Many enterprises generate hundreds of gigabytes — even terabytes — of data every day. With data ecosystems comprising hundreds of first- and third-party apps and services, ingesting vast volumes of data and making it useful are major challenges. Most enterprises are making substantial investments in data integration and infrastructure for this work, which requires powerful database replication capabilities.

Replicating this much data comes with additional complexities, like data consistency, throughput speeds, governance, security and scalability. Effective database replication at this scale requires change data capture (CDC) to ensure continuous synchronization, advanced encryption and compliance with regulations (e.g. GDPR, HIPAA, CCPA) as well as efficiency at high volumes for a variety of architectures.

In this article, we’re highlighting three enterprises that chose Fivetran for their global-scale database replication needs. These enterprises have used Fivetran to automate complex replication, allowing their data teams to focus on high-value work while saving money and practically eliminating the common barriers enterprises face when modernizing their data ecosystems.

[CTA_MODULE]

CHS gains real-time decision-making for global agribusiness

CHS Inc. is a Fortune 500 agribusiness cooperative managing complex supply chains across the globe, offering critical services for global food supply. It manages a wide array of structured and unstructured data, ranging from international supply chain metrics to drone video footage to farm machinery statistics. 

The challenges of integrating and using all this data were impacting CHS’s ability to make timely decisions. The data team implemented Fivetran for high-volume database replication, using log-based CDC to reduce data processing times and ensure data consistency across 50 applications and 14 different ERP systems. This enabled CHS to optimize supply chain management in real-time and reduce operational costs by improving data accessibility and accuracy.

Fivetran allowed CHS to scale its data operations effortlessly, handling increasing data volumes while supporting growth and improving service delivery. Their modern data stack, powered by Fivetran, Snowflake and dbt, now supports advanced analytics, providing deeper insights that drive strategic decisions and operational improvements. CHS plans to expand its use of real-time data to enhance forecasting and decision-making capabilities further, using the scalable infrastructure provided by Fivetran to support future growth and innovation.

“We leverage Fivetran to do CDC off all our data, stream it into [Snowflake] and provide real-time analytics back to our business. That was one of the game changers [for our] new data stack when we moved from Cloudera to our new data stack.”
— Riley Buss, Senior Manager of IT Engineering, CHS Inc.

[CTA_MODULE]

Pitney Bowes: Real-time logistics and operational efficiency with database replication

Pitney Bowes is a global B2B technology company specializing in e-commerce, shipping and mailing, managing over 800 million parcels annually across 16 distribution centers worldwide. The company’s operations involve large volumes of data from hundreds of thousands of IoT sensors, operational systems and daily customer interactions.

Struggling with siloed data, slow batch processing times and a lack of real-time insights, Pitney Bowes turned to Fivetran to optimize their logistics and overcome service level agreement (SLA) delivery challenges. They used Fivetran to centralize data into Snowflake for real-time analytics and access to insights. The move from manual, custom ETL processes to Fivetran’s high-volume database replication reduced data processing by up to 94%, from days to minutes.

Fivetran integrated data from over 700,000 IoT devices, enabling the live tracking of parcel movements and optimizing operations across all the global distribution centers. Real-time data access enhanced delivery estimate accuracy to 93%, improving customer service and enabling new revenue-generating programs like the guaranteed delivery option. With new real-time predictive analytics, they implemented optimized labor management to improve staffing levels for peak shipping times.

“When we introduced Fivetran to our facilities’ data processing, it revolutionized the flow and we were able to achieve near real-time data from all 16 sites at the same time. I can now understand all the site operational metrics in one single pane of glass and track an individual package to find out where it is currently.”
— Vishal Shah, Data Architect Manager at Pitney Bowes

See how Pitney Bowes manages millions of packages per day with Fivetran.

Envision Pharma accelerates drug time-to-market with secure, compliant database replication

Envision Pharma Group is a global leader in medical affairs and healthcare communication, providing data-driven solutions that enhance R&D and streamline time-to-market for pharmaceutical products. All of the top 20 pharma companies rely on Envision to manage document creation, funding, grants and clinical trial (IRT) data. Regulated data spans multiple systems, from SQL Server instances to highly-tailored customer-specific systems. Envision is critical to commercial drug development, managing important data and ensuring compliance with industry standards.

For many years, Envision was able to manage these processes manually with a sizable data team but eventually hit diminishing returns. Their data team implemented Fivetran to automate and centralize their database replication, providing a standardized data architecture and replacing multiple custom data models. The move to Fivetran significantly reduced the time required for data replication and provided real-time data availability, accelerating R&D processes for data-driven decisions. Reports that used to take weeks could now be automated and generated on demand.

Ultimately, moving to Fivetran is helping to reduce the time to market for drugs with real-time data feeding into medical affairs workflows. What previously required a large team of data engineers doing manual work now only requires a small team working with Fivetran. They have deeper insights into clinical trial data, funding and regulatory compliance, allowing Envision Pharma’s customers to bring new drugs to market much faster. They’re also able to support advanced analytics and AI/ML applications, driving continuous improvements in R&D and operational efficiency for their customers.

“With Fivetran, we help the world’s largest drug providers get their breakthroughs to market faster.”
— Joe Zeleski, Data Governance Product Lead at Envision Pharma Group

Learn how Envision Pharma Group is accelerating pharmaceutical innovation.

Fivetran empowers enterprises at global scale

Fivetran empowers enterprises to maximize their data’s value by automating and simplifying database replication across complex environments. Key features for high-volume replication like CDC ensure continuous data synchronization. Automated schema drift handling maintains data integrity without manual intervention. Seamless operation at global scale means data teams can focus on high-value data deliverables instead of maintaining DIY data pipelines.

For companies looking to improve data integration and analytics, Fivetran’s robust, secure and scalable database replication capabilities provide the foundation for real-time decision-making and growth.

[CTA_MODULE]