Life Is But A Stream

Real-time data and AI are converging—and companies that have already solved the data pipeline problem are pulling ahead fast. Wix processes over 40 billion interactions every day across hundreds of millions of websites, and the architecture behind that scale didn't happen by accident. It was built, lane by lane, around the principle that your upstream data must be at least as fast as your fastest use case.

In this episode, Josef Goldstein, Head of R&D for the Big Data Platform at Wix.com, joins Joseph Morais to unpack how Wix evolved from a batch-based Hadoop architecture to a fully streaming-first platform on Confluent Cloud. The conversation covers Wix's multi-lane data architecture—from petabyte-scale data lakes to sub-second algorithmic decisions—how they approach data contracts and governance at distributed scale, and why Confluent Freight Clusters became a strategic unlock for cost and elasticity. Josef also explains how Wix is now wiring real-time stream processing directly into context layers for agentic AI systems.

You'll Learn:

How to architect a multi-lane data streaming system that serves use cases from sub-second ML inference to petabyte-scale analytics

Why upstream data quality, governance, and metadata are the real prerequisites for production-grade agentic AI

How Confluent Freight Clusters reduced costs and unlocked elastic scale for Wix's highest-volume, latency-tolerant data streams

About the Guest: 
Josef Goldstein is an Israeli software engineer and engineering manager specializing in big data infrastructure and real-time analytics. With over 15 years of experience in developing data-intensive SaaS applications, Goldstein has built and led high-performing teams in the technology sector. Since 2021, he has served as the Head of R&D for Wix's Big Data and Analytics Platform, where he oversees the infrastructure and tools enabling data-driven decisions for the company's users and operations.

Guest Highlight:

"You understand that you need to be on the upstream side of the house as fast as your fastest lane. Otherwise, none of that is possible."

Chapters:

[00:00] Wix.com Overview and Customer Base

[07:08] Segment 1: Data Streaming Goodness

[24:24] Segment 2: Beyond the Stream

[45:37] Segment 3: Quick Bytes

[47:08] Joseph’s Top Takeaways

Dive Deeper into Data Streaming:

EP1—Stream On: Unleashing Innovation With Data Streaming | Life Is But A Stream

EP2—Processing Without Pause: Continuous Stream Processing and Apache Flink® | Life Is But A Stream

EP3—The Connective Tissue: Shift Left to Turn Data Chaos to Clarity | Life Is But A Stream

Get Connected:

Connect with Joseph: @thedatagiant

Joseph’s LinkedIn: http://linkedin.com/in/thedatagiant

Josef’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/josefgoldstein/

Our Sponsor:  

Your data shouldn’t be a problem to manage. It should be your superpower. The Confluent data streaming platform transforms organizations with trustworthy, real-time data that seamlessly spans your entire environment and powers innovation across every use case. Create smarter, deploy faster, and maximize efficiency with a true data streaming platform from the pioneers in data streaming. Learn more at confluent.io.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Most enterprises don't need to build AI models from scratch—they need to put AI to work. That requires a data foundation that is real-time, reliable, and ready to serve intelligent systems at scale.

In this episode, Varun Jasti, Solution Architect at AWS, joins host Joseph Morais to explore how AWS and Confluent are co-architecting the infrastructure layer for agentic AI. Varun draws a direct parallel between multi-agent system design and microservice architecture—explaining why Apache Kafka® on Confluent Cloud is the natural backbone for agent-to-agent coordination, stateful memory, and scalable provisioning.

You'll Learn:

Why AI value depends on data accessibility—not model sophistication alone

How multi-agent architectures mirror microservice design, and why Kafka is the connective tissue

How the AWS and Confluent partnership abstracts AI infrastructure so teams can focus on outcomes

About the Guest: 
Varum Jastim is a Solution Architect at AWS, and an AI/ML enthusiast that likes building on the cloud to architect solutions for AWS Partners who need to adhere to federal compliances and regulations. His areas of interest are Computer Vision and Generative AI.

