Fanatics: From 55 Cassandra nodes to 12 nodes of ScyllaDB

Fanatics, a leading online sports apparel company, has transitioned its database infrastructure from Apache Cassandra to ScyllaDB to address scalability and performance challenges. Founded in 1995, Fanatics has grown significantly, now valued at $4.5 billion with $2.6 billion in annual merchandise sales, and operates numerous ecommerce sites for various sports leagues. Initially moving to the cloud in 2015, Fanatics faced issues with Cassandra, such as node sprawl and frequent garbage collection pauses, leading to increased AWS costs and maintenance efforts. In 2019, the company successfully migrated from 43 Cassandra nodes to 6 ScyllaDB nodes, significantly reducing operational costs and improving performance, particularly during high-traffic events. This transition also involved developing custom management tools for cluster automation and autoscaling on AWS, enhancing both efficiency and reliability. The migration resulted in smoother operations with zero timeouts during peak traffic, making both customers and internal teams more satisfied with the platform's real-time responsiveness.