS (‘mobility as a service’) model, as it is called. Flexible, safe and sustainable mobility practices are supported by more than 30 connected services, including cashless fuel payments, electric car charging, parking, car-sharing, and related insurance products. As a trailblazer in the mobility sector, Telepass is committed to facilitating people’s freedom of movement, expanding its offerings, investing in cutting-edge start-ups, and enabling its services to be accessed across Europe, so that every instance of travel is an experience without borders.

Go Reply is the Reply Group company specialised in cloud services based on Google Cloud technology. Go Reply works with leading companies in markets such as the telco & media, financial services, and retail & manufacturing sectors to leverage digital transformation processes based on cloud infrastructure and application models. It offers cloud strategy and migration, cloud infrastructure hosting, big data, machine learning, PCI/ISO and security management compliance, and cloud-based services aimed at optimising the performance of hosted services, along with fully structured, 24-7 cloud service management facilities. Go Reply supports its customers with managed services across the entire application life cycle.