Three infrastructure challenges for application developers

At Cegeka, we’ve been developing applications for clients for many years and we know from experience that application development is always closely tied to the underlying infrastructure. 

As infrastructure strategies evolve, we see some clients fully embracing the public cloud, while others adopt a hybrid model that combines public and private environments. Across these different approaches, the same three infrastructure challenges consistently arise: observability, security, and self-service. Recognizing this pattern, we set out to develop a structured approach to address these recurring issues.

• Observability

In many organizations, infrastructure and application development teams use separate monitoring tools. This siloed approach often results in fragmented insights, making it difficult for developers to gain a clear and complete understanding of system behavior. As a consequence, identifying the root causes of issues -whether they relate to availability, performance, compliance, or security- becomes increasingly complex.

To address this, organizations need seamless, end-to-end observability: a unified capability to assess system health and behavior through its outputs. Without this holistic visibility, maintaining real-time oversight is nearly impossible. Achieving it requires a shift-away from technology-centric tooling and toward a monitoring strategy designed around end-user expectations and business outcomes.  

• Security

The traditional model -developing an application first, then conducting security testing before deployment- is no longer sufficient. This reactive approach often uncovers significant vulnerabilities late in the process, resulting in delays to production rollout. 

A more effective strategy is Shift Left Security: embedding security early in the development lifecycle. By continuously testing code from the outset -through methods such as runtime scanning- security issues are identified and addressed long before deployment decisions are made, reducing the risk of last-minute rework. 

This proactive approach extends beyond applications. When infrastructure is defined as code, it too can be continuously scanned to ensure compliance with security baselines and best practices, further strengthening the organization’s security posture from end to end. 

• Self-service

Collaboration between application developers and infrastructure teams often causes bottlenecks. Developers submit their requirements, but infrastructure teams may take significant time to deliver solutions, slowing progress for both sides. 

A more efficient approach is for infrastructure teams to create a library of standardized platform components. These can be made available through a self-service portal or embedded directly into Kubernetes deployments. When developers need specific components, they simply select them from a predefined list. 

This self-service model enables developers to deploy and integrate infrastructure components without needing deep technical knowledge. The platform can operate in both private and public cloud environments. 

Cegeka’s approach to these challenges 

Several clients facing the challenges mentioned earlier have turned to us for support. In fact, development teams at Cegeka encountered the same challenges. At the start of every project, they repeatedly identified the same foundational components and ended up building a platform from scratch over and over again. 

We recognized that a DevSecOps infrastructure platform could save significant time for both our teams and our clients. By using standardized components based on best practices, we can also meet increasingly strict security and compliance requirements. Taking into account feedback from both developers and clients, we built our managed Cloud-Native Platform that gives developers the infrastructure they need, eliminating the need to start from zero with every new project. 

To enhance visibility, we extended our infrastructure monitoring tools into a comprehensive platform and application monitoring system. This provides end-to-end visibility, from infrastructure to application. 

For security, we chose an open architecture that makes it easy to integrate new tools for security and compliance testing. All of these capabilities are now bundled into a managed service, accessed via a self-service portal where developers can easily select the components they need. The portal makes life easier for both our own developers and our clients, who can now get projects off the ground much more quickly.  

Cloud-Native Platform for DevSecOps 

Gaëtan Willems, VP Cloud & Digital Platforms at Cegeka, elaborates on the objectives of the Cloud-Native Platform: 

"The platform consolidates all non-functional components, including integrated DevSecOps tooling. This means developers no longer need to reinvent the wheel with each new project, they can focus entirely on delivering core functionality. It results in significant time and resource savings for both us and our clients. Additionally, the framework ensures a standardized, secure, and high-performance ecosystem, whether deployed in a private or public cloud model."

Herbert Vanhove, VP Application Services at Cegeka, shares a similar perspective from the application side:  

“The smartest move is to invest in a cloud-native application platform where all non-functional components come built-in. This allows your developers to focus entirely on delivering core business functionality, rather than starting from scratch each time. By shifting these non-functional elements to an automated platform, you not only gain in efficiency, you also lay down a secure, stable foundation for future development.” 

Are you tackling issues relating to infrastructure, observability, security and self-service as part of your app development process? Get in touch with us to see how our Cloud-Native Platform could help make life easier for your application developers.