Sam’s Club, as a division of Walmart, has strategically adopted a robust cloud-first approach, leveraging specific cloud platforms, services, and DevOps tooling to modernize its infrastructure, enhance member experiences, and drive operational efficiency. While detailed, proprietary specifics about their technology stack are not always publicly disclosed, available insights from industry reports, Walmart’s broader technology strategy, and Sam’s Club’s initiatives provide a clear picture of their cloud platforms, services, and tooling. Below is a detailed breakdown of these elements, focusing on specificity where possible.

Cloud Platforms

Sam’s Club primarily relies on a hybrid cloud model, integrating public cloud providers with private cloud infrastructure to balance scalability, cost, and control. The key platforms include:

1. Microsoft Azure:
   
   • Primary Public Cloud Provider: Sam’s Club, aligned with Walmart’s enterprise strategy, heavily utilizes Microsoft Azure as its primary public cloud platform. Approximately 80% of Sam’s Club’s technology stack runs on public cloud, with Azure hosting a significant portion of its workloads.
     
   • Use Cases: Azure supports critical systems such as e-commerce platforms (e.g., samsclub.com), membership management, warehouse management systems, and AI-driven analytics. For example, the migration of membership processes to a cloud-based Salesforce platform is likely hosted on Azure, given Walmart’s deep integration with Microsoft.
     
   • Rationale: Azure’s enterprise-grade security, global reach, and integration with Microsoft tools (e.g., Power BI, Azure DevOps) make it a natural fit for Sam’s Club’s scale and compliance needs.
     
2. Google Cloud Platform (GCP):
   
   • Complementary Public Cloud: Sam’s Club uses GCP for specific workloads, particularly those requiring advanced AI and machine learning capabilities. This aligns with Walmart’s multi-cloud strategy to leverage best-of-breed technologies.
     
   • Use Cases: GCP powers AI-driven tools like predictive demand forecasting for fresh food sales and computer vision applications, such as the Inventory Recognition as a Service system, which processes millions of images daily to monitor stock levels and pricing.
     
   • Rationale: GCP’s strengths in AI/ML, data analytics, and cost-effective compute options complement Azure’s enterprise capabilities, enabling Sam’s Club to optimize performance for specialized workloads.
     
3. Private Cloud (Walmart Cloud Native Platform – WCNP):
   
   • Custom Infrastructure: Sam’s Club, as part of Walmart, leverages the Walmart Cloud Native Platform (WCNP), a private cloud built on open-source technologies like OpenStack and Kubernetes. WCNP serves as the backbone for workloads requiring high control, security, or cost optimization.
     
   • Use Cases: WCNP hosts internal systems, legacy applications in transition, and sensitive data that must remain on-premises for compliance. It also supports hybrid scenarios where workloads shift between private and public clouds.
     
   • Rationale: The private cloud ensures Sam’s Club maintains sovereignty over critical data while benefiting from cloud-native scalability and flexibility.

Cloud Services

Sam’s Club utilizes a range of cloud services across compute, storage, analytics, AI, and application hosting to support its retail operations and member-facing innovations. Specific services include:

1. Compute and Containers:
   
   • Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS): Sam’s Club uses AKS to manage containerized applications, enabling scalable deployment of microservices for platforms like Scan and Go and e-commerce. Kubernetes is central to their cloud-native development approach.
     
   • Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE): For AI-heavy workloads, Sam’s Club may leverage GKE on GCP, benefiting from its integration with Google’s AI tools.
     
   • Virtual Machines: Azure Virtual Machines and GCP Compute Engine support legacy applications or workloads not yet containerized, ensuring flexibility during migration.
     
2. Storage and Databases:
   
   • Azure Blob Storage and GCP Cloud Storage: These services store large volumes of unstructured data, such as images for inventory recognition and member feedback data.
     
   • Azure Cosmos DB: A globally distributed, multi-model database used for real-time, high-performance applications like membership management and e-commerce transactions.
     
   • Google BigQuery: Leveraged for big data analytics, particularly for supply chain optimization and predictive analytics, enabling Sam’s Club to process petabytes of transactional and operational data.
     
3. AI and Machine Learning:
   
   • Azure Machine Learning: Used for building, training, and deploying machine learning models, such as those for personalized recommendations and demand forecasting.
     
   • Google Cloud AI Platform and Vertex AI: These power advanced AI applications, including computer vision for inventory management and natural language processing for member feedback analysis via tools like Medallia Experience Cloud.
     
   • Custom AI Models: Sam’s Club collaborates with Walmart’s AI teams to develop proprietary models, hosted on Azure or GCP, for tasks like optimizing fresh food inventory to reduce waste.
     
4. Analytics and Business Intelligence:
   
   • Azure Synapse Analytics: Provides integrated data warehousing and big data analytics for real-time insights into sales, inventory, and member behavior.
     
   • Google Looker Studio: Used for visualizing operational metrics and member feedback, complementing Azure’s Power BI for business intelligence dashboards.
     
