How ComplyAdvantage built a more flexible observability strategy with OpenTelemetry and Grafana Cloud

ComplyAdvantage, a fintech company focused on compliance and risk management, enhanced its observability strategy by transitioning from on-premise Grafana OSS to Grafana Cloud, with OpenTelemetry playing a crucial role in the process. Adam Wilson, the principal SRE at ComplyAdvantage, shared insights at ObservabilityCON 2023 into how OpenTelemetry's vendor-neutral and open-source nature facilitated the migration, allowing the company to optimize its metrics, logs, and traces. The company deals with a complex infrastructure, including six billion spans daily and approximately 41 Kubernetes clusters, necessitating a robust observability stack. Initially struggling with the challenges of fragmented observability and overloaded Prometheus servers, ComplyAdvantage leveraged OpenTelemetry's capabilities to streamline its processes and improve data storytelling across the organization. The migration to Grafana Cloud enabled quicker integration due to native support for OpenTelemetry, fostering better alignment between technical teams. Post-migration, the company adopted Grafana SLO to manage service level objectives, finding a cultural fit with Grafana Labs that fostered a productive partnership. This transition not only improved operational efficiency but also allowed for impactful organizational insights, enhancing product and customer engagement.