The Company

Before designing an IT infrastructure, we first need to understand the business it is supposed to support

In the previous chapter, I introduced the idea behind this series.

Rather than building a collection of self-hosted services, I'll design and implement the IT infrastructure of a fictional company based on real-world requirements and architectural principles.
Before making a single technical decision, we need to answer one question:

Who are we building for?

Meet Fetched & Far GmbH

Fetched & Far GmbH is a fictional software company developing cloud-based business applications for customers across Europe.
The company currently employs around 120 people across two offices in Stuttgart and Zurich while supporting a hybrid working model.

The business is growing rapidly and expects to reach approximately 500 employees within the next five years.

Although the company is fictional, every requirement, architectural decision and implementation throughout this series is based on realistic enterprise scenarios.

Business Overview

Departments

The company consists of several departments with different responsibilities and therefore different IT requirements.

Each department will require different applications, permissions and security policies throughout this project.

Business Goals

Technology almost never exist for its own sake in an buisness context.
Before selecting any software, we first need to understand what the business wants to achieve.

Fetched & Far has defined the following goals:

• Build reliable cloud-based software products.
• Support hybrid work without compromising security.
• Hire new employees quickly.
• Protect customer and company data.
• Expand internationally.
• Keep operational overhead low.
• Scale without major infrastructure redesigns.

These goals will directly influence every architectural decision made later in the series.

Constraints

Every project has limitations.
Fetched & Far is no exception.

The company has a relatively small IT team consisting of only six people.
Budgets are limited, meaning every technology introduced must justify its operational cost.
Where possible, open-source software is preferred.

The infrastructure should remain easy to operate while still providing enterprise-grade security and scalability.

Translation

Business goals alone aren't enough.
They need to be translated into technical requirements.

We're still defining what needs to be achieve and not how we'll achieve it.
That distinction is one of the most important aspects of enterprise architecture.