TAM Strategic Tracks
Overview
Planet's technology strategy is organised into four strategic tracks that drive the organisation toward its target architecture. Each track addresses a specific dimension of technology improvement and contains multiple initiatives with measurable outcomes.
The 4 Strategic Tracks
Track 1: Application Rationalisation
| Aspect | Details |
|---|
| Goal | Reduce complexity by consolidating overlapping systems and migrating to target platforms |
| Focus | Eliminate redundancy, reduce maintenance burden, simplify the application landscape |
| Key Question | Does this new capability already exist in our target systems? Should we extend rather than build new? |
Initiatives
| Initiative | Description | Target Systems | Status |
|---|
| E-commerce Consolidation | Consolidate e-commerce capabilities to DFS (Datatrans) | DFS | In Progress |
| Card-Present Consolidation | Standardise card-present processing through Integra | Integra FE/TE | In Progress |
| Portal Rationalisation | Consolidate legacy portals to Planet Portal | Planet Portal | In Progress |
| APM Consolidation | Consolidate APM processing through APM Switch/DGW | DGW, APM Switch | Planning |
| Legacy Decommissioning | Retire Web2Pay and other deprecated systems | N/A | Ongoing |
Questions to Ask
Track 2: Shared Capabilities
| Aspect | Details |
|---|
| Goal | Build and expose reusable platform capabilities that multiple products can leverage |
| Focus | Reduce duplication, accelerate delivery, ensure consistency across products |
| Key Question | Is this capability being built in a reusable way? Can other teams benefit from it? |
Initiatives
| Initiative | Description | Owner Boundary | Status |
|---|
| Identity Platform | Centralised IAM for all users and systems | Identity & Access Management | In Progress |
| API Gateway (Kong) | Centralised API management and security | Interfaces | In Progress |
| Tokenisation Service | Unified tokenisation for all channels | Cards | In Progress |
| Merchant Master Data | Single source of truth for merchant information | Merchant | Planning |
| Rate Management | Centralised rate calculation and management | Rates | Planning |
| Notification Service | Unified notification capabilities (email, SMS, push) | Interfaces | Planning |
Questions to Ask
Track 3: Technology Maturity
| Aspect | Details |
|---|
| Goal | Improve the technical health, reliability, and maintainability of our systems |
| Focus | Modernise tech stack, improve observability, adopt platform standards |
| Key Question | Does this work improve our technical maturity? Are we following platform standards? |
Initiatives
| Initiative | Description | Related Standard | Status |
|---|
| CI/CD Modernisation | Adopt GitHub Actions + ArgoCD pipeline standards | CI/CD Standard | In Progress |
| Observability Rollout | Implement OpenTelemetry + Coralogix across all services | Observability Standard | In Progress |
| API Standards Adoption | Classify and standardise all APIs | API Types Standard | In Progress |
| Event-Driven Migration | Replace file transfers and CDC with events | API Communication Standard | In Progress |
| Kafka Standardisation | Implement topic naming and message design standards | Kafka Standard | Planning |
| IDP Adoption | Onboard all applications to the Internal Developer Platform | IDP | Ongoing |
Maturity Levels
| Level | Description | Example |
|---|
| Crawl | Basic compliance, manual processes | Manual QA sign-off, basic logging |
| Walk | Automated gates, structured practices | Automated tests, structured logs, APM |
| Run | Full automation, self-service, proactive | Progressive rollout, auto-rollback, predictive alerting |
Questions to Ask
Track 4: Data-Driven Organisation
| Aspect | Details |
|---|
| Goal | Enable data-driven decision making through unified, governed data capabilities |
| Focus | Centralise data, improve quality, enable analytics and insights |
| Key Question | Is data flowing to the Data Platform? Can stakeholders access the insights they need? |
Initiatives
| Initiative | Description | Technology | Status |
|---|
| Event-Based Data Ingestion | Feed Data Platform primarily through domain events | Kafka → Snowflake | In Progress |
| Snowflake Rollout | Establish Snowflake as the central data warehouse | Snowflake | In Progress |
| PowerBI Standardisation | Standardise reporting through PowerBI | PowerBI | In Progress |
| Data Governance | Implement data ownership and lineage | Data Catalog | Planning |
| Real-Time Analytics | Enable real-time data processing for operational insights | Streaming Analytics | Planning |
| Self-Service Analytics | Empower business users with self-service data access | PowerBI, Data Portal | Planning |
Data Flow Principles
- Events over ETL - Prefer event streaming over batch ETL processes
- Boundaries own data - Each boundary owns its data; no cross-boundary table sharing
- Single source of truth - Data warehouse is the analytical source of truth
- Operational vs Analytical - Don't use observability tools for business KPIs
Questions to Ask
Questions to Ask When Proposing Work
Use these questions to validate alignment with TAM strategic tracks:
Before Starting Any Initiative
| Track | Key Questions |
|---|
| App Rationalisation | Does this add to or reduce our application count? Can we extend existing target systems? |
| Shared Capabilities | Is this being built for reuse? Are we duplicating something that should be shared? |
| Tech Maturity | Are we following architecture standards? What's our maturity level? |
| Data-Driven | Is data flowing to the platform? Can stakeholders access needed insights? |
Architecture Review Questions
- Alignment: Which strategic track(s) does this initiative support?
- Boundaries: Which boundary owns this capability?
- Integration: How does this integrate with other boundaries (APIs, events)?
- Data: How does data flow to/from the Data Platform?
- Standards: Which architecture standards apply? Are we compliant?
- Maturity: What's the current and target maturity level?
- Rationalisation: Are we consolidating or creating new overlap?
Red Flags
| Red Flag | Likely Issue | Action |
|---|
| "We need our own database for X" | Potential boundary violation | Review with Architecture |
| "We'll build a quick portal for this" | Portal proliferation | Use Planet Portal |
| "We'll do CDC to get the data" | Anti-pattern adoption | Use events instead |
| "This is just for our team" | Missing reuse opportunity | Evaluate as shared capability |
| "We don't need monitoring for this" | Tech maturity gap | Implement per observability standard |
Related Documentation