Guest Highlight:

"The average company is not an AI lab. Their job is not to say, 'How do I create a great AI model?' Their job is, how do I use AI to create business value? And I believe that's the core mission of AWS and Confluent to get together and figure out how we make AI accessible to the customer." 

Chapters:

[01:23] Why AI Feels Different

[04:07] What Makes AI So Provocative

[07:46] Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Explained

[09:20] Real-Time Context Engine

[11:57] Scaling Multi-Agent Systems

[16:01] Where to Run Agents

[18:36] Security and Guardrails

[26:24] Global GenAI Architecture

[29:21] What's Next at AWS

Dive Deeper into Data Streaming:

EP1—Stream On: Unleashing Innovation With Data Streaming | Life Is But A Stream

EP2—Processing Without Pause: Continuous Stream Processing and Apache Flink® | Life Is But A Stream

EP3—The Connective Tissue: Shift Left to Turn Data Chaos to Clarity | Life Is But A Stream

Get Connected:

Connect with Joseph: @thedatagiant

Joseph’s LinkedIn: http://linkedin.com/in/thedatagiant

Varun’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/varun-jasti-1a21b21b9/

Our Sponsor:  

Your data shouldn’t be a problem to manage. It should be your superpower. The Confluent data streaming platform transforms organizations with trustworthy, real-time data that seamlessly spans your entire environment and powers innovation across every use case. Create smarter, deploy faster, and maximize efficiency with a true data streaming platform from the pioneers in data streaming. Learn more at confluent.io.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

The average grocery store has 65 to 80% inventory accuracy. One in 10 products is out of stock at any moment. For an industry operating on razor-thin margins and competing against digital-native challengers, that data gap is existential.

In this episode, Kevin Johnson, CEO of Focal Systems, sits down with Joseph to explore how his team is using computer vision, data streaming, and stateful stream processing to close that gap at scale.

Kevin walks through how Focal moved from brittle, homegrown pipelines to a fully managed streaming platform—unlocking new use cases including virtual store walk, planogram compliance, and real-time theft detection—all without the operational overhead of managing infrastructure.

You'll Learn:

How Focal Systems uses stateful stream processing with Apache Flink® to convert millions of shelf images into real-time store actions

Why homegrown data pipelines fail at scale—and how managed infrastructure freed Focal's engineers to focus on innovation

How real-time data unlocked unplanned use cases, from virtual store walk to computer-vision-driven theft detection

About the Guest: 
Kevin Johnson, CEO of Focal Systems, has 30 years of experience successfully starting, growing, and managing businesses domestically and internationally. Particular emphasis on business transformation — changing companies from slow to high growth, money-losing to profitable, industry-lagging to industry-leading, and from founder leadership to professional management.

Guest Highlight:

"If you built this rickety data pipeline—congratulations. That's your job for the rest of your life is to keep that thing operating. Or would you like to work on this new thing and, you know, maybe something else and value added? And so I think that's where you get full buy-in. That's where you hit the tipping point. It's like, oh wait, I could outsource this and I can go focus on the new. If you can outsource the things that somebody else has done and done really well, and it scales and it's robust, it's an easier decision. If you've got interesting problems to work on, they'll take it, you know?"

Chapters: 

[01:07] Guest Introduction + Focal Systems Overview 

[10:19] Segment 1: Data Streaming Goodness

[16:08] Segment 2: Beyond the Stream 

[25:56] Segment 3: Quick Bytes

[31:38] Segment 4: Joseph’s Top Takeaways

Dive Deeper into Data Streaming:

EP1—Stream On: Unleashing Innovation With Data Streaming | Life Is But A Stream

EP2—Processing Without Pause: Continuous Stream Processing and Apache Flink® | Life Is But A Stream

EP3—The Connective Tissue: Shift Left to Turn Data Chaos to Clarity | Life Is But A Stream

Get Connected:

Connect with Joseph: @thedatagiant

Joseph’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/thedatagiant

Kevin’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/kevinhjohnson

Resources:

Learn more about Focal Systems: https://focal.systems/

Learn more at Confluent.io

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

What happens when a security intelligence company decides that data contracts aren't optional, they're the foundation? For SecurityScorecard, that decision changed everything: how teams share data, how pipelines are built, and how quickly a new engineer can ship production-grade work on day one.

