Case Studies
Case study

Modernizing Insurance Application: Vaadin and Java for Smooth Transformation

Sharing best practices of development engineering
while fixing and renewing an insurance application
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About the project

  • Client
    HDI Group
  • Industry
    Insurance
  • Ongoing Partnership
    since 2021
  • Methodology
    Scrum

 

Reversed engineering for a complex business-critical application with the support of Java and two teams of extremely talented IT professionals.

Teamwork at its finest to rewrite and future-proof a strategic application.

Challenges

HDI relies on its Policy application, which was developed in 2009, to manage intricate contracts, draft policy documents, and issue invoices for its corporate customers.

The outdated application was impeding business operations and HDI sought a modern Java-based solution that could thrive in the cloud. To achieve this goal, HDI was seeking a strategic partner to support them in the endeavor.

HDI’s Policy application has a complex architecture consisting of three tiers, with the backend containing the entire business logic and the front-end using an Eclipse RCP (SWT) client with 420,000 lines of code for managing the UI.

Previously, changes could only be deployed every two months, hampering the development team’s productivity. Bug fixes in the UI were not deployable on demand, leading to severe limitations in the application’s functionality.

To enhance its business-critical application, HDI chose to rewrite and modernize the Policy for faster development updates. For such an ambitious undertaking, they needed a close-knit team of developers to support them.

Scope & Highlights

Transformation of app views

Migration to modern technologies

cloud-disaster-recovery-scalability

Nearly 50% code reduction

Digital Product Design Benefits

2 Teams working together

Automated testing

1 Web application

checkbox

Bi-weekly updates

Modern UI

Our solution

  • Hicron provided the experts in the field and selected Vaadin as the main technology for implementation.
  • 2 teams worked together: one dedicated to front-end technology transformation from Eclipse RCP to Vaadin, and the other to development on the business side.
  • We launched high-quality software, which allowed us to do everything on the web without having a separate desktop application.
  • We worked in Scrum. We hired extra testers to work better during the development phase through our Quality Assurance process.
  • Thanks to continuing the app development in pure Java, HDI were able to reuse all of its current business objects, data containers, and more.
  • To provide further new functionalities, the old Java code was refactored and upgraded to Java 8.

Outcomes

Jakosc

High software quality and smaller number of reported bugs.

quality assurance testing

No additional costs due to the fact of not having to upload everything to new devices. 

legacy update

Much faster time-to-market and bug fixing.

Thumb up

Efficient automated testing.

automated software testing Hicron Software House

Modern UI, & quick implementation of changes – 2 weeks instead of initial 3 months

digital-product-design

Thanks to the introduction of modern technologies we simplified HDI’s application – from 450,000 lines of code down to 250,000!

Technologies we used

Vaadin, Mockito, JUnit4, TestBench, RCP, Java8, Oracle DB, Eclipse RCP, SWT, JPA, IBM Websphere, Maven, H2 DB, Camunda BPM S, plunk

Testimonials

What our partners say about us

After carefully evaluating suppliers, we decided to try a new approach and start working with a near-shore software house. Cooperation with Hicron Software House was something different, and it turned out to be a great success that brought added value to our company.

With HICRON’s creative ideas and fresh perspective, we reached a new level of our core platform and achieved our business goals.

Many thanks for what you did so far; we are looking forward to more in future!

hdi logo
Jan-Henrik Schulze
Head of Industrial Lines Development at HDI Group

Hicron is a partner who has provided excellent software development services. Their talented software engineers have a strong focus on collaboration and quality. They have helped us in achieving our goals across our cloud platforms at a good pace, without compromising on the quality of our services. Our partnership is professional and solution-focused!

NBS logo
Phil Scott
Director of Software Delivery at NBS

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