Lightricks scales content creation tools with Google Cloud data platform

March 2022

Content editing company ingests billions of events weekly while enhancing user experience through advanced analytics and machine learning

1 billion: events ingested per day
1 billion: events processed daily
10,000: events per second

“When, for instance, we wanted to create a cluster on GKE and attach it to our machine learning systems, DoiT ensured that our data lakes that we use for research and our on-premises compute functionality synched. We have an elaborate machine learning construction and DoiT provides ongoing support for everything from architecture to problem-solving.”
Ofir Bibi
VP Research, Lightricks

The Challenge

Lightricks' original hybrid system struggled to meet growing demand and support increasingly complex machine learning and analytics needs. The infrastructure created bottlenecks during critical business moments, with data uploads reaching limits and clusters shutting down during funding rounds and peak usage periods.

The Solution

Lightricks migrated to Google Cloud, leveraging BigQuery and Dataflow for automated data ingestion and analysis. The team deployed Google Kubernetes Engine for containerized infrastructure and utilized Vertex AI for machine learning models. DoiT International provided ongoing architectural support and problem-solving expertise.

Results

Processes around 1 billion events per day with BigQuery and Dataflow
Deployed working Kubernetes infrastructure on GKE in just weeks with minimal engineering resources
Eliminated infrastructure bottlenecks that previously caused system failures during critical business periods
Enabled real-time business intelligence for optimizing ad campaigns on terabytes of data

Meeting the Challenge of Scale

Lightricks quickly found market success with apps like Facetune, Videoleap, and Photoleap. However, rapid growth exposed limitations in their hybrid cloud-on-premises infrastructure. The system struggled with GPU usage demands and couldn't support increasingly complex machine learning and analytics requirements. Critical failures occurred during funding rounds and peak usage periods, creating urgent need for a more robust platform.

Automating Data Ingestion at Scale

BigQuery and Dataflow became the foundation of Lightricks' data platform transformation. The company now ingests around 10,000 events per second, totaling a billion events daily. Dataflow's autoscale feature eliminated previous bottlenecks where data uploads reached system limits. This automation enables real-time business intelligence, allowing teams to optimize ad campaigns on terabytes of data and instantly target users from successful marketing campaigns.

Empowering Small Teams with Big Infrastructure

Google Kubernetes Engine dramatically reduced infrastructure complexity for Lightricks' lean engineering team. Within weeks, just a few engineers and DevOps personnel deployed a working Kubernetes infrastructure that would have been impossible with their previous system. The separation of storage and compute eliminated the infrastructure obstacles that previously hindered development, allowing teams to focus on delivering business value instead of maintaining systems.

Enhancing Machine Learning Capabilities

Google Cloud solved Lightricks' compute availability challenges for machine learning workloads. The team migrated from experimental cloud training in 2014 to a robust platform where compute resources are available on demand. Marketing, product optimization, and recommendation engine teams now create machine learning models on Compute Engine, with migration to Vertex AI enabling even faster scaling for recommendation systems and user interaction optimization.

Securing Third-Party Integrations

Google Cloud's integration capabilities enable Lightricks to securely connect with third-party services like Cloudinary and Elasticsearch. The platform provides secure traffic forwarding outside private networks without exposing systems to the public Internet. This security framework supports Lightricks' backend development as they build services on open-source technologies while maintaining robust protection.

Future Growth and Platform Expansion

Lightricks plans major backend service expansion in 2022, including shared profiles across apps and media upload capabilities. This growth will generate more data and require enhanced machine learning models. With Google Cloud's support, the company can achieve rapid, cost-effective scaling while developing their creators' platform and maintaining state-of-the-art content creation services.

See how DoiT helps cloud teams control spend

Explore how DoiT Cloud Intelligence helps teams improve visibility, governance, and unit economics across cloud environments.

Visit DoiT Talk to our team

Story overview

What they say

DoiT was a true partner, not a vendor. They helped us understand the problem, refine the vision, and build something production-ready far faster than we could have on our own. Their expertise, responsiveness, and commitment made all the difference.

Dr. Anish Kapur, Founder & CEO, Promptly

DoiT's Customer Success and Forward Deployed Engineering teams work very closely with us. The regular sessions with our CSM keep us focused on the right priorities, and the FDEs provide the deep technical guidance we need to validate decisions and optimize our environment. That combination has been genuinely valuable for us.

Alexander Lundberg Santos, Platform Engineer at Extenda Retail

When we started working with DoiT, we deployed Flexsave to save time and reduce complexity. We still use it today. But what really stands out is the expert support. Having someone to collaborate with on deep cloud cost topics, someone who really understands the nuances, is incredibly valuable.

Jesper Terkelsen, CTO at Monta

DoiT's Cloud Accelerator turned our AI idea into a shipped product, saving at least three months of development and delivering reliable, explainable insights our customers trust.

Scott Desgrosseilliers, CEO and co-founder, Wicked Reports

DaySmart

Working with DoiT gave us the speed of a startup and the rigor of an enterprise R&D lab. We launched an AI feature in ninety days with zero engineering lift, unified our cloud visibility across multiple products and built a foundation to scale AI responsibly.

Tim Green, SVP of AI, DaySmart

Our AWS environment had grown rapidly, and complexity was outpacing control. DoiT helped us bring structure and clarity, aligning financial and technical decisions through a shared foundation.

Maurizio Trezzi, Director of IT, Vivaticket

DoiT gives us contextual insight into what's happening in our cloud environment. That helps us ensure we're meeting customer needs while managing our costs. It's that central pane of glass that lets engineering and finance work together, powered by the technology and backed by DoiT's people.

Matt Warner, Co-Founder and CEO at Blumira

For anyone considering DoiT: do it. The tools pay for themselves. We've reduced costs, improved visibility, and built a platform that can scale globally with control and confidence.

Matej Serbec, CTO, TradeLocker

DoiT didn't just give us a product – they gave us clarity. Cloud Diagrams has helped our teams understand what we're running, why we're running it, and where we can improve. The real-time visibility is a game changer for engineering, leadership, and everything in between.

Donnie Green, VP of Platform Engineering, Bloomerang

Sentric Music

With maybe 5-10 minutes, Ava had guided me right down into the low-level detail of the services that we were running in our compute environment, named the exact instances that were starting to chew through our money, produced a report for me that showed that this was almost a direct correlation to the cost growth that we were seeing, which meant that we were able to get on top of it pretty much immediately.

Stephen Roughley, Head of Engineering at Sentric Music

Atadex

With DoiT Cloud Intelligence™ managing our procurement and DoiT's engineers acting as an extension of my team, my costs are down, my efficiency is up, and my profitability is up

Mitch Bernet, Founder and CEO at Atadex

Skyral

A key takeaway for me working with DoiT is that the level of professionalism is extremely high. They're an obvious choice if you're looking for a partner to help implement best practices in your cloud environment and reduce cost.

Oliver Young, Senior Technical Manager at Skyral

We knew WhatsApp was the perfect channel for global remittances, but building secure, real-time conversations across languages was a massive challenge. DoiT helped us break through. They didn't just advise, they helped us architect and launch a GenAI solution that's 100x more powerful than what we had. We're now in a completely different league.

Jaime Gonzalez-Gasque, CEO, Reimagination Technologies

Your cloud bill shouldn't be a mystery

Let us show you what ships this week.

Book a demo