At a glance
Client | An enterprise client in the financial services sector in the DACH region with a mobile advisory and field sales team |
Scope | A Java/JSF-based back-office sales application that controls campaigns, adviser configurations, commission rules, approval workflows and mobile app configuration |
Analysed Codebase | ~190,000 lines of Java in ~1,150 source files; 118 JSF Views; 62 Backing/Managed Beans |
Integration surface | 11 back-end integrations (CRM, finance, identity, reporting, document management, mobile app configuration); 7 batch and scheduler jobs |
User base | ~750 back-office users (including sales, operations, finance, compliance, regional administration and support); ~12,000 mobile field sales users indirectly affected |
Method | 7P Legacy Fast Check: Scan. Score. Strategize. |
Tools | 25 automated analysis tools, an AI pipeline, expert walkthroughs and coding agent walkthroughs |
Time-to-Verdict | Scans in hours; full assessment delivered in approximately three weeks |
Deliverables | As-is state report assessment, prioritised top 10 list, JSF-to-Jakarta migration assessment, traceability map for commission rules, UI complexity and backing bean inventory, mobile configuration compatibility matrix, strategic evolution roadmap and service takeover checklist |
The company
The client is a financial services provider in the DACH region that employs a mobile advisory and field sales force. Around 750 back-office users worked directly with the application, while approximately 12,000 field sales staff were indirectly affected by its settings and approvals. The back office system was critical to the business, directly impacting operational processes and sensitive technical decisions.
The initial situation
The application was created between 2014 and 2016 as a pragmatic, JSF-based administration interface. It was a suitable solution for the requirements at the time. However, over time, new products, additional roles, regional specifics, campaign logic and other requirements were added. More and more rules, exceptions and special operational cases were incorporated into the application as this was the most logical place for them.
At the same time, the environment changed. Knowledge of technical interdependencies became increasingly concentrated among a few individuals while changes to the system became less frequent. While the business departments continued to work with the existing interfaces, uncertainty grew within IT about the impact of any adjustments. In particular, during campaign cycles, approvals and month-end closings, there was no reliable basis for assessing risks and future developments meaningfully.
Therefore, before the client could invest in stabilisation or modernisation, answers to the following key questions were needed:
- Where are the greatest technical and business risks?
- Which issues need to be addressed in the short term?
- Which evolution paths are realistic from technical, organisational and economic perspectives?
The solution
7P did not view the application as merely a legacy technical system, but rather as a business-critical back office with direct relevance to operational procedures and technically sensitive rules. To this end, automated code and security analyses, AI-supported evaluations and expert reviews were combined.
These quickly provided a reliable overall picture of the technical quality, architectural state, rule location and operational readiness.
The decisive factor was not just the identification of individual weaknesses.
The ‘Legacy Fast Check’ was designed to convert numerous technical and business findings into a decision-making basis suitable for management.
The Legacy Fast Check followed a three-step process:
- Scan: Analysis of the codebase, architecture, security posture and business-critical rule areas.
- Score: Evaluation of the findings with regard to risk, maintainability and future viability.
- Strategise: Development of concrete action plans for stabilisation, further development and modernisation.
The full assessment was delivered within approximately three weeks.
Sebastian Grundhöfer
Senior Solution Engineer
Voice from the project
'The Fast Check clarified which risks affect financial correctness and which are primarily technical problems. This enabled the board-level discussion to be truly well-founded.’
The result
The Fast Check revealed that the back office was still fulfilling its business function, but its technical and structural foundation had lost resilience over the years. Many of these weaknesses had a direct impact on the system’s changeability, traceability, and business reliability.
Location of business-critical rules
Business-critical rules were not clearly anchored in one place. The business logic for commissions, approvals and configurations was spread across different parts of the application. This made it increasingly difficult to safely contain changes and reliably estimate their effects in advance.
Architectural and technological limitations
At the same time, it became apparent that the structure of the application had grown significantly. While the existing JSF stack was still viable for ongoing operations, it was becoming increasingly challenging to make changes and take steps towards modernisation. A possible migration path towards Jakarta was also significantly more complex than it seemed from the outside.
Operational and audit perspective
The analysis revealed that, in the long term, the technical traceability and reliable operational mechanisms were not consistently in place to the extent necessary for a business-critical system in a regulated environment.
What the client received
As-is state report | Transparent assessment of architecture, maintainability, and security |
Top 10 immediate actions | Prioritised improvements with a high impact |
Strategic evolution roadmap | Seven assessed modernisation options |
Traceability map | Transparent business-critical commission logic |
Service takeover | Basis for a quick operational takeover |
Dashboard | Interactive evaluation of all analysis results |
The decision the client can now confidently make
With the help of the ‘Legacy Fast Check’, the next sensible measures could be determined. Rather than continuing to discuss the future of the back office in fundamental terms, it was now possible to reliably assess where short-term action was needed and where gradual further development would suffice. At the same time, the issues that needed to be clarified before a major investment became apparent.
Would you like this result for your system?
The Legacy Fast Check offers reliable external insights, including structured scores, a comprehensive risk register and prioritised recommendations for action. Act now!
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