The Fathom Factor: Engineering Bespoke Data Solutions

Fathom Data provides end-to-end data solutions for our clients. But what does this really mean, and how can your business benefit by collaborating with us? Since every business is unique, we design and implement solutions that are tailored to our clients’ needs. As part of our Fathom Factor series, we provide a high-level overview of the various services that we offer and the value they bring to our clients.

We cover a wide range of data and technology services. In this article, we’ll focus on what we offer as part of data engineering.

At Fathom Data, engineering covers everything from the pipelines and databases that collect and store your data, to the software, dashboards and AI tooling that put it to work. It spans both data engineering and software engineering, and involves designing the infrastructure and tools that let your organisation manage and use its data effectively.

Data acquisition

Your business likely employs various existing methods for data collection, such as surveys, interviews, app inputs, and more. Your business might also benefit from acquiring data from external sources, such as web scraping, API’s, public datasets and surveys. A data partner can assist you by finding, collecting and aggregating data relevant to your particular use case from various sources.

Popular methods of data collection that we have ample experience in are APIs and web scraping. APIs provide structured data access and are the preferred method when available. On the other hand, web scraping involves extracting content and data from web pages in an automated way and transforming it into a format that is ready for analysis. This has many use cases, including lead generation, market research in competitor pricing or customer sentiment analysis on social media. These techniques can be used to gather external data to give context to your own data, allowing you to gain new insights and give you a competitive edge.

Organisation and storage

The best way to store any type of data that provides optimal data quality and governance is a database. A well-designed database will prevent duplication in your data and ensure data integrity. Multiple users can access a database at the same time, so that multiple versions of your data are eliminated. Permissions can be configured so that only authorised users can access or alter data.

Database management is a core function of data engineering. All modern businesses have to organise and store data, whether it is employee records, multimedia content like images and videos, sensor data from IoT devices, website traffic data or customer details. Often data storage can be an afterthought with text-based data stored in spreadsheets, multimedia based data getting dumped on a network drive and various other bad practices being followed. But spreadsheets were never designed for data storage, network drives aren’t secure and the problems these cause will grow as your business expands.

We can create automated pipelines to clean and validate data as it gets written to your database. We have experience with various different data types and expertise in optimising your database design for enhanced performance. This means that you will always have accurate, securely stored data at your fingertips when you need it, no matter the type or size of data.

Automation

Automating recurring or tedious tasks in your business can be a game changer and free up your employees to focus on the core business of your company. Besides automated pipelines to extract, transform and load (ETL) data, we offer many services that exploit the many benefits of automation. We can implement continuous integration and continuous delivery/continuous deployment (CI/CD) pipelines, automate processes in your workflow or even set up systems that generate and send beautifully formatted reports based on your data, all without you lifting a finger.

Software engineering

Fathom Data also offers more conventional software engineering services. We can develop integrations that connect and synchronise systems, build secure web APIs for seamless integration and programmable access to your services, design backend systems to manage your business logic, and create an intuitive user interface that interacts with all these components. Additionally, if needed, we can assist in building and deploying your website.

Cloud solutions

Utilising cloud computing services is an excellent option for many established and emerging businesses due to its cost effectiveness, scalability and reliability. We develop cloud-based solutions to drive your business forward. Cloud computing provides the infrastructure and resources needed to effectively host applications or handle and analyse big data, making it a vital component of modern data strategies. Additionally, we can assist with migrating your current systems to the cloud, ensuring a smooth transition while minimising downtime. Of course we also consider robust cloud exit strategies for seamless migration between cloud providers, or transition back to on-premises servers if required.

Frequently asked questions

Can you help integrate and implement SaaS platforms? Yes. We can help integrate and implement SaaS platforms as part of your broader data and software ecosystem.

Do you cover multiple cloud platforms? Yes, we specialise in AWS but can help with any cloud platform, including GCP and Azure.

Do you build custom dashboards or web applications? Yes. We design and build custom dashboards and web applications tailored to your business needs.

Can you help us build AI tooling like chatbots or automation? Yes. We build AI-powered tooling, including custom chat interfaces and automation backed by machine learning.

Get in touch!

Managing data is essential to modern business processes, and doing so effectively can save you time, money, and a great deal of frustration. Efficient and robust systems are the foundation of a strong data strategy, supporting all downstream operations and ensuring seamless data flow. By implementing tailored solutions, we can help you optimise your data management, enhance decision-making, and drive overall business performance. If you want to know more, contact us today to discuss how we can support your data initiatives and empower your organisation for success.

Want to learn more about what Fathom Data offers? Read more about our technical training and data analytics services.