Infura Switches to env0, Boosts Security and Efficiency, Cuts Costs

Background

Consensys is a leading blockchain and web3 software company which has been pioneering technological developments within the web3 ecosystem since 2014. 

Infura, part of Consensys, offers developers reliable and scalable API access to Ethereum and other decentralized networks, eliminating the need to run their own nodes.

The Infura DevOps/SRE team at Consensys supports various engineering teams by promoting best practices and improving infrastructure and DevOps processes. With a globally distributed team, they collaborate extensively via Slack.

Challenge

The team sought a solution to improve and standardize infrastructure management for all teams while maintaining pipeline flexibility. Their goal was to build best practices and pipelines to accelerate the Infrastructure-as-Code journey. 

The team initially chose another managed solution for hosting Terraform states that they hoped would be the most compatible option. However, they quickly encountered several issues. 

The lack of support for role assumptions and SSO integration at the time created significant challenges in managing secrets and credentials securely. 

The complexity of these workarounds made the process cumbersome and unreliable. Additionally, as the number of projects grew, the pipelines slowed down drastically, making them unmanageable.

The high costs of scaling did not measure up to the value it provided, leading to frustration among the team. Eventually, these pain points prompted the team to seek an alternative solution that offered better performance, security, and cost-effectiveness.

Solution

The team began looking at other solutions. After a quick comparison, they decided to try env0 and started integrating it into their workflow with support from the env0 team through Slack communication.

The initial setup involved installing the application into their GitHub organization and experimenting with the system. Initially, the concepts of projects, environments, templates, and workspaces were somewhat confusing. However, after a brief adjustment period, the team figured out how everything fit together. 

The availability of the env0 Terraform provider made the transition smoother, allowing the team to create their own Terraform module and streamline the process of bootstrapping projects.

The migration was smooth and efficient. The team moved several projects from other providers to env0 using detailed documentation for guidance. When specific cases weren't covered, they used a dedicated Slack channel for quick support and feedback, ensuring any issues were promptly addressed.

With env0, the team benefited from unlimited concurrency with no slow-downs, SSO integration, and RBAC implementation for smooth authentication, tightened security, and automation and reusable templates for accelerated processes. As a result, more teams and individuals adopted the platform.

Results

Implementing env0 brought numerous benefits to the Infura DevOps team at Consensys:

• Significant cost savings: Paying only for successful deployment reduced platform costs, paving a path to cost-effective scalability and optimizing value for money.
• Faster deployments: Removing the cap on simultaneous deployments allowed for quicker and more efficient deployment processes.
• Better security practices: Integration with SSO and dynamic RBAC enhanced security and streamlined access management, in line with industry best practices.
• Shortened onboarding time: Standardized processes and default configurations enabled new team members to onboard quickly.
• Stable and fast IaC deployments: Increased reliability and speed of deployments prompted more teams within the organization to adopt env0.

What’s Next

With established best practices and demonstrated success, the Consensys DevOps team plans to expand their use of env0 across more business units. 

The stability and speed of env0, along with streamlined integrations and automated processes, help facilitate this growth. 

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