
Episode 38

Alexis Lowe
Principal Engineer at Moonpig
Whether you need to send greeting cards or flowers, Moonpig makes personalized gifting for any occasion easy. But behind the simplicity of Moonpig’s platform are complex technologies that enable the deep customization that customers love. To talk about the architecture behind Moonpig, Principal Engineer Alexis Lowe sat down with our host David Joy.
Join as we discuss:
How serverless technologies are helping Moonpig manage costs and handle spikes in usage
The failover solutions that are implemented to ensure Moonpig can provide an always-on experience even during high-traffic events such as holidays
How Alexis experiments with new AWS services and why he loves Lambda
A podcast for architects and engineers who are building modern, data-intensive applications and systems. In each weekly episode, an innovator joins host David Joy to share useful insights from their experiences building reliable, scalable, maintainable systems.

David Joy
Host, Big Ideas in App Architecture
Cockroach Labs

How to Scale Data Infrastructure from Startup to Enterprise
Nishant Raman
Data Engineer at FinTech Company

How to Build an AI-Native Organization
Peter Mattis
Co-founder and CTO/CPO at Cockroach Labs

Inside Infrastructure as Code with Pulumi’s Founder & CEO
Joe Duffy
Founder/CEO at Pulumi

Inside Ericsson: How AI and Automation Are Shaping Telecom
Anand Bajaj
Chief Architect - 5G Network Slicing at Ericsson

Unboxing the Cloud: AI, Microservices, and Resilient Databases
Jim Hatcher
Solution Engineer at Cockroach Labs

Strategic AI and Cloud Solutions: GitHub’s Blueprint for Modern Development Success
Ari LiVigni
Senior Cloud Solutions Architect at GitHub

Cloud Architecture in the Public Sector: Balancing Innovation and Security
Nick Mayer
Principal Cloud Architect at Maximus

GenAI Meets Celebrity: Inside Cameo’s Journey from Startup to Stardom
Dom Scandinaro
CTO at Cameo

The journey from mainframe to adopting generative AI with Equifax’s Senior Network Architect
Samarth Shah
Senior Network Architect at Equifax

Modernizing your cloud strategy with OneStream’s Senior VP of Cloud Architecture
Ryan Berry
Senior VP Cloud Architecture at OneStream Software

Driving digital transformation with Chief Architect at Altimetrik, Ignacio Segovia
Ignacio Segovia
Chief Architect at Altimetrik

Discussing the Patterns of Distributed Systems with Unmesh Joshi
Unmesh Joshi
Principal Consultant at Thoughtworks and Author of Patterns of Distributed Systems

How to simplify your software architecture
Rob Reid
Technical Evangelist at Cockroach Labs

Behind the scenes with Vimeo’s Director of Enterprise Architecture
Sachin Joshi
Director of Enterprise Architecture at Vimeo

How to leverage real-time data processing for enterprises
Andrew Sellers
Head of Technology Strategy at Confluent

Inside the Mind of the Chief Architect at Index Exchange
Joshua Prismon
Chief Architect at Index Exchange

Solving for Scale: Real-time Retail Experiences with Endear's CTO
JP Grace
Endear

Data, Acquisitions, and AI: Insights from FiscalNote's CTO
Vlad Eidelman
CTO and Chief Scientist at FiscalNote

Discussing Data Trends in the AI Era
Gajanan Chinchwadkar
CTO at Hypermode

Unwrapping Moonpig: Architectural Insights into Personalization and Scalability
Alexis Lowe
Principal Engineer at Moonpig

Solving for data intelligence at scale
Madalina Tansie
Chief Technology Officer at Collibra

Simplifying solutions architecture with Brian Johnson of Booz Allen Hamilton
Brian Johnson
Sr. Solutions Architect at Booz Allen Hamilton

How to make your applications smarter
Rod Senra
VP of Engineering at Loadsmart

Scaling for 2 billion events per day with Principal Software Engineer at Red Ventures
Majid Fatemian
Principal Software Engineer, Data Platform at Red Ventures

The data behind digital marketing: A conversation with Bluecore’s Software Architect
Mike Hurwitz
Software Architect at Bluecore

