01/15/2025
In FinOps, cost is not the problem - it's a symptom of deeper engineering challenges.
Meet Dany Daya, Director of FinOps and Cloud Strategy at Etsy, a marketplace connecting 96.7M buyers and 8.5M sellers in nearly every country in the world.
Dany transformed FinOps at Etsy to focus on business impact, not just savings. He's helped negotiate $500M+ provider agreements, and achieved remarkable results - from helping reduce storage costs below 2-year-old levels by matching data lifecycles to business needs to pioneering sophisticated approaches that recognize cost inefficiencies often signal larger engineering opportunities.
Listen to this latest episode of the Future of Cloud Optimization podcast now on:
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Youtube: https://buff.ly/4gUjOA3
Sedai website: https://buff.ly/3BDI3mS
In his conversation with Suresh Mathew, Dany shares:
🔵 Etsy's FinOps journey and key accomplishments, including their transition from on-premises to cloud infrastructure and achievements in storage optimization
🔵 The critical balance between cost optimization and performance, using data-driven approaches to set the right targets
🔵 How to avoid over-optimization and maintain focus on product innovation rather than cost-cutting
🔵 The division of responsibilities between FinOps & Engineering teams at Etsy
🔵 Etsy's pioneering work in sustainable computing, starting with energy metrics and evolving to a comprehensive CO2-based approach
🔵 Essential steps & mindset shifts for organizations starting their FinOps journey
🔵 Strategies for building trust & visibility in engineering culture
🔵 The role of AI & automation in the future of cloud optimization
Key Takeaways:
1️⃣ Cost isn't the problem - it's a symptom of underlying engineering challenges. The real focus should be on addressing root causes: design issues, architectural decisions, and resource utilization patterns. Engineers relate better to these fundamentals than dollar values.
2️⃣ Trust your engineering culture and enable innovation. At Etsy, providing visibility into resource usage naturally drove optimization efforts without heavy-handed policies. Engineers focus on building features that drive business growth while maintaining efficiency.
3️⃣ Balance performance and cost through data-driven decisions. By understanding customer latency requirements and setting appropriate thresholds, teams can optimize cost without compromising user experience.
4️⃣ Sustainability initiatives align with cost optimization. Etsy's journey from measuring energy usage in 2016 to tracking carbon impact shows how environmental responsibility can be integrated into FinOps.
5️⃣ Start your FinOps journey with fundamentals: simple metrics like cost variance and CPU utilization, transparent communication, comfort with uncertainty, and reasonable error margins that allow for natural fluctuations in cost.
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