<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">DevOps keeps spreading across the globe and more companies than ever start to adapt the methodology. There are many clear advantages of doing DevOps &#8211; for example increased release frequency, less time spent on bugs and rework and better company culture. Just as with most areas, there are a few role models to look up to and we have listed 6 organisations that we think are great DevOps companies.</span></p> <p style="text-align: left;"><!--more--></p> <h2 style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 18pt;"><strong>1. Amazon</strong></span></h2> <p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Amazon has gone from being a company with all information stored on local, dedicated servers to being a massive vendor of the cloud service called <a href="https://aws.amazon.com/">Amazon Web Services</a> (AWS). This change created possibilities to publish code changes, bug fixes and other additions whenever they like, which created a huge competitive advantage. They even have their own department for <a href="https://aws.amazon.com/devops/">DevOps within AWS</a>.</span></p> <p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Regarding clear numbers, Amazon today<a href="https://blog.newrelic.com/2016/02/04/data-culture-survey-results-faster-deployment/"> pushes releases every 11.7 seconds</a> and experience both fewer and shorter outages. This makes them a clear contestant for our best DevOps companies list.</span></p> <h2 style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 18pt;"><strong>2. Facebook </strong></span></h2> <p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">The service we all know and use one a daily basis. Facebook was actually one of the very <a href="https://techbeacon.com/keeping-facebooks-devops-delivers-faster-mobile-app-development">first advocates of DevOps</a> and they have worked hard to update and improve its service without downtime. They have used DevOps elements such as automation, <a href="http://solidify.se/continuous-integration-vs-delivery-vs-deployment/">continuous integration and continuous deployment</a> to create new ways of cooperation and ongoing improvements. For years, Facebook was doing DevOps without it being called DevOps.</span></p> <p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">As a result of Facebooks efforts to constantly improve, we as consumers now expect more from the software we use. Hence we no longer accept month-long waiting times for bug fixes, new features and new versions. Companies that cannot keep up with this new standard will most likely fall far behind and have a hard time catching up with those who can.</span></p> <h2 style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 18pt;"><strong>3. Microsoft</strong></span></h2> <p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Microsoft offers a wide variety of services &#8211; SQL, PowerBI, Azure, Visual Studio, Visual Studio Online, Windows Server, to name a few. By utilizing agile methods, Microsoft grew more and more efficient at producing software, but found a bottleneck in managing deployments. Therefore, they were met with increasing difficulties to respond to customer feedback.</span></p> <p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Today, Microsoft is one of the leading DevOps companies in the world. In addition, they offer everything from <a href="https://mva.microsoft.com/training-topics/devops#!lang=1033">training courses</a> and <a href="https://devopsassessment.azurewebsites.net/">DevOps self-assessment</a> to a bunch of <a href="https://channel9.msdn.com/DevOps">webinars and other resources</a>. Sam Guckenheimer, Product Owner of Visual Studio, says:</span></p> <blockquote> <p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 14pt;"><em>We went from a world where the notion was to have a &#8220;deliverable&#8221; product at the end of every sprint to actually delivering live at the end of every sprint. We&#8217;re always automating everything we can and improving everything we can.</em></span></p> </blockquote> <p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Read more about Microsofts transformation towards DevOps <a href="http://stories.visualstudio.com/devops/">here</a>.</span></p> <h2 style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 18pt;"><strong>4. Netflix</strong></span></h2> <p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">The Netflix streaming service is a grand distribution system based on the Amazon Web Services mentioned above. With support for almost every possible unit, ranging from mobile to tablet and desktops, Netflix needed to put efforts into stability and quality first &#8211; both on the server side and on the client side. Because of this, they created the <a href="http://techblog.netflix.com/2011/07/netflix-simian-army.html">Netflix Simian Army</a> to stress test the service and discover issues before they happen.</span></p> <p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Today, Netlifx publishes new code thousands of times per day. Their efforts make them a great role model and they were awarded the <a href="https://jaxenter.com/jax-awards-2015">JAX Special Jury Award in 2015</a> for progress and contributions to automation, open source and DevOps.</span></p> <h2 style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 18pt;"><strong>5. Walmart</strong></span></h2> <p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Walmart has been the king of physical retail for a long time. However, with Amazon being the digital giant, Walmart has had trouble catching up on the online side of sales. For that reason, Walmart created <a href="http://www.walmartlabs.com/">WalmartLabs</a> in 2011 and today use DevOps as an important part of innovation. Through achieving <a href="http://walmartlabs.blogspot.se/2013/05/oneops-is-joining-walmartlabs.html">OneOps</a>, Walmart found a way to utilizing cloud for automation and faster deployments.</span></p> <p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Walmart has also been contributing to many open source tools within DevOps. For example <a href="https://github.com/hapijs/hapi">Hapi</a>, a Node.js framework for creating applications and services that lets developers focus on creating reusable logic instead of spending time with infrastructure.</span></p> <h2 style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 18pt;"><strong>6.  Nordstrom</strong></span></h2> <p style="text-align: left;">The <a href="http://shop.nordstrom.com/">Nordstrom</a> mobile application was the breakthrough that pushed their change from waterfall-based development to DevOps over the edge. Since breaking down the old silos, they now had the ability to work as one unit and allocate resources towards the continuous delivery of value.</p> <p style="text-align: left;">Their DevOps initiative also resulted in fewer bugs, more releases and overall better quality.</p> <p style="text-align: left;"><strong>Why these are the best DevOps companies</strong></p> <p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">DevOps can be done in many different ways and in many different industries and markets. The above companies have survived large scale transformations and are now reaping clear benefits from DevOps, agile development and automation. Perhaps you and your company can learn something from these examples, or maybe just find inspiration.</span></p> <p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><em>Have we missed something in our list? Who are your DevOps role models? Let us know in the comments or send us an e-mail at info@solidify.se!</em></span></p>