Irish retail chain modernizing legacy systems with cloud-native data infrastructure
Dunnes Stores is a 10,000+ person retail operation actively migrating from mainframe (AS/400) and Oracle monoliths toward Microsoft cloud (Fabric, Synapse, Data Factory). The hiring surge in infrastructure, security, and data roles—concentrated at senior and lead levels—reflects a major platform modernization effort. Active projects span cloud security posture management, enterprise data platform build, and regulatory automation, while pain points center on legacy system modernization and cost performance—a classic large-retailer infrastructure refactor.
Notable leadership hires: Infrastructure Head, Head of Infrastructure
Dunnes Stores is Ireland's largest privately held retailer, operating across fashion, homewares, and grocery with over 10,000 employees. The company sells directly to consumers through physical and digital channels, competing on value and product quality. Operationally, they span supply chain, buying, HR, and finance functions at scale. Tech-wise, the business still runs on mature on-premise systems (AS/400, Oracle EBS, Oracle HCM) but is in active transition to Microsoft Azure for analytics and data warehousing.
Dunnes runs Oracle EBS (financials), AS/400 (legacy core), Oracle HCM Cloud (HR), and is transitioning to Microsoft Fabric, Azure Synapse, and Azure Data Factory for analytics and data platforms. They use Power BI for reporting and Google Analytics for web properties.
Key initiatives include a new enterprise data platform, cloud security posture management, modernization of legacy systems, tax automation, regulatory compliance automation, and data-led decision-making frameworks. All point toward cloud migration and operational modernization.
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