Groww: Empowering investors with a user-friendly platform powered by Google Cloud
About Groww
Headquartered in Bangalore, Groww is India’s fast-growing online investment platform that offers a simple and easy way to invest in stocks, direct mutual funds, IPOs, ETFs, and digital gold. Its mission is to make investing as intuitive and accessible as ecommerce.
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Contact usGroww makes investments simple and accessible, using Google Kubernetes Engine to ensure a reliable platform for customers, and makes data-backed decisions to grow its business with BigQuery.
Google Cloud results
- Reduces hardware costs with Preemptable Virtual Machines
- Enables a lean DevOps team with Google Cloud
- Analyzes data effectively and quickly for agile business growth
Provides users with a safe, reliable investment platform
Investing is one way to ensure financial security. However, the thought of it can be a daunting one, especially for people without any prior experience. With a mission to make investment simple for digital natives in India, Groww was launched in 2016.
"We noticed that many people were on social media, booking cabs, and ordering food online, but the same people were not investing, despite having the means to do so," says Singh. This observation led to a lightbulb moment for the team, and they realized that in order to appeal to the millennial, mobile-savvy generation, they had to create an investment platform that was as easy to use as an ecommerce platform.
"We've only got four or five people in DevOps, and that's only possible because Google Cloud products are already able to run on their own."
—Neeraj Singh, co-founder and Chief Technology Officer, GrowwManaging unpredictable spikes with Google Kubernetes Engine
As with any platform, there are bound to be peak and non-peak hours when it comes to traffic. For Groww, regular spikes take place in the early mornings, or in the evenings when people are more relaxed having come home from work. But the nature of the fintech industry is a volatile one. Investors are only human, and their investment decisions can be swayed quickly by the news. As such, spikes in traffic can happen at the most unpredictable times. To cope with this unpredictability, Groww uses Google Kubernetes Engine to scale up and down automatically to meet the required capacity around the clock. This also helps the company save costs, as it pays only for what is needed.
"No matter how much of an expert you are, you can never predict when traffic on the platform will be heavy," says Singh. "Google Kubernetes Engine helps ensure that we never run out of capacity, without overspending on infrastructure cost."
More recently, the investment company started using Preemptible Virtual Machines, which run at one third of its hardware cost. It also leverages Anthos to monitor and manage its backend infrastructure and to have better workload visibility. Singh shares, "We are very open to adopting new technologies, and our team is always eager to learn if we can do things better. We believe that technology is always evolving and it's our responsibility to learn and make use of what's available out there."
Despite having so much running in the background, Singh explains that the company keeps a very lean DevOps team. "We've only got four or five people in DevOps, and that's only possible because Google Cloud products are already able to run on their own."
"From a startup perspective, BigQuery is really helpful because often setting up your data lake can be very costly and a distraction when the team is also busy focusing on setting up an infrastructure."
—Neeraj Singh, co-founder and Chief Technology Officer, GrowwMaking swift, data-backed business decisions
Infrastructure is only part of the equation for a successful business. Outside of operations, the ability to analyze data effectively is arguably the most important component for a startup to thrive. Groww leverages BigQuery to make decisions quickly and efficiently. "With BigQuery, we have a place where we can put all data, fire queries, and build dashboards almost instantly, allowing us to make business decisions quickly," explains Singh.
The team also uses Looker Studio to clearly visualize the information generated through charts and graphs. The best part? Groww doesn't need to spend additional time and resources setting up a large data team, since BigQuery does most of the work and in a shorter period of time. The resources saved also enables the team to focus on addressing functional requirements, rather than managing and sizing the data platform.
"From a startup perspective, BigQuery is really helpful because often setting up your own data lake can be very costly, and a distraction when the team is also busy focusing on setting up an infrastructure," adds Singh.
“As we gain more users with different wants and needs, it will be a natural progression that the company evolves. I believe that with Google Cloud, we are well equipped to pave the way for the future."
—Neeraj Singh, co-founder and Chief Technology Officer, GrowwEnsuring security and compliance with Google Cloud
As a fintech company, security and compliance continue to be top priorities for Groww. It chose Google Cloud as its preferred cloud provider because there are three data center replication zones in Mumbai, which means it adheres to financial regulations for keeping its user data within borders.
Moving forward, Groww plans to evolve its platform alongside its users. Singh says, "As we gain more users with different wants and needs, it will be a natural progression that the company evolves. I believe that with Google Cloud, we are well equipped to pave the way to the future."
Tell us your challenge. We're here to help.
Contact us
About Groww
Headquartered in Bangalore, Groww is India’s fast-growing online investment platform that offers a simple and easy way to invest in stocks, direct mutual funds, IPOs, ETFs, and digital gold. Its mission is to make investing as intuitive and accessible as ecommerce.