Company Overview
The client is an Internet startup based in Atlanta, GA. Their focus is providing electronic receipts in place of paper receipts. The client's customers are retail stores and their solution allows consumers to store, sort, and retrieve their receipts electronically, thus reducing the retail stores' paper waste and reducing the retailers cost of operations.
Business Challenge
There were multiple integration points because several vendors were working on different technologies such as point of sales systems, database systems, and messaging systems. The client needed a site that was scalable in the near term and could be gradually upgraded to future Java EE environments such as a portal environment. They had very specific requirements for the web site look and feel, and needed a robust data management solution to grow with their business. The site needed to be very secure and scalable.
Solution
Strongback Consulting integrated the existing backing POS and receipt storage technology using several IBM tools and established an architectural plan for future growth by selecting stable, scalable Java frameworks. Receipt images that were stored in a Lotus Domino database were moved to DB2 using Lotus Enterprise Integrator. Consumers were able to sign up for accounts and securely retrieve their historical receipt data. The site was also a relaunch of the customer's primary corporate website which included areas for press releases, careers, and contact information. The site was built with full accesibility in mind. It is viewable in all browers including IE 6, Firefox, Opera, Safari, Google Chrome, and even mobile web browsers such as the Apple iPhone, Blackberry, and Palm OS.
Results
In less than 3 months from the start, the client was able to launch their product into production and begin a positive revenue stream. This allowed them to begin planning future designs, reimburse existing investors and also help lure more venture capital for future expansion. The site is green certified from CO2 Stats.
Technologies Used
- Apache Tomcat and HTTP Server
- Apache Struts2 Framework
- Hibernate Framework
- Spring Framework
- IBM Lotus Enterprise Integrator
- IBM Lotus Domino
- IBM DB2 Enterprise
- Novell OpenSuSE
- Rational Software Architect
- Rational Team Concert