Zappi, a growing scale-up, faced a make-or-break moment: to unlock the next generation of insights, it needed a purpose-built Lakehouse platform - fast. With limited runway after previous setbacks, it took a bold gamble: adopting Elixir, despite having zero prior experience with the language.
This high-stakes choice paid off. Elixir’s concurrency model, scalability, and “Let it crash” philosophy were a force multiplier for us to design a robust, decoupled system. From onboarding Elixir newcomers to overcoming technical challenges, we learned invaluable lessons about maximizing delivery under pressure.
In this talk, I’ll share:
- Why we chose Elixir.
- Strategies for rapidly onboarding a team with no Elixir experience.
- How Elixir’s unique principles turned challenges into opportunities.
- Practical insights for teams betting on new technologies in high-risk projects.
Whether you’re a tech lead or engineer, this story offers real-world guidance for innovating under constraints.
Key Takeaways:
- How Elixir’s design can be used to elevate and improve your design and architecture.
- Eliminate concern around adopting Elixir and some tips on how to approach.
- Useful insights on how to use Elixir in practice.
Target Audience:
The intended scope of the audience is quite broad. While it won’t go into deep technical details, there will be content for
- Engineers who are cautious about adopting Elixir
- Engineers interested in real world implementations, especially in organisations where the primary language is not Elixir
- Engineers who are interested in design and architecture