Flowerplus uses AnalyticDB for MySQL in combination with ApsaraDB RDS for MySQL to implement a hybrid transaction/analytical processing (HTAP) solution. AnalyticDB for MySQL can quickly analyze large amounts of data. Crucial modules such as procurement, order analysis, marketing, and alerts are optimized based on analysis results to accelerate the growth and development of Flowerplus and its business.

Challenges

Flowerplus handles the procurement, sales, and delivery of flowers. Business intelligence (BI) is a crucial tool in analyzing their inventory, procurement channels, logistics progress, and business conversion rates. They also rely on BI tools to receive alerts for sold out products and to manage and analyze their ever-growing customer orders. As their business grows, the timeliness of data becomes more and more important. However, online transaction processing (OLTP) MySQL databases are unable to provide real-time data analytics to suit their needs.

  • Performance of complex queries

    OLTP MySQL databases are slow when used to analyze orders, product traffic, procurement, business conversion rates, and alerts for sold out products. If you attempt to use OLTP MySQL databases to process tens of millions or hundreds of millions of data records, complex query reports are returned very slowly or may not be returned at all. Therefore, OLTP MySQL databases cannot support reporting and BI business.

  • Data timeliness

    Specific reports require responses within seconds.

  • Data compatibility

    The original system of Flowerplus is built on multiple MySQL database services such as ApsaraDB RDS for MySQL, PolarDB for MySQL, and PolarDB-X 1.0. To reduce R&D and training costs, the solution has to be compatible with MySQL syntax.

  • Storage scalability

    Flowerplus has generated hundreds of millions of data records in current reports and may generate over one billion data records in the future. This requires the solution to take future scalability into account.

Solution

To tackle the preceding challenges, Alibaba Cloud provides the following solution for Flowerplus.

Description:

  • AnalyticDB for MySQL takes over OLTP databases to perform data analysis. This accelerates the analysis of business and BI reports and ensures that responses are returned quickly. For more information, see What is AnalyticDB for MySQL?
  • AnalyticDB for MySQL V2.0 and AnalyticDB for MySQL V3.0 are both compatible with the MySQL syntax. The architecture of AnalyticDB for MySQL V3.0 is more compatible with MySQL databases.
  • Node groups are scaled out to improve the concurrency and computing performance of AnalyticDB for MySQL. This ensures that responses are returned at a stable speed even as business reports increase in volume and queries grow in complexity.

Benefits

This HTAP solution provides the following benefits for Flowerplus:

  • Improves the data analysis efficiency and accelerates business optimization for Flowerplus based on the quick analysis capability of AnalyticDB for MySQL.
  • Improves data analysis performance by up to 10 times when AnalyticDB for MySQL is used to analyze reports, improving business experience.
  • Reduces the maintenance costs caused by increasing volumes of data and visits. AnalyticDB for MySQL uses an architecture that has multiple nodes. Compared with traditional relational databases, this architecture provides higher scalability and flexibility.