Fifteen years ago, the Internet was a very different place. It operated on a very different scale, had different market leaders and it faced different technical challenges. What has not changed, however, is the need for the best – indeed ever higher - performance and resilience. We founded Catchpoint in September 2008 (amid terrible economic conditions) with the desire to make the Internet better. Not exactly the greatest year to launch a startup.

User expectations are at an all-time high, and any performance hiccups can lead to frustrated users and lost business opportunities. To get real-time insights into their digital assets and succeed in this competitive landscape, businesses need Internet Performance Monitoring (IPM) that incorporates both synthetic and Real User Monitoring (RUM). RUM and synthetics are two powerful tools that, when used in tandem, offer a comprehensive view of performance and user experience.

Over the last few months, we’ve been analyzing the thought-provoking findings of a recent study conducted by Forrester Consulting. This study illuminated the notoriously challenging-to-measure financial impact of Internet disruptions on eCommerce companies.

Catchpoint is pleased to announce that Gartner has released six new Hype Cycle reports that mention Catchpoint in respective categories. Gartner Hype Cycles provide a graphic representation of the maturity and adoption of technologies and applications, and how they are potentially relevant to solving real business problems and exploiting new opportunities.

Today the Internet IS the new enterprise network your organization relies upon. However, most of your key applications and systems are outsourced to the cloud. In fact, huge parts of your Internet Stack are either outsourced to the cloud or to 3rd-parties who themselves rely upon the cloud. And that's an issue because if any of those cloud-based services go down, your network is going to be impacted.

In our previous blog, we shared our firsthand experience of implementing a tracing collector API using serverless components. Drawing parallels with Amazon Prime Video’s architectural redesign, we discussed the challenges we encountered, such as cold-start delays and increased costs, which prompted us to transition to a non-serverless architecture for more efficient solutions.

Not to be confused with the popular children’s TV character, DORA is a new EU regulation for the financial sector, which stands for the Digital Operational Resilience Act. DORA became law on 16 January 2023 and will start to apply from 17 January 2025, so it’s crucial that senior executives in the financial sector, such as Chief Risk Officers and Chief Information Security Officers, understand its implications and prepare for compliance from day one.

In the previous blog in this series, we delved into the redesigned architecture of Amazon Prime Video and how they integrated different architectural styles for optimal performance and cost efficiency. We also discussed the impact of Amazon’s decision on the concept of a “serverless-first” mindset, highlighting the importance of considering alternative architectural approaches based on specific use cases and requirements.

Let’s face it: when it comes to Digital Experience monitoring, the customer is always the first thing organizations focus on. They are the ones who give the organization their reason to exist, and their satisfaction determines the organization’s future. The link between revenue and good Customer Experience is obvious, so it’s a hot topic of interest and often the top priority – as it probably should be.

This is the second blog in our deep dive series on serverless architectures. In the first installment, we explored the benefits and trade-offs of microservices and serverless architectures, highlighting the case of Amazon Prime Video's architectural redesign for cost optimization.