In this episode, Brandon Brown, Senior Engineering Manager, and Manan Monga, Senior Software Engineer at SecurityScorecard, join host Joseph Morais to walk through their multi-year journey from batch snapshots and MSK to a fully schema-governed, event-driven platform on Confluent Cloud. They cover how Protobuf and Schema Registry became the organization's shared language for data, how Apache Flink® pipelines now power real-time CVE enrichment across 12 Kafka topics, and how Kafka became the undisputed single source of truth for data across teams.

You'll Learn:

How SecurityScorecard used schema-first design and Protobuf to eliminate downstream data drift and reduce processing time from days to near real-time

Why shifting data logic left—into Kafka and Flink—freed downstream consumers from replicating brittle query logic and reduced cross-team dependencies

How Confluent Cloud's managed infrastructure, Terraform provider, and Schema Registry gave a lean engineering team the operational leverage to focus on product, not plumbing

About the Guests: 
Brandon Brown, Senior Engineering Manager Engineer, Scoring SecurityScorecard – Brandon Brown is a Senior Engineering Manager at SecurityScorecard where he leads the team who provide the scores at the core of our ratings platform. These scores guide cybersecurity leaders worldwide in reducing their risk and addressing risk in their vendors. His team also drives secure data sharing and advances company-wide adoption of streaming technologies.

With 10+ years of experience in software development, Brandon has experience across the full SDLC specializing in Data Pipelines over the last 8+ years. His language of choice is Scala but he has a soft spot for SQL. He’s contributed to top open source projects such as Debezium and was an early contributor to the ZIO ecosystem. He’s passionate about Kafka and Hybrid Data Pipeline strategies. Outside of work he’s helping raise his young son and catching live music or talking about movies.

Manan Monga is Senior Software Engineer at SecurityScorecard, building real-time pipelines that stream threat intelligence into the SCDR platform. With experience in SIEM, cloud security, and distributed systems, along with an MS in Computer Science and Cybersecurity from Boston University, he's passionate about performant data at scale. Java is his go-to, but Kafka has his heart. When he's not optimizing pipelines, he's reading sci-fi, cooking, or out cruising in his convertible.

Guest Highlight:

"It was like a weekend to process one day, and that was if the Scala service didn't die while it was running… friends don't let friends ignore schemas. Schemas all the way down." — Brandon Brown, SecurityScorecard

Chapters:

[00:50] Guest Introduction + SecurityScoreCard Overview 

[07:00] Segment 1: Data Streaming Goodness

[23:20] Segment 2: Beyond the Stream 

[42:40] Segment 3: Quick Bytes

[45:20] Segment 4: Joseph’s Top Takeaways

Dive Deeper into Data Streaming:

EP1—Stream On: Unleashing Innovation With Data Streaming | Life Is But A Stream

EP2—Processing Without Pause: Continuous Stream Processing and Apache Flink® | Life Is But A Stream

EP3—The Connective Tissue: Shift Left to Turn Data Chaos to Clarity | Life Is But A Stream

Links & Resources:

Connect with Joseph: @thedatagiant

Joseph’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/thedatagiant

Brandon’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brandon-brown-8529681b/

Manan’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/manan-monga/

The Ultimate Data Streaming Guide - Second Edition: https://www.confluent.io/resources/ebook/streaming-use-case-guide/?utm_campaign=tm.fm-ww_cd.2026-usecase-book-podcast-nbas&utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=podcast  

Our Sponsor:  

Your data shouldn’t be a problem to manage. It should be your superpower. The Confluent data streaming platform transforms organizations with trustworthy, real-time data that seamlessly spans your entire environment and powers innovation across every use case. Create smarter, deploy faster, and maximize efficiency with a true data streaming platform from the pioneers in data streaming. Learn more at confluent.io.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

45 million vehicles, 90 markets, 12+ iconic brands, each with its own data silos, standards, and infrastructures. 

