Standardizing Kong Gateway at Scale: Vanguard's Playbook

How a 3‑tier governance model with decK, Jinja2 templates, and GitHub Actions delivered 70% faster deployments across 400+ apps and $2.4M in savings.

Vanguard shares how they standardized Kong Gateway at enterprise scale using a 3-tier governance model, decK, Jinja2 templating, and GitHub Actions. The result: 70% faster deployments, $2.4M in annual savings, and 400+ apps onboarded.

Key takeaways:
- 3-tier governance: application, orchestration, and Kong governance layers
- decK + Jinja2 templates for centralized, reusable Kong configs
- GitHub Actions CI/CD pipeline for consistent, automated deployments
- OpenID Connect centralized (200+ fields) for simplified, secure setup
- Developer autonomy with enterprise controls (DevEx up, risk down)
- 90-day rollout plan: foundation, scale, optimize