What’s Driving the Move from SRE to Platform Engineering?
Key Benefits of Platform Engineering
Cisco’s Move Toward Platform Engineering
How Bunnyshell Supports the Transition to Platform Engineering
Why You Should Care About Platform Engineering
Learn more
As technology evolves, so do the roles and strategies that drive software development and infrastructure management. One of the most significant shifts we’ve seen in recent years is the move from Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) to platform engineering. This change is reshaping how companies operate, from scaling their infrastructure to improving the developer experience. In this article, we’ll explore why this shift is happening, its key benefits, and how companies like Cisco are adopting platform engineering to stay ahead in the fast-paced tech world.
What’s Driving the Move from SRE to Platform Engineering?
SRE has been a crucial discipline for maintaining system reliability and reducing downtime, with a focus on optimizing infrastructure and ensuring that services remain stable. However, as companies grow and the demand for more frequent, faster releases increases, SRE alone has its limitations.
Enter platform engineering—a new approach that builds on the strengths of SRE but focuses more on creating self-service infrastructure for developers. The goal? To allow development teams to work independently of operations and infrastructure teams, which not only speeds up the release process but also frees engineers to focus on innovation instead of maintenance.
More and more companies are making this transition because platform engineering enables them to:
- Accelerate Development Cycles: With platform engineering, repetitive, manual tasks are automated, reducing the time it takes to deploy and scale applications.
- Enable Developer Self-Service: Engineers can use pre-built tools and workflows to manage their environments without needing to go through operational teams, removing bottlenecks.
- Focus on Higher-Value Work: By taking care of routine tasks automatically, developers can focus more on creating new features, improving product quality, and enhancing user experience.
Key Benefits of Platform Engineering
The transition from SRE to platform engineering offers several clear advantages that are reshaping the way engineering teams operate:
- Enhanced Developer Autonomy
One of the most critical benefits of platform engineering is that it gives developers the autonomy to manage their own infrastructure. Instead of waiting for SRE or DevOps teams to provision resources or handle deployments, developers can use self-service tools to get the job done themselves. This empowerment not only speeds up processes but also reduces frustration and burnout among teams. - Faster Time-to-Market
In today’s competitive environment, getting products to market quickly is more important than ever. By automating manual tasks like testing, deployment, and scaling, platform engineering enables faster release cycles. This agility allows companies to stay competitive by delivering new features and updates more rapidly. - Improved Scalability and Reliability
Platform engineering focuses on building scalable, resilient systems. By providing tools and infrastructure that can scale automatically based on demand, companies can ensure that their applications continue to perform well even as user traffic increases. - Streamlined Operations
With SRE, a lot of time is spent maintaining systems and fixing issues. Platform engineering shifts this focus by automating those routine tasks, meaning less time is spent on “firefighting” and more time on building and improving the platform.
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Cisco’s Move Toward Platform Engineering
A major indicator of the shift to platform engineering is Cisco’s recent transition from SRE to platform engineering. Cisco recognizes the need for scalability, autonomy, and operational efficiency, which is why it’s adopting a platform-as-a-product approach. This move enables their teams to streamline operations and reduce reliance on manual processes, allowing engineers to focus on delivering value to customers.
TL;DR: Cisco is transitioning from SRE to platform engineering to foster scalability and innovation. The move shifts focus toward building self-service capabilities, freeing up engineers to tackle higher-level challenges. Read more about Cisco’s transition here.
This shift highlights the broader industry trend of moving away from purely operational roles like SRE to more proactive, product-oriented strategies. It’s not just about keeping systems running anymore—it’s about building systems that enable innovation and can scale effortlessly.
How Bunnyshell Supports the Transition to Platform Engineering
At Bunnyshell, we’re all about accelerating developer productivity and enabling platform engineering with Environments-as-a-Service (EaaS). Our platform provides automated ephemeral environments for every pull request, helping developers deploy, test, and stage code effortlessly. This shift is key for companies transitioning from SRE to platform engineering.
With Bunnyshell’s Internal Developer Platform, teams can focus on delivering high-quality code faster. Developers enjoy self-service capabilities that allow them to spin up environments in seconds, empowering them to work independently without waiting on DevOps teams.
Here’s how Bunnyshell aligns with platform engineering:
- Automated Ephemeral Environments
Every pull request gets a fresh, isolated environment automatically—meaning you can test, debug, or demo without impacting production. This drastically reduces the risk of integration issues and speeds up feedback loops. - Environment Consistency with GitOps
By integrating GitOps principles, we enable standardized, reproducible environments. Your development, testing, and production environments remain consistent, ensuring fewer errors and smoother deployments. - Self-Service Development
Developers no longer need to rely on infrastructure teams to provision resources. With our self-service catalog, they can deploy full-stack environments in just a few clicks, reducing delays and boosting efficiency. - Cloud-Native Development
Bunnyshell offers remote development environments that allow developers to write and test code directly in cloud environments. This means you can work from anywhere without worrying about local setups or infrastructure issues. - Cost-Efficiency
Our pay-as-you-go model optimizes resource usage by automating the creation and teardown of environments. You no longer have to worry about the costs associated with long-running, idle environments.
In short, Bunnyshell enables companies to adopt platform engineering smoothly by providing the tools and automation required for faster releases, scalable infrastructure, and developer autonomy. We help teams shift away from traditional, manual processes, allowing them to focus on innovation rather than maintenance.
Why You Should Care About Platform Engineering
your organization is struggling to scale or your developers are bogged down by operational tasks, platform engineering could be the solution. The benefits are clear: faster development cycles, reduced bottlenecks, and scalable, resilient systems that keep your business competitive.
Platform engineering isn’t just a trend—it’s a strategic shift that’s transforming how companies build and manage their infrastructure. By adopting a platform-as-a-product mindset, companies can not only improve operational efficiency but also unlock the full potential of their development teams.
Are you ready to make the shift? Let’s talk! At Bunnyshell, we’re here to help you navigate the transition to platform engineering, providing the tools and expertise needed to succeed in today’s fast-paced tech world.
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Learn more
1. Platform Engineering Layers: The Role of an Internal Developer Platform
TL;DR: This webinar dives into the critical components of platform engineering and the importance of internal developer platforms (IDPs) in enhancing scalability, automation, and developer experience.
2. How Stripe Approaches Platform Engineering
TL;DR: In this webinar, Stripe shares insights into their platform engineering strategies, focusing on how they build and maintain efficient, scalable infrastructure that supports rapid development and innovation.