Under Armour designs smarter testing, faster sites

The challenge

Strategic testing transformation

Under Armour faced three essential challenges in evolving its testing capabilities that required a comprehensive approach to infrastructure, reporting, and process optimization. Building a testing infrastructure was the first step, which included implementing an in-house performance and load-testing framework that could run both on-premises and in the cloud. In addition, to ensure performance and load testing on any project at any time, it was necessary to create flexible testing capabilities for simulating different load-testing scenarios and customer traffic volumes. 

The next layer of the challenge was focused on improving reporting and visibility. By optimizing the vendor’s existing format and implementing web-based reporting with advanced export capabilities, Under Armour sought to transform its reporting system. The ultimate goal was to develop robust trend and baseline tracking to illuminate performance insights and design intelligent reporting layers with granular investigation options for managers and technical teams.

The final part was dedicated to overall testing optimization by making web performance testing possible during each release, preparing e-commerce platforms for the end-of-year holiday period, reducing costs, and removing schedule restrictions that were imposed by the previous vendor.

The approach

From traffic bottlenecks and data complexity to clarity and peak performance

Network session timeouts occurred when the volume of customer traffic surged, such as during Black Friday sales. To prevent this, Under Armour enhanced the capacity of traffic the server could handle. Increasing the maximum number of concurrent network sessions that the server could handle ensured that customer requests during peak times were processed without any interruption or delay. The software of the traffic-generating server played a key role in this—it enabled Under Armour to maintain a seamless customer experience during peak sales periods and prevented any revenue loss due to network downtime.

As the data presentation was different from what was stipulated in the previous vendor’s reports, it led to confusion and made it difficult for Under Armour’s team to analyze and interpret the data. To ensure that the data was presented clearly and consistently, Under Armour reviewed and adopted a new reporting format. This helped improve the accuracy and reliability of the data and made it much easier for stakeholders to understand and use the information. By adopting a standardized reporting format, Under Armour was able to ensure that data was presented consistently across all different departments and teams, making it easier to track progress and make informed decisions.

The outcome

Stability and speed with a holistic approach

By addressing these challenges holistically, Under Armour created a more agile, efficient, and comprehensive testing approach that could support its rapid growth and complex digital ecosystem.

Running internally and without any 3rd party high-load testing resulted in cost savings and more control over the testing process. Expanded performance and load testing to OIS, OCAPI, UACAPI, PWA-UK, and Ecomm Sites (US, UK, CA & JP) enabled the identification and repair of performance issues across various systems and geographies.

As new tests were run and additional sites were added, Under Armour immediately was able to save costs which helped reduce the reliance on external vendors. Quarterly load testing was made possible for almost all projects, and this was a key step in identifying and fixing issues early, resulting in improved overall performance.

Weekly website performance monitoring helped identify any issues early on for corrective actions to be taken. Tracking low performance and assigning issues to the development team in a timely manner resulted in quicker problem resolution times and improved website performance.