Global Energy Company
Replacing an In-House Kubernetes Platform and Scaling Secure Container Operations with Portainer
Business overview
This prominent North American energy company specializes in the extraction of oil and natural gas from unconventional sources. Operating across multiple high-yield basins, the organization has built its success on advanced technology, operational excellence, and continuous innovation. With 15,000 employees and more than 100 developers, the company relies heavily on modern software systems to drive production efficiency, manage data, and maintain operational performance across distributed environments. As part of its digital transformation journey, the company embraced containerization to modernize application delivery and infrastructure management. However, as container adoption grew across the enterprise, so did the complexity of managing Kubernetes and Docker environments at scale.
Challenge
Eliminating a Costly Internal Kubernetes Platform
The organization had five developers working for nearly two years building an internal Kubernetes management platform—essentially recreating functionality that already existed in the market. The cost of this internal effort was estimated at $1.7 million.
Despite the investment, the in-house solution required ongoing maintenance and continued development. The team recognized the need to replace this internally built UI and management layer with a purpose-built platform.
Accessibility and Usability at Scale
As container usage expanded to 15–20 Docker Swarm clusters and more than 300 containers, command-line management became increasingly impractical.
While managing five or ten nodes via CLI was feasible, scaling to 50 or more nodes introduced significant operational overhead. Developers and Information Systems personnel needed a simple way to gain visibility into the environment without relying on complex command-line tools.
Approximately 500 people across the organization were exposed to Docker and Portainer, making ease of use a critical requirement.
Security and SOX Compliance
With SOX compliance requirements in place, the organization needed stronger segregation of duties between developers and operations teams.
Developers required controlled access to deploy and update applications, while other teams needed troubleshooting capabilities without risking unauthorized changes. Role-Based Access Control (RBAC) became the deciding factor in selecting a container management platform.
Streamlining Operations Across Clusters
The organization was operating numerous swarm clusters and multiple Portainer instances across production and development environments. Access and management were fragmented.
They needed a single, consistent entry point to reduce confusion and simplify operations across environments.
Solution
Replacing the In-House Platform with Portainer
Portainer fully replaced the internally built Kubernetes management platform. Instead of maintaining a custom UI and orchestration layer, the organization adopted Portainer as a centralized container management solution across Docker Swarm and Kubernetes environments.
This eliminated the need for a dedicated development team maintaining internal tooling and immediately reduced operational complexity.
Single Pane of Glass Visibility
Portainer provided a unified dashboard where teams could quickly see cluster status, container health, network activity, and logs.
Instead of navigating individual clusters or relying on CLI commands, users now access a consistent web interface. This significantly improved visibility, troubleshooting speed, and user adoption across the enterprise.
Enterprise-Grade RBAC and Compliance Controls
Portainer’s Role-Based Access Control enabled the organization to enforce strict segregation of duties required for SOX compliance.
Developers could be restricted from modifying protected applications, while operations personnel could be granted troubleshooting access. This resolved a long-standing compliance challenge and provided confidence in governance controls.
Consolidated and Scalable Operations
By centralizing access to 15–20 swarm clusters and associated environments, Portainer eliminated confusion and created a standardized operational model.
As the organization scales toward managing 300+ Kubernetes nodes and hundreds of containers, Portainer provides the framework to maintain clarity, visibility, and control.
Managed Services Partnership
To further support scale and operational excellence, the organization engaged in a comprehensive managed services program. This covers up to 500 container host nodes and 100 clusters across production and non-production environments.
The partnership includes:
- 24/7 monitoring and incident response
- Change management
- DevOps support
- Disaster recovery planning
- High availability targets ranging from 97% to 99.99%
This allows the company to focus on its core energy operations while ensuring container infrastructure is continuously optimized, secured, and maintained.
Results
$1.7 Million in Developer Cost Savings
By replacing an internally built Kubernetes platform, Portainer eliminated the equivalent cost of five developers working for two years.
15–20% Potential Productivity Increase
Improved visibility, centralized logging, and simplified operations create measurable efficiency gains for development and operations teams.
Enterprise-Wide Adoption
- 15,000 employees
- 100+ developers
- 500 employees exposed to Docker and Portainer
- 300+ Docker containers managed
- 15–20 swarm clusters consolidated
- 300+ Kubernetes nodes planned for management
Improved Compliance and Governance
RBAC implementation resolved long-standing SOX compliance challenges by enforcing segregation of duties and controlled access.
Operational Simplicity at Scale
A single access point for container management reduced confusion, improved troubleshooting, and streamlined cluster operations across environments.
Strategic Impact
Portainer enabled this energy leader to transition from internally maintained tooling to an enterprise-ready, scalable platform. By eliminating redundant development, strengthening governance, and simplifying infrastructure management, the company accelerated its digital transformation while reducing costs and operational risk.
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