   • Medallia Experience Cloud: A third-party SaaS platform, likely hosted on Azure, powers the Member Experience Voices (MxVoices) tool for real-time member feedback analysis.
     
5. Application Hosting and Integration:
   
   • Salesforce on Azure: Sam’s Club migrated its membership processes to Salesforce, hosted on Azure, for automated, scalable member management. This includes Salesforce CRM and custom applications for associate-member interactions.
     
   • Azure App Service: Hosts web and mobile applications, such as the Scan and Go app, ensuring high availability and scalability.
     
   • Azure API Management: Manages APIs for internal and external integrations, enabling seamless connectivity between e-commerce, mobile apps, and third-party services.
     
6. Networking and Security:
   
   • Azure Virtual Network and GCP VPC: Provide secure, isolated environments for workloads, ensuring compliance with retail data privacy standards.
     
   • Azure Active Directory: Manages identity and access control for employees and systems, ensuring secure access to cloud resources.
     
   • Azure Sentinel and Google Cloud Security Command Center: Offer advanced threat detection and response, critical for protecting member data and transactions.

DevOps Tooling

Sam’s Club’s DevOps approach emphasizes automation, continuous integration/continuous delivery (CI/CD), and cloud-native development to accelerate software delivery and ensure reliability. Specific tools and practices include:

1. CI/CD Pipelines:
   
   • Azure DevOps: The primary tool for CI/CD, enabling automated build, test, and deployment pipelines. Sam’s Club uses Azure Pipelines to deploy updates to e-commerce platforms, mobile apps, and internal systems.
     
   • GitHub Actions: Integrated with Azure and WCNP, GitHub Actions supports open-source and internal workflows, automating code testing and deployment for cloud-native applications.
     
   • Jenkins: Likely used in hybrid scenarios or for legacy systems, Jenkins automates CI/CD for workloads on WCNP or during cloud migration.
     
2. Version Control:
   
   • GitHub Enterprise: Sam’s Club, aligned with Walmart, uses GitHub Enterprise for version control, hosting repositories for microservices, AI models, and application code. GitHub’s integration with Azure DevOps streamlines development workflows.
     
3. Infrastructure as Code (IaC):
   
   • Terraform: Used to provision and manage cloud infrastructure across Azure, GCP, and WCNP. Terraform ensures consistent, repeatable deployments of resources like Kubernetes clusters and databases.
     
   • Azure Resource Manager (ARM) Templates: Specific to Azure, ARM templates automate infrastructure setup for compute, storage, and networking resources.
     
4. Container Orchestration:
   
   • Kubernetes: Central to Sam’s Club’s cloud-native strategy, Kubernetes (via AKS and GKE) orchestrates containerized applications, ensuring scalability and resilience for platforms like Scan and Go.
     
   • Helm: Used for packaging and deploying Kubernetes applications, simplifying complex deployments across hybrid clouds.
     
5. Monitoring and Observability:
   
   • Azure Monitor and Application Insights: Provide real-time monitoring of application performance, infrastructure health, and user interactions, critical for e-commerce and mobile apps.
     
   • Google Cloud Operations Suite: Complements Azure Monitor for GCP workloads, offering logging, monitoring, and alerting for AI and analytics applications.
     
   • Prometheus and Grafana: Likely used within WCNP or hybrid setups for monitoring Kubernetes clusters and visualizing metrics.
     
6. Development Frameworks:
   
   • Java and Spring Boot: Core frameworks for building high-performance, cloud-native applications, such as membership and e-commerce systems.
     
   • Node.js and React: Used for front-end development, particularly for the samsclub.com website and Scan and Go app.
     
   • Python: Powers AI/ML workloads, data pipelines, and scripting for automation tasks.
     
7. Testing and Quality Assurance:
   
   • Selenium and JUnit: Automate functional and unit testing for web and backend applications, ensuring reliability during rapid CI/CD cycles.
     
   • Chaos Engineering Tools: Tools like Gremlin or custom frameworks (aligned with Walmart’s practices) simulate failures to test system resilience, particularly for mission-critical systems.

Conclusion

Sam’s Club’s cloud and DevOps ecosystem is built on a hybrid cloud foundation, with Microsoft Azure as the primary public cloud, Google Cloud Platform for AI-driven workloads, and Walmart’s WCNP for private cloud needs. Specific services like AKS, Azure Cosmos DB, Google BigQuery, and Salesforce power critical applications, while DevOps tools like Azure DevOps, GitHub, Terraform, and Kubernetes enable rapid, reliable software delivery. This technology stack supports Sam’s Club’s member-driven strategy, delivering innovations like Scan and Go, AI-powered inventory management, and personalized membership experiences. For deeper technical details or proprietary insights, additional primary sources (e.g., Walmart tech blogs or Sam’s Club engineering talks) would be needed, as some specifics remain internal.