Kai Waehner

378 posts
bridging the gap between technical innovation and business value for real-time data streaming, processing and analytics
How Data Streaming with Apache Kafka and Flink Powers AI and Autonomous Networks in the Telecom Industry
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  • 8 minute read

How Data Streaming Powers AI and Autonomous Networks in Telecom – Insights from TM Forum Innovate Americas

AI and autonomous networks took center stage at TM Forum Innovate Americas 2025 in Dallas. Leaders from AT&T, Verizon, and other telcos showed how large-scale AI is transforming customer experience, security, and network operations, while the vision of self-optimizing networks moves closer to reality. At the heart of these advances lies data streaming: real-time, governed data flows that connect OSS/BSS, feed AI with fresh context, and enable automation at scale. This article captures the key insights from the event and explains why data streaming is becoming the central nervous system of modern telecoms.
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Telecom OSS Modernization with Data Streaming using Apache Kafka and Flink for Cloud-Native BSS and OTT Integration
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  • 7 minute read

Telecom OSS Modernization with Data Streaming: From Legacy Burden to Cloud-Native Agility

OSS is critical for service delivery in telecom, yet legacy platforms have become rigid and costly. They slow innovation just as 5G, cloud native networks and OTT partnerships demand agility. This article explores how a data streaming platform with Apache Kafka and Flink helps telcos modernize OSS step by step, cut costs, accelerate time to market and turn OSS into the real time backbone for AI and event driven operations.
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Amazon MSK Forces a Kafka Cluster Migration from ZooKeeper to KRaft
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  • 3 minute read

Amazon MSK Forces a Kafka Cluster Migration from ZooKeeper to KRaft

The Apache Kafka community introduced KIP-500 to remove ZooKeeper and replace it with KRaft, a built-in consensus layer that simplifies operations, improves scalability, and reduces complexity. Kafka itself supports smooth, zero downtime migrations from ZooKeeper to KRaft, even for large, mission critical clusters. But Amazon MSK does not. Instead, MSK forces users to perform a disruptive full migration to a new cluster. This article explores the challenges of MSK’s approach, highlights the risks for client applications, and outlines key evaluation criteria and recommendations for choosing the right data streaming platform in a rapidly evolving ecosystem.
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Connected Car Vehicle API and Data Streaming with Apache Kafka and Flink in the Automotive Industry
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  • 7 minute read

Streaming the Automotive Future: Real-Time Infrastructure for Vehicle Data

Connected vehicles are transforming the automotive industry into a software-driven, data-centric ecosystem. While APIs provide access to critical vehicle data, they fall short when it comes to real-time intelligence and scalability. This post explores how data streaming with Apache Kafka and Apache Flink turns raw API responses into reusable, governed data products that support real-time operations, analytics, and innovation. Learn how industry leaders are combining APIs and event streaming to build modern automotive platforms -where real-time data becomes a strategic asset.
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Global Payment Processor Built with Data Streaming using Apache Kafka at Stripe Paypal Payoneer Worldline
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  • 10 minute read

How Global Payment Processors like Stripe and PayPal Use Data Streaming to Scale

This blog post explores how leading payment processors like Stripe, PayPal, Payoneer, and Worldline are leveraging data streaming with Apache Kafka to power real-time, scalable, and secure financial systems. As the industry shifts from batch processing to event-driven architecture, data streaming has become essential for handling transactions, fraud detection, compliance, and embedded services. The post highlights why Kafka is at the core of modern payment infrastructure – and how it enables innovation, resilience, and operational agility in the evolving fintech landscape.
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The Future of Data Streaming with Apache Flink for Agentic AI Supporting A2A and MCP
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  • 8 minute read

The Future of Data Streaming with Apache Flink for Agentic AI

Agentic AI is moving into production. Autonomous, tool-using, goal-driven systems that need real-time data and context. Apache Kafka and Flink provide the event-driven foundation to run these agents at scale. With the new Flink Agents project (FLIP-531), Flink will natively support long-running, system-triggered AI agents integrated with LLMs, tools, and emerging protocols like MCP and A2A. This marks a major step toward reliable, enterprise-grade Agentic AI.
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The Rise of Diskless Apache Kafka with Object Storage and No Brokers
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  • 8 minute read

The Rise of Diskless Kafka: Rethinking Brokers, Storage, and the Kafka Protocol

Apache Kafka has evolved from a data lake pipeline into the backbone of real-time transactional systems. The shift from broker-based storage to Tiered Storage and now to Diskless Kafka using cloud object storage redefines Kafka’s role. This blog explores the business value, technical architecture, and use cases of running Kafka without brokers, using the Kafka protocol as the foundation for scalable, cost-efficient event streaming.
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Synchronous Multi-Region Replication with Apache Kafka Confluent WarpStream for Zero Data Loss Disaster Recovery
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Multi-Region Kafka using Synchronous Replication for Disaster Recovery with Zero Data Loss (RPO=0)

Apache Kafka is the backbone of real-time data streaming. Choosing the right deployment model – self-managed, fully managed, or bring-your-own-cloud (BYOC) – is a strategic decision. It affects performance, compliance, and cost. This article explains the most common Kafka deployment strategies and highlights the innovation of synchronous multi-region replication to achieve zero data loss (RPO=0). Alternatives like stretched Kafka clusters, Confluent Multi-Region Clusters (MRC), and WarpStream offer different paths to RPO=0. They support critical workloads with strong durability and high availability. For mission critical and regulated use cases, zero data loss is no longer a future goal. It is now achievable with the right architecture.
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Data Streaming and AI in the Automotive Industry at OEMs like Porsche Tesla BMW
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  • 13 minute read

Driving the Future: How Real-Time Data Streaming Is Powering Automotive Innovation

The automotive industry is rapidly shifting toward a software-defined, data-driven future. Real-time technologies like Apache Kafka and Apache Flink are now critical to powering connected vehicles, smart factories, autonomous platforms, and personalized mobility services. This blog explores how leading OEMs and suppliers use data streaming to drive digital transformation – from edge processing and AI to predictive maintenance and customer experience. As the industry moves toward intelligent, adaptive systems, event-driven architecture becomes a strategic foundation.
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