A Lesson in Scaling: How Kami handled 25x growth with CTO and Co-Founder Jordan Thoms
Jordan Thoms
CTO & Co-Founder at Kami

Mastering Multi-Cloud with PwC’s Erol Kavas
Erol Kavas
Director at PwC Canada

From FedEx to Five Guys: Designing digital experiences with Yext’s VP of Software Engineering
Matt Bowman
VP of Software Engineering at Yext

Reliability and scalability in a data-driven world with Fivetran’s VP of Platform Engineering
Mike Gordon
VP of Platform Engineering at Fivetran

Enabling a data-driven and innovative engineering culture at Amplitude
Shadi Rostami
SVP of Engineering at Amplitude

How Estée Lauder scales strong engineering culture
Meg Adams
Executive Director of Platform Engineering at Estée Lauder

Can I take your order? Building conversational AI to improve the customer experience
Akshay Kayastha
Senior Engineering Manager at ConverseNow

Engineering resilient systems: Rescuing old treasures and unleashing modern capabilities
Marianne Bellotti
Author, Engineering Leader, Systems Geek

The Full Package: How Route architects its all-in-one post-purchase platform
Siddhartha Sandhu
Engineering Manager at Route

A historical journey in developer technologies
Mike Willbanks
CTO at Spark Labs

From Legacy to Cloud: Success stories from migrating mission-critical applications
Kishore Koduri
Senior Director of Enterprise Architecture at Ameren

Building purpose-driven engineering cultures
Jason Valentino
Head of Engineering Enablement at BNY Mellon

Modernizing Insurance Application Architecture at New York Life
Mike Murphy
Corporate Vice President and Life Insurance Domain Architect at New York Life

Innovation and Disruption: How Materialize pioneered a new era in data streaming
Arjun Narayan
Co-Founder and CEO at Materialize

Stories from an SRE: How Hans Knecht builds better developer experiences
Hans Knecht
Cloud Consultant at Knechtions Consulting (Ex: Capital One; Ex: Mission Lane)

Inside Chick-fil-A’s infrastructure recipe for a perfect customer experience
Brian Chambers
Chief Architect at Chick-fil-A Corporate

Modernizing from the Mainframe: An Exploration of Distributed Systems
Chris Stura
Director, PwC UK

IoT Standards & Data Mesh: Utility Facility App Architecture
Grant Muller
Vice President, Applications and Technology Architecture at Xylem

Relational Data Problems: Doubble Dating Application Architecture
Mattias Siø Fjellvang
CTO & Co-Founder at Doubble

From Legacy Systems to Limitless Scaling with Paycor’s Systems Engineering Fellow
Adam Koch
Systems Engineering Fellow at Paycor

How to Understand Problems & Build Better Software with Technical Leader Joe Lynch
Joe Lynch
Technical Leader

Observability in the Cloud & Dataflow Modifications with Yolanda Davis from Cloudera
Yolanda Davis
Principal Software Engineer, Data Flow Operations

Early Days at Google & Building CockroachDB with Peter Mattis
Peter Mattis
Co-Founder and CTO of Cockroach Labs

Database Benchmarking Efficiency with OtterTune’s Andy Pavlo
Andy Pavlo
Associate Professor of Databaseology at Carnegie Mellon and Co-Founder at OtterTune

Observability & Statelessness with TripleLift’s Chief Architect
Dan Goldin
Chief Architect at TripleLift

Understanding AI: PubNub CTO Stephen Blum’s Key to Faster App Development
Stephen Blum
PubNub

Building reliable systems with DoorDash's Matt Ranney
Matt Ranney
DoorDash

Real-Time Data Capturing: The Future of Fitness Technology
Paul Lawler
Head of Software at Wahoo Fitness

Building Efficient App Architecture with Alloy Automation’s Gregg Mojica
Gregg Mojica
Co-Founder and CTO Alloy Automation

Unleashing the Power of Hiring Software with Greenhouse CTO Mike Boufford
Mike Boufford
CTO at Greenhouse Software

Decoding Data Warehousing: Insights from Ken Pickering, SVP of Engineering at Starburst Data
Ken Pickering
Senior Vice President of Engineering, at Starburst Data