In this episode, Chetan Alatagi, Solution Architect reveals how they transitioned from fragmented legacy ETL silos to a Unified Data Ecosystem—a global data streaming highway that turns vehicle telemetry into real-time value.

Chetan joins Joseph to go under the hood of a multi-region, multi-cloud architecture powered by Apache Kafka® and Confluent Cloud that ingests petabytes of vehicle telemetry, enforces data governance from edge to cloud, and powers mission-critical use cases like real-time emergency services, friction data alerts, and automated compliance across the entire Volkswagen Group.

You'll Learn:

How CARIAD ingests, governs, and distributes vehicle data at petabyte scale across a multi-cloud, multi-region architecture

Why Apache Flink® was the best option for stateful processing and how CARIAD balances Confluent Cloud for Apache Flink with self-managed clusters to achieve global flexibility and meet regional regulatory requirements

How CARIAD migrated multiple brands onto a unified event highway with near-zero data loss through Schema Registry and backward compatibility

Whether you’re battling Apache Kafka operational overhead or building a global data mesh, this episode is a blueprint for large-scale platform modernization and real-time fleet analytics.

About the Guest: 
Chetan Alatagi is a Solution Architect in Solution Management at CARIAD, the automotive software company of the Volkswagen Group. He works within CARIAD's Connecting Cloud division on the Data and AI Platform, where his team is focused on unleashing vehicle data through a Unified Data Ecosystem that powers connected, intelligent experiences for brands across the VW Group portfolio. He is a certified SAFe 5 Architect.

Guest Highlight:

"We chose a neutral event highway and migrated brand by brand, easing integration with simple configuration and easy onboarding. We upheld security standards, delivered on time, and enabled a switch with almost no data loss." – Chetan Alatagi

Episode Timestamps: 

[00:47] Guest Introduction + CARIAD Overview 

[06:10] Segment 1: Data Streaming Goodness

[19:52] Segment 2: Beyond the Stream 

[43:36] Segment 3: Quick Bytes

[51:00] Segment 4: Joseph’s Top Takeaways

Dive Deeper into Data Streaming:

EP1—Stream On: Unleashing Innovation With Data Streaming | Life Is But A Stream

EP2—Processing Without Pause: Continuous Stream Processing and Apache Flink® | Life Is But A Stream

EP3—The Connective Tissue: Shift Left to Turn Data Chaos to Clarity | Life Is But A Stream

Links & Resources:

Connect with Joseph: @thedatagiant

Joseph’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/thedatagiant

Chetan’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/chetan-alatagi-14646316/

The Ultimate Data Streaming Guide - Second Edition: https://www.confluent.io/resources/ebook/streaming-use-case-guide/?utm_campaign=tm.fm-ww_cd.2026-usecase-book-podcast-nbas&utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=podcast  

Try Confluent Cloud: 

https://www.confluent.io/confluent-cloud/tryfree/?utm_source=simplecast&utm_medium=podcast&utm_id=tm.content_life-is-but-a-stream-cariad



Learn more at Confluent.io

https://www.confluent.io/life-is-but-a-stream-show/?utm_source=simplecast&utm_medium=podcast&utm_id=tm.content_life-is-but-a-stream-cariad



Our Sponsor:  

Your data shouldn’t be a problem to manage. It should be your superpower. The Confluent data streaming platform transforms organizations with trustworthy, real-time data that seamlessly spans your entire environment and powers innovation across every use case. Create smarter, deploy faster, and maximize efficiency with a true data streaming platform from the pioneers in data streaming. Learn more at confluent.io.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.