Secure Cloud Document Management System for a Global Investment Services Provider

About Our Client

The Client is a global provider of investment operations services serving leading institutional investment organizations worldwide.

Legacy Document Management System Created Inefficiencies

The Client relied on its SharePoint-based document management system (DMS) to manage service contracts, operational documentation, and reports. As the company’s business scaled up, the system started experiencing performance issues and was no longer able to handle increasingly complex document management processes. Plus, the system wasn’t designed to accommodate advanced collaboration features, which were required to drive higher employee productivity.

The Client decided to replace its DMS with a new solution that would provide all necessary automation and creative features for collaborative document management, as well as better scalability and security. The Client was seeking an experienced technology partner to handle DMS development end to end. ScienceSoft came across as a trustworthy investment IT vendor experienced in creating custom DMS.

End-to-End Development of an Investment DMS

ScienceSoft provided the Client with a team of a project manager, a business analyst, a solution architect, a UX/UI designer, a DevOps engineer, four full-stack developers, two manual testers, and a test automation engineer.

Laying the foundation for DMS development

ScienceSoft's business analyst discovered the Client’s document management workflows and held a number of interview sessions with the company’s stakeholders and investment operations experts to grasp their needs and elicit requirements for the DMS. As a result, the expert composed a detailed functional specification for the future solution and triaged features for implementation based on their value for the Client’s document workflows.

In collaboration with the business analyst, ScienceSoft’s solution architect vetted the required features for technical and economic feasibility. The architect proposed several secure options for the DMS architecture and tech stack and pointed out the one best fitting for the Client’s case. Given the growing complexity and collaborative nature of the company’s document management processes, our architect recommended building the DMS in the cloud to ensure the solution’s easy accessibility and scalability for future needs.

The Client wanted to enable smooth experiences for all DMS users from the onset, so ScienceSoft’s UX/UI designer joined the project at an early project stage. The designer analyzed the needs of focus user groups (business users, clients, system admins, etc.), mapped intuitive user journeys, and created UX wireframes for role-specific screens.

The resulting DMS concept laid the basis for development project planning. ScienceSoft’s project manager studied the expected deliverables, documented the task scope and required resources, and provided the Client with project cost and time estimates. The project manager also composed a pragmatic strategy to mitigate risks.

Agile development of a tailored investment DMS

ScienceSoft’s team handled the entire investment DMS development process, from establishing DevOps to back-end and UI development to quality assurance. ScienceSoft’s developers followed secure coding standards like OWASP ASVS to eliminate DMS vulnerability risks at the code level. The QA engineers ran the necessary testing procedures in parallel with coding so that developers could quickly fix the identified issues. The engineers also integrated the DMS with the Client’s internal systems (CRM and multiple source document systems). ScienceSoft is currently finalizing data migration from the previously used software to the new DMS.

The project workflow was organized following the Scrum methodology with 2-week sprints. The choice of the iterative model enabled frequent communication between the project stakeholders and secured swift and agile responses to changes.

If the Client’s stakeholders submitted a change request, ScienceSoft’s team evaluated the impact of both scenarios (implementing the change vs. rejecting it) and communicated the technical and economic implications to the Client. This approach allowed the team to address the Client’s emerging critical requirements while preventing scope creep, delays, and budget inflation.

As a result, the Client obtained an investment DMS with the following major features:

Document creation and management features

• Automated creation of multi-language digital documents.
• Support for multiple document formats: PDF, DOCX, XLSX, JPG, and more.
• Drag-and-drop document uploading and downloading (one by one and batch).
• Document review, modification, copying, sharing, and moving to other folders.
• Applying document metadata (ID, title, date, etc.) for indexing and search.

Collaborative features

• A separate digital space for the Client’s teams and clients to create, update, and review service documents.
• Document version control.
• Document-level comments.

Search and navigation features

• User dashboards showcasing the recently created and modified investment documents, documents pending review, etc.
• Multi-folder document hierarchies with customizable subfolders.
• Document search by metadata and via direct links.

Automation features

• Automated document importing from and exporting to the connected systems.
• Automated document versioning.
• Configurable notifications to users about document-related events (e.g., uploading, saving, approval status changes, etc.).
• User self-subscription to auto-notifications about document changes.

Security features

• Permission-based access to investment documents and document management functions (creation, editing, sharing, etc.).
• Multi-factor authentication (MFA).
• A complete log of user manipulations with documents.
• A full audit trail of user account activities within the DMS platform.
• Automated document retention and deletion according to corporate policies.
• Automated security checks for incoming and modified documents.
• Data backup and recovery.

Driving Efficient and Secure Investment Document Management

The Client received a proprietary DMS tailored to its collaborative document management workflows and business requirements. ScienceSoft’s professional advice on the optimal feature set, architecture, and tech stack for the DMS helped reduce development costs while ensuring the system met current and future needs. The project was delivered on time and within budget through effective change management, even as the Client’s priorities evolved during implementation.

With its cloud-first architecture, the DMS provides scalability and easy accessibility for users across the organization. Robust data protection features and secure coding practices applied by ScienceSoft’s engineers help safeguard sensitive information. The system's intuitive functionality, smooth performance, and ease of use position the Client's document management teams for higher productivity.

Technologies and Tools

.NET, Angular, TypeScript, Microsoft SQL Server, Azure, AWS, Terraform, Kubernetes, Docker, Nginx.