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Technology Magazine's September 2025 issue features Collectors Universe, the company behind Professional Sports Authenticator (PSA) and Professional Coin Grading Service (PCGS). The piece covers how the company scaled from processing tens of thousands of collectibles monthly to 2.5 million while working through a 14-million-item backlog.
The feature, titled "How Collectors Is Digitising the World of Collectibles," covers the company's shift from on-premise servers to cloud infrastructure powered by Tessell's database automation platform. Chief Technology Officer Dan Van Tran (DVT) explains how a three-person database team now handles work that would typically require thirty people, supporting over 100 million authenticated items while building AI features for their mobile app.
From Physical Servers to Cloud-Native Operations
Collectors Universe manages four decades of collectibles data - specifications and grading records dating back to the late 1800s. For years, this data lived on physical servers at company headquarters. For an industry now valued at approximately $400 billion worldwide, DVT knew this setup couldn't scale.
"We had to figure out how to make sure that if the power goes out, it doesn't affect all of our customers worldwide," DVT explains in the Technology Magazine feature. The stakes were clear: a single infrastructure failure could impact millions of collectors depending on PSA's authentication services and PCGS's coin grading expertise.
The solution began with migrating everything to AWS for elastic scale. But moving to the cloud was just the first step. The real challenge was managing millions of database records while enabling the company to innovate rapidly particularly as Collectors raced to build AI-powered tools for its mobile applications.
"Air Traffic Control for Your Databases"
This is where database automation became critical. With a small three-person DBA team managing complex, mission-critical databases, Collectors needed a way to eliminate maintenance overhead and focus on innovation. The company turned to Tessell for database automation that could handle backups, failovers, hot patching, and self-healing—all without constant human intervention.
DVT describes Tessell's impact with a vivid analogy: "Tessell is like air traffic control for your databases."
The platform's self-healing capabilities changed how the team operates. "If it detects an issue, it will determine what to do to fix it and try to fix it without having to involve a human," DVT notes in the feature. "This helps us to grow quickly without having to spend in a linear or exponential fashion, which allows us to then invest that into more customer-facing features or to grow the team."
The results: Collectors reduced database management costs by nearly 20% freeung up resources to reinvest in AI and machine learning development.
Enabling Innovation at Scale
The database automation created a multiplier effect on Collectors' technical team.
"Tessell allowed us to take our three-person database administration team and give them the superpowers of a 30-person team," DVT shares in the Technology Magazine interview.
This let the team build and iterate on customer-facing AI features without getting bottlenecked by database maintenance. Collectors launched the PSA mobile app with an AI-powered scanner that identifies cards instantly, pulling from decades of specifications and market data. What once took collectors minutes or hours to research now happens in seconds with a smartphone photo.
The app's adoption numbers: Coverage for trading card price estimates increased from 81% to 93% in less than six months. 79% of collectors who use the scanner would recommend it to friends.
"Transparency really has been key in us growing this hobby and increasing the number of collectors that we see come through our doors," DVT explains. "We're making collecting more accessible. It's no longer something you need to study for years to understand and enjoy."
Building for the Future
As Technology Magazine's feature details, Collectors is pursuing a three-part growth strategy: global expansion into Canada, the EU, and Asia-Pacific; becoming multi-asset by bringing PSA-level confidence to new collectible categories beyond sports cards; and rolling out more AI-driven intelligence features.
The database foundation that Tessell helps maintain supports all three priorities. With operational resilience handled through automation, Collectors' technical team can focus on building features for their growing community of collectors.
"Every time our AI accurately identifies a card, we help educate and lower the barrier for a new collector," DVT notes. "That openness brings people into the community and allows them to participate faster with more confidence."
