Case StudiesCybersecurity and InfrastructureeCommerce and Online B2BData and Business IntelligenceDigital Transformatione-Learning and PublishingAI Sales Quoting Software

INTRO

The project involved multiple high-profile organizations: Bucharest Bar Association, Cartepedia, the ART Publishing Group (Art, Arthur, Paladin, Youngart, Grafic, Cartea Românească, Planeta Arthur) and Art Klett (Art Educational).

With thousands of users continuously connected and thousands of e-commerce orders processed each day, these platforms required a stronger, faster, and more secure digital infrastructure. Reliability was crucial — for the Bar Association, it meant uninterrupted access to sensitive legal documents and instant delivery of notifications, while for the publishing houses and Cartepedia, it meant ensuring that readers could browse, order, and receive confirmations without delays.

The challenge was not just about handling more traffic, but also creating a foundation to support future AI-driven capabilities like automated monitoring, traffic scoring, and smart recommendations, including optimizations via Google Gemini.

This project also served as a pilot within the OPTI AI Sales Automated Quoting Platform ➛ — the integrated Gemini architecture with automated quoting and workflows for companies with large product catalogs.

AI Ready Infrastructure

CHALLENGES

As traffic and workloads grew, four key challenges emerged:

1. Scalability

  • Thousands of users and orders per day required systems that could scale without slowing down.

2. Security

  • Sensitive data (legal documents, orders, transactions) required enhanced security, stronger protections, and multi-factor authentication.

3. Reliable Communication

  • Critical email messages (legal delegations, signed documents, order confirmations) needed to arrive instantly, not minutes (or hours) later.

4. Future Readiness

  • Infrastructure needed to be prepared for AI-based workflows, such as automated traffic scoring, recommendations, and monitoring.
Lucian Cârlogea
"The infrastructure upgrade was a race against time. We took advantage of the general VAT rate change to prepare everything beforehand and upgrade myriad systems over the weekend of 1-3 August. But it was a technical success. "
Lucian Cârlogea, Senior Engineer

SOLUTION

FROM IDEA TO DELIVERY IN 5 WEEKS

OPTI delivered a robust, AI-ready infrastructure in just 5 weeks, focusing on speed, security, and reliability.

  1. Stronger Edge Security & Faster Websites
    • OPTI modernized the infrastructure with Cloudflare for faster and more secure web services, blocking attacks and serving most traffic directly from the edge.
  2. Reliable Email Delivery
    • Premium Postmark service was integrated to ensure near-instant email delivery, with critical messages reaching inboxes in under a minute.
  3. AI-Assisted Optimizations
    • Using Google Gemini, we optimized caching and routing rules based on real traffic, while automated tests keep core user flows stable.
  4. Infrastructure Upgrades
    • To support growth, we also doubled server storage and rolled out two-factor authentication (2FA) in sensitive areas, giving end users both speed and security.
This infrastructure modernization is a classic application of DevOps and SRE (Site Reliability Engineering) principles. By automating deployments and proactively monitoring performance, we reduced the risk of human error and guaranteed over 99.9% uptime, which is essential for high-traffic platforms

SECURITY AND DATA PROTECTION

Living up to ISO 9001 and ISO 27001 standards, the upgrade was designed with security in mind, from end-user level to disaster recovery runbook.

Security diagram

Dan Zaharia
TESTIMONIAL

"OPTI are always fast, also always prepared and friendly in discussing things in detail. After the upgrade we finally saw email confirmations arriving in under a minute consistently. "
Dan Zaharia, IT Manager, Bucharest Bar Association

RESULTS

7-14 DAYS AFTER GO-LIVE

Faster and more secure websites

Up to 95% of traffic is served directly from the edge (Cloudflare), keeping websites fast and stable.

AI-Optimized Performance

Frontend and backend performance increased by 30–50%, improving workflows for all types of users.

Instant Email Delivery

Delivery in under a minute in over 99% of cases, critical updates received without delay by lawyers or clients.

Scalable Infrastructure

Enhanced security with multi-factor authentication and consolidated SPF/DKIM/DMARC. The number of spoofing incidents has reached 0.


Postmark implementation
Emails are split into clear streams (notifications, delegations, documents, newsletters), ensuring critical messages arrive instantly while marketing stays separate.



Cloudflare implementation
Cache performance for one of the web platforms. In one week: 1.41 million requests, 79% served from Cloudflare cache. Faster pages, lower load on servers.



Cloudflare implementation
Cache performance – E-commerce portal: 7.21 million requests, 95% served from cache. Almost everything delivered instantly, servers remain available.



Google Search evolution
Impressions in Google Search Console – E-commerce portal
Scale-up: From < 200 clicks, < 5,000 impressions / day to > 1,200, > 75,000 impressions / day.

TECH AND METHODOLOGY

  • Services: Server admin, DevOps, Backend Dev, Security Audit
  • Tech: CloudFlare, Postmark, Google Gemini, Google Analytics, Search Console, Firebase, React, PHP, Yii Framework, Sphinx Search Server, MySQL, Sentry, Bugbug.
  • Standards: ISO 9001, ISO 27001, NIS2 roadmap.


Horizontal scaling

Traffic growth cannot create accelerated resource exhaustion.

Separation of concerns

Separate services based on their role in the business. Choose a technology for each.

Data Driven design

For projects with historical data, extract patterns and flows with AI

Gemini
Cloudflare
Postmark

References

Quick Questions

What was the main challenge of the project?

The platforms handled tens of thousands of daily users and orders, requiring a faster, more scalable, and secure infrastructure to prevent slowdowns and protect sensitive data.

How was the website speed improved?

By implementing Cloudflare, which allowed up to 95% of traffic to be served directly from the edge, reducing server load and accelerating response times for users.

What solution was used for critical email delivery?

We integrated the premium Postmark service, which guaranteed the delivery of important emails (confirmations, notifications) in under a minute in over 99% of cases.

What role did AI play in this infrastructure project?

We used Google Gemini to analyze real traffic and optimize caching and routing rules, resulting in a performance increase of 30-50%.

What is the TLDR (conclusion)?

This infrastructure modernization is a classic application of DevOps and SRE (Site Reliability Engineering) principles. By automating deployments and proactively monitoring performance, we reduced the risk of human error and guaranteed over 99.9% uptime, which is essential for high-traffic platforms

What technologies and methodologies are involved?

Technologies: Cloudflare, Postmark, Google Gemini, Google Analytics, Firebase, React, PHP, Yii Framework, Sphinx Search Server, MySQL, Sentry, Bugbug
Methodologies: Server Admin, DevOps, Security: ISO 27001, NIS2, SRE - Site Reliability Engineering.

How can I find out more?

Lucian Cârlogea

Article written by

Lucian Cârlogea

Senior Software Engineer (with OPTI since 2013). eCommerce, database and backend optimization.

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AI Sales Automated Quoting Platform
using the infrastructure model for companies with large ERP catalog and multi-channel sales.
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