upgrade to microservices using Golang and Temporal

Orchestration

microservices

architecture

golang

expertise

Services

Custom Software Development, Legacy Modernization, Temporal Consulting

Industries

Business Automation, E-Commerce, Retail

Technologies

Angular, AWS EC2, DynamoDB, Elasticsearch, Golang, Lambda, Nomad, RDS (Aurora), Temporal

Converting a Legacy PHP Monolithic Application

About The Project

Inturn has built a unique platform that allows businesses to connect with a global network of buyers, and easily discover new products, get real-time data, and access various tools to help them make informed business decisions. But with their rapid growth and transformation from a startup to an enterprise business, they were facing some roadblocks around building their technical team and software.

That’s where we came in! The Inturn team reached out to us with a specific goal in mind after they were referred to us by another happy client: they wanted to rewrite their PHP Monolith application to a microservice architecture, to ensure that it could handle their growing user base and continue to develop new features and functionalities. We were more than happy to help them out. After defining the challenge Inturn had around converting monolithic applications to microservices, we recognized the potential for Temporal’s workflow automation to streamline their transformation and suggested it as a solution for converting legacy to microservices.

Objectives

Migrate from a monolithic PHP architecture to microservices for better scalability.
Introduce Golang as the new backend language for enhanced performance.
Implement Temporal’s workflow automation to manage complex processes and stateful execution.
Assemble a high-performing engineering team to support long-term development.

Challenges

Solutions

Challenges

Monolithic Architecture Slowing Down Development

During Inturn’s growth phase, the move from a monolithic to a microservice architecture demanded a robust solution for managing their complex workflows. The existing PHP-based monolith was tightly coupled, making it difficult to scale individual components or introduce new features without affecting the entire system. They weren’t taking advantage of Temporal’s capability to handle long-running, reliable processes became a pivotal component of the strategy.

Solutions

Leveraging Golang for Scalable Microservices

We updated Inturn’s legacy PHP monolithic application into multiple microservices using Golang. This transition leveraged Golang’s performance and scalability, making it easier to build and maintain microservices, thus effectively managing complex workflows. It also allowed Inturn to scale individual services independently without disrupting the platform.

Challenges

Lack of Workflow Orchestration & State Management

Transitioning to microservices introduced new complexities—ensuring that processes remained synchronized and stateful interactions didn’t cause failures.

Solutions

Higher Orchestration and Management

Our Temporal experts implemented Temporal’s workflow orchestration, enabling fault-tolerant, scalable microservices that could maintain state across long-running processes and retry failed operations automatically.

Challenges

Rapid Hiring & Team Scaling for Development

The company experienced significant growth within a short period, leading to operational challenges, technical debt, and an overwhelming workload. Rewriting the PHP Monolith application to a microservice architecture and introducing Golang into the tech stack were key objectives to address these issues. Inturn needed an experienced engineering team to execute the transition without slowing down their existing operations.

Solutions

We Scaled their Team Up

Spiral Scout quickly staffed a team of 12 backend engineers with expertise in Golang, Temporal, and microservices architecture, ensuring a smooth and efficient transition. The introduction of this new team allowed Inturn to scale their development architecture efficiently. This also addressed the operational challenges and technical debt by guaranteeing that the team could handle increased workloads and user demands.

Challenges

Testing & Validation of the New System

The client aimed to re-architect the application to ensure scalability, maintainability, and the ability to handle a growing user base but needed this to be fully tested. They needed to select the best tool set and tech stack for the re-architecture and assist with developing and testing new features.

Solutions

Established an Automation Team for Testing

We established a 5-member automation QA team, led by senior engineers, to create a comprehensive testing framework that validated microservices functionality, performance, and reliability.

Our microservices strategy

Overview of the critical steps that shaped the project’s conversion to microservices and addressed its key challenges.

Leveraging Golang & Temporal for Microservices Communication

Simply replacing PHP with Golang wasn’t enough—we integrated Temporal’s workflow engine to ensure reliable inter-service communication. This approach allowed microservices to function independently while seamlessly managing long-running operations.

Collaborative Evaluation & Architecture Design

Our team worked closely with Inturn’s leadership to evaluate available toolsets, select the most efficient microservices framework, and map out a phased migration strategy that minimized risk and downtime.

Building a High-Performance Engineering Team

The Inturn team aimed to start development quickly, requiring a team of Golang and PHP engineers. We swiftly staffed their team with engineers knowledgeable in Temporal and engaged our HR team to recruit these highly skilled engineers. We built a team of 12 backend engineers and after presenting an automation test plan and selecting the most suitable automation testing framework, we established a 5-member Automation QA team, led by two exceptional automation engineers.

Results & Impact

The integration of Temporal and successful migration to microservices provided Inturn with a scalable, high-performance system that could handle increased traffic and onboard more Fortune 500 retailers. Temporal’s workflow orchestration eliminated state management issues, allowing for seamless execution of distributed processes.

As a trusted technology partner, Spiral Scout didn’t just execute the migration—we provided strategic guidance, architectural recommendations, and a long-term vision for Inturn’s evolving platform.

KEY OUTCOMES

Successfully staffed the project with senior engineers who brought experience and enthusiasm, allowing them to make proactive recommendations about architectural solutions and technical approaches.
Scalable microservices architecture capable of handling high user traffic.
Seamless Temporal integration for workflow automation and state management.
50% faster feature deployment, improving agility and product development cycles.