Dutch Financial Services Company, Rabobank, Creates Global Data Platform with Azure Synapse Analytics and Power BI

Headquartered in Utrecht, Netherlands, Rabobank has spent the past 125 years expanding and finding more ways to create a more sustainable and inclusive society. The organization serves nearly 40 different countries and over 9 million customers in the Netherlands. 

Keeping up with technology and properly leveraging data and analytics is key to propelling the success of Rabobank. The company continues to strive to create value out of data, at scale. 

Source: rabobank.com ‘Rabobank at a glance' 

Traditionally, each time there was a request for data, Rabobank’s data team would build a singular solution that couldn’t be reutilized for other needs or use cases. Rabobank is determined to change this process and create scalable data platforms ready for the development of new, user-friendly solutions that can be reused, optimized, and scaled. 

To meet these needs, the Global Data Platform (GDP) was created to build a single “platform of truth” and a place where users can work with data owners to quickly get access to data to build dynamic and scalable solutions. This initiative was led in a joint effort by business, Architecture and IT delivery led by Henk Richmond, Tech Domain manager for Data & Analytics, and Martijn Groen, IT Lead for GDP. 

Building a New Vision with Microsoft Azure

The journey to creating GDP began nearly three and a half years ago, when the team started with their first analysis of what cloud platform would be the best fit for their needs. “We wanted a set of platforms that could be used from a producer and consumer perspective to make sure supply and demand of data were meeting each other” states Richmond. Self-service concepts are key in this, otherwise our central data organization becomes a bottleneck. 

Rabobank was keen on using cloud-based services that exceed the development capacity of a single bank; The team saw a good match in Microsoft’s cloud strategy, and how the platform would provide holistic tech stack that could cater to the needs of scalability, agility, and performance. 

Once Azure was confirmed for GDP, Rabobank gradually started to move data to the cloud, and used small successes as leverage to greenlight the ongoing migration of data to the cloud. The data exchange platform is supported by tools such as Azure Data Factory, Azure Data Lake Gen 2, Azure Synapse Analytics, and Azure Databricks. 

Raw data from various sources is ingested, defined, and curated via Azure Data Factory. Processed data is then stored in Azure Data Lake Gen 2 and is then sent to Azure Synapse Analytics where it is prepped for several purposes, including reporting, operation steering, management information, and more. Many of the governance principles and practices set in place are executed at the data lake level. Here the team can track who ingested data, uses the data, and maintain a strong data lineage, which is partially orchestrated by Microsoft Purview. Azure Synapse Analytics enables data to be presented in a user-friendly way and combine a large set of tooling in an integrated way that proves very convenient for the GDP. Prepped data is featured within ‘information factories’ where data is made available for users to use in various forms, including real-time insights, interactive dashboards, and batch-data delivery. 

“There’s now one single point of data where you can pick and choose form and immediately create value. It’s only an automated process giving authorization to the data instead of building a complete data pipeline” explains Groen. 

Bringing Centralized Data to Self-Service Reporting

With data being more centralized and accessible, data is now being used for all types of solutions, with most of the applications being centered around Power BI. “Because you now have a centralized data platform, you can use [Power BI] much more easily because the data is already available. The threshold to use Power BI is much lower now that we have that centralized data accessibility” says Groen. 

Most of the Power BI usage within Rabobank is self-service. Users across the organization are empowered by the ease of Power BI and how fast they can create stunning visuals. To further support Power BI adoption and education, Rabobank has put together written documentation on best practices to help ensure users are properly accessing and using the data. The Data team has also started a center of excellence and actively works with Microsoft to develop their enterprise skills initiative to provide proper training and certifications. 

Expanding the Usability of GDP

With GDP, Rabobank has been able to break down the walls of their siloed data and applications and make data significantly more accessible across the board. Singular data touch points—information factories-- have increased speed to insights tremendously; data that once took months or years to prioritize are now readily available. Not only do users get a better overview of the data they can use, but the platform has also been able to help support initiatives to scale while still reducing costs. GDP helps Rabobank to better support retail customers around the world and help analyze and drive better insights for their organizations. 

Moving forward, Rabobank hopes to expand the usage and accessibility of the data platform, as well as evolve reporting capabilities. As data standards evolve every year, the team will also work to meet those standards and keep data quality at the highest level possible. The data team is looking to implement Azure Purview as part of their platform to help gain more insights and control over data. The team also wants to develop the platform and bring reporting to more regions and continually improve ease of use to help more individuals across Rabobank get the most value out of their data. 

Find out more about Rabobank on LinkedIn.