Capital One’s DevOps Transformation

The increasing need for online and mobile banking services was recognized by Capital One in 2010.Senior management made investments in building the organization's technological platform and cultivating a culture that would draw and keep outstanding personnel as an outcome of this insight.

(2012-2020)

Capital One made several significant stages in their DevOps journey:

Using agile methods

Creating automated test scenarios

Automating tests and deployments

Switching to the public cloud

As a result of these efforts, Capital One transitioned to an open source company and became the first bank in the United States to declare in 2020 that it was moving all of its historical on-premises data centers to the public cloud.

Capital One Adopted: A Three-Phase Approach

Phase 1: Cross-functional SWAT Teams

The firm developed specialized cross-functional "SWAT" teams for older applications as the first step in its DevOps shift. These groups enhanced workflows, automated crucial procedures, and effectively deployed configuration management. After that, this strategy was repeated in other applications, enabling teams to use the best practices that the SWAT teams had discovered.

Phase 2: Embracing Microservices Architecture

In order to improve delivery speed without sacrificing quality, Capital One switched to microservices from a monolithic architecture. This change entailed developing strict software delivery criteria and putting in place immutable pipeline execution phases, such as source control systems, safe application binary storage, and access-controlled application environments.

Phase 3: Cloud Infrastructure and Automation

Capital One implemented a cloud-first strategy, using AWS tools to improve response times and obtain insightful customer data. Additionally, the business automated software delivery using Jenkins-based pipelines, which improved developer experience and operational stability.

Key Strategies for Success

Governance with “Clean Rooms”

Capital One adapted the concept of “clean rooms” to software development, establishing well-defined guidelines to ensure code quality before release. This approach focused on defect prevention rather than removal, enabling the identification of issues across various product pipelines.

Chaos Engineering

Recognizing the unpredictability of cloud failures, Capital One implemented chaos engineering practices. The company introduced a disruption tool called “Cloud Detour” to test application resilience against various failure scenarios, enhancing disaster recovery strategies.

DevSecOps Integration

Capital One embedded automated security checks into its DevOps pipeline, accelerating the assessment of misconfigurations and vulnerabilities in containers and virtual machine images. This integration allowed DevOps teams to run necessary tests and initiate rectifications without involving the security team directly.