Leveraging the Power of Data Mesh for Eurocommercial Properties
Eurocommercial Properties (ECP), a leading company in the real estate industry that owns, manages, and develops shopping centers in Europe, grappled with rising demand for reporting stemming from standard business activities and external obligations such as ESG reporting. As ECP progresses towards becoming a more data–driven organization, its current data infrastructure has begun to hit scalability limits, thus impairing its ability to efficiently cater to the rising need for insights from the business. Additional challenges included siloed data, ineffective processes, minimal data governance, and limited flexibility.
After sessions about the theory of Data Mesh that Latitude hosted, the core question for the project was:
How could ECP leverage data mesh principles to overcome these hurdles, gather insights, and turn them into valuable, actionable strategies?
Results
Our collaboration with ECP led to the definition of concrete steps toward a successful Data Mesh transformation. We proposed tech, process, and people initiatives. Tech initiatives included modernizing Data Architecture, creating a Data Catalog, and setting up Row Level Security in their reporting environment. The process initiatives consisted of developing Data Products, putting Domain Users in the Driver‘s Seat, and standardizing the Data Product Lifecycle. People initiatives involved setting up Multidisciplinary Teams and forming a Central Governance Team.
Solution
n this initial phase, we embarked on an exploratory journey to comprehend the current state of affairs regarding end–users, technology, and business processes. We defined problem statements, identified bottlenecks in the technical landscape, and explored potential solutions that align with the principles of Data Mesh and ECP‘s operational strategy. This work laid the groundwork for an expansive effort to transform ECP‘s data architecture and operations towards a more scalable, decentralized, and self–organizing paradigm.
Method
Our approach consisted of technical sessions, end–user sessions, Problem Statement Canvases, and Use Case Canvases. The Discovery Sprint allowed us to design the “as–is“ architectural overviews, define architectural bottlenecks, and establish a connection between Data Mesh theory and ECP‘